State v. Ledford

• Decision Date: 18 February 1986
• Docket Number: No. 452A84,452A84
• Citation: 315 N.C. 599,340 S.E.2d 309
• Court: North Carolina Supreme Court
• Parties: STATE of North Carolina v. Ricky Dale LEDFORD.

Page 309

340 S.E.2d 309

315 N.C. 599

STATE of North Carolina v. Ricky Dale LEDFORD.

No. 452A84.

Supreme Court of North Carolina.

Feb. 18, 1986.

Lacy H. Thornburg, Atty. Gen. by Tiare B. Smiley, Asst. Atty. Gen., Raleigh, for State.

Ann B. Petersen, Chapel Hill, for defendant-appellant.

MEYER, Justice.

The State's evidence tended to show that on Saturday morning, 23 July 1983, Charlotte Henson drove down Pisgah Drive in Canton past the home of Nora Curtis, her husband's grandmother, as she did every day on her way to work. On that morning, however, she noticed that the front window of Mrs. Curtis' home was broken. When she arrived at work, Mrs. Henson telephoned her brother-in-law, Stanley Henson, and asked him to check on his grandmother.

Stanley Henson drove to Mrs. Curtis' house, and when there was no response to his knock on the front door, he moved to the broken window and called out to his grandmother. He heard her moan and say that she was hurt. He then drove to the Canton Police Department and advised the dispatcher to send a patrol car to Mrs. Curtis' home immediately. He returned to his grandmother's home, arriving at the same time as Officer R.G. Stroup. Unable to gain entry through the locked front door, the men walked around to the side screen door which was secured by a hook and eye latch. Officer Stroup was able to force open the screen door, and the two men entered the house. A third door leading to the basement was locked from the inside.

The men found 87-year-old Nora Curtis in her nightgown, lying