State v. Goode

• Decision Date: 09 April 1999
• Docket Number: No. 40A98.,40A98.
• Citation: 512 S.E.2d 414,350 N.C. 247
• Parties: STATE of North Carolina v. William Christopher GOODE.
• Court: North Carolina Supreme Court

512 S.E.2d 414

350 N.C. 247

STATE of North Carolina v. William Christopher GOODE.

No. 40A98.

Supreme Court of North Carolina.

April 9, 1999.

Michael F. Easley, Attorney General, by Teresa L. Harris, Assistant Attorney General, for the State.

Staton, Perkinson, Doster, Post, Silverman, Adcock & Boone, P.A., by Jonathan Silverman, Sanford, for defendant-appellant.

PARKER, Justice.

Defendant William Christopher Goode was indicted on 30 March 1992 for first-degree murder in the killing of victim Margaret Batten and for first-degree murder and robbery with a dangerous weapon in the killing and robbery of victim Leon Batten. His first capital trial resulted in a mistrial. He was tried capitally a second time, and the jury found him guilty of two counts of aiding and abetting first-degree murder and one count of aiding and abetting robbery with a dangerous weapon. Following a capital sentencing proceeding, the jury recommended a sentence of life imprisonment with respect to the first-degree murders, and the trial court entered judgment accordingly. On the robbery with a dangerous weapon conviction, the trial court sentenced defendant to a consecutive sentence of fourteen years' imprisonment. For the reasons discussed herein, we conclude that defendant's trial was free from prejudicial error.

The evidence presented at trial tended to show that on the evening of Saturday, 29 February 1992, defendant and his older brother, George Goode, went out driving in George's wife's car with two friends, Eugene DeCastro and Glenn Troublefield. At one point, George and DeCastro got out of the car and robbed a man named Lamont Wiggins of a gold chain and a Champion jacket. Back behind the wheel, George started driving wildly and "playing chicken" with oncoming traffic; eventually, he lost control and drove the car into a ditch. After some men helped them pull the car out of the ditch, defendant and the others went to a store and bought wine. While driving again, George began taking his hands off the wheel and dancing to music; again he lost control of the car and drove into a ditch. This time the four could not move the car out of the ditch; so they left it there. Troublefield left the others at this point, walking or running down the road. The other three went on foot a short distance through some fields to George's mobile home in the Dallas Mobile Home Park in Bentonville.

A neighbor who saw the car in the ditch went to George's mobile home and asked if everyone was all right. Shortly after the neighbor left, Leon Batten, George's landlord, happened to drive up in his tan Toyota pickup to ask about unpaid rent that was due. Batten had gone by earlier in the day and had left a note on the door about the rent. George, DeCastro, and defendant went outside with Batten; and Batten and George began discussing or arguing about the rent. When Batten turned around, DeCastro struck him with his fist in the back of the head, staggering him; George joined in, beating and kicking Batten. A short while after this assault began, DeCastro went inside the mobile home, momentarily leaving George fighting with Batten alone. The two were rolling around on the ground. Although George was in the United States Marine Corps and Batten appeared to defendant to be in his fifties, defendant testified that, at one point, Batten was "getting the best of my brother"; so defendant kicked Batten, thereby allowing his brother to get up off of the ground. Batten came up to his knees. At this point DeCastro came out of the mobile home with a nine-inch long butcher knife and began stabbing Batten. George also began stabbing Batten, but defendant could not see what weapon George was using. Defendant was standing six to seven feet away while George and DeCastro stabbed Batten to death.

The medical examiner found, in addition to multiple bruises, abrasions, and stab wounds on the body, neck, and head, a large stab wound in the middle of Mr. Batten's chest which fractured the left fourth and fifth ribs and cut through the heart and lower portion of the right lung. This wound which caused bleeding within the pericardial sac and in both chest cavities was the probable cause of death with the injuries to the head serving a contributing role.

Margaret Batten, Leon Batten's wife, had been told by a neighbor that there was a fight in the trailer park; and she immediately got in her car and drove there, pulling up beside her husband's truck at George's mobile home. DeCastro said, "I got to take her out too." Mrs. Batten got out and began walking toward Mr. Batten's prostrate body. DeCastro threw her to the ground by her neck; kicked her; and stabbed her for two or three minutes, ultimately killing her, while defendant stood ten feet away. The autopsy revealed twelve closely spaced stab wounds in the middle of Mrs. Batten's chest, three of which went completely through the heart and eleven of which went through the lungs. There were also stab wounds to her lower chest, side, and buttocks; cuts through the stomach, spleen, liver, and kidney; and cuts to the esophagus. Mrs. Batten received a minimum of twenty-three stab wounds, several of which were so deep that after going through the organs, they actually pierced the back of the chest cavity. She also had cuts on her right hand and fingers and multiple abrasions and lacerations on her head. The cause of death was the multiple stab wounds to the chest and abdomen.

DeCastro then asked defendant to help move the bodies into the back of Mr. Batten's truck, which defendant did. Defendant helped clear the area of evidence and picked up Mr. Batten's partial dental plate, putting it in his pocket. Defendant, DeCastro, and George had started to go through Mr. Batten's wallet when Detective Michael Bass arrived at the scene in his patrol car.

When Detective Bass pulled up, he saw three men. One, who turned out to be George, had on dark-colored coveralls and was kneeling, going through credit cards. The other two were standing beside him: One, DeCastro, was wearing a camouflaged jacket; and the other, defendant, had on a jacket with bright yellow showing at the collar and sleeve. When they saw the police car, they fled behind the mobile home and into a wooded area. Detective Bass then saw the blood-strewn area and discovered the bodies of Mr. and Mrs. Batten in the back of the pickup truck.

George, making his way from the scene on a nearby road, was stopped shortly thereafter by Lieutenant Ron Reynolds, who was responding to a call from Detective Bass. Lt. Reynolds drove George back to the scene of the crime, where Detective Bass identified him as one of the suspects who had fled. When George was searched, Leon Batten's wallet was found in his front pocket.

Defendant, meanwhile, ran out to a road, and while walking away from the direction of the crime scene, hitched a ride from a man named Clarence Atkinson. Atkinson asked defendant where he was going; and defendant named a place which was apparently in the opposite direction, that is, back toward the crime scene. Atkinson turned the car around. At that point Atkinson saw the flashing lights of the police cars at the mobile home park and said he wanted to see what was going on; so he pulled into the mobile home park. Defendant got out of the car, went over to the crime scene, and, indicating that his brother lived at the cordoned-off mobile home, asked the officers, "Where's my brother at (sic)?"

Lt. Reynolds noticed that defendant was wearing a bright yellow, long-sleeved shirt and that there was a bloodstain around the cuff of his sleeve. Lt. Reynolds handcuffed defendant, told him he was under arrest, and turned him over to Detective Tommy Beasley. Detectives Bass and Beasley noticed blood spatters on defendant's white K-Swiss tennis shoes in addition to the large spot of blood on his left cuff.

Detective Beasley gave defendant his Miranda warnings while driving him to the sheriff's office in his patrol car at 9:36 p.m. Shortly after they left, Clarence Atkinson, who had found defendant's bloodstained jacket in the front seat of his car, brought it to the officers at the crime scene.

At the sheriff's office Detective Beasley asked defendant to remove everything from his pockets; one of the things defendant removed was Mr. Batten's partial dental plate. Detective Ned Summerlin then again read defendant the Miranda warnings. Defendant signed a waiver of his rights, and at 10:00 p.m. he gave a statement relating the events as they had occurred that evening.

Other officers found Eugene DeCastro with the help of an SBI airplane and infrared tracking devices.

PRETRIAL ISSUES

In defendant's first two assignments of error, he argues that he was unlawfully arrested without probable cause and that the trial court erred in failing to suppress the clothing and partial dental plate seized from him without a warrant and in the course of an unlawful arrest.

Initially we note that defendant has not properly preserved for appellate review the issue of the lawfulness of the arrest. Defendant did not object to the legality of the arrest either in his pretrial motion to suppress the clothing and dental plate or at the hearing on the motion to suppress. At the hearing the prosecutor began by saying, "It appears the defense does not challenge the constitutionality of the arrest in his motion." Defense counsel did not respond to this with any clarity. Later, in closing argument at the hearing, the prosecutor again noted that "defendant in his motion does not... address the question of the legalities of his arrest." Defense counsel was thereafter invited by the trial court to respond; and counsel simply said, "No response to that, your honor." Nevertheless, the trial court addressed the legality of the arrest in its conclusions of law as a necessary part of determining whether the seizure of the clothes and dental plate was lawful.

This Court must likewise address the lawfulness...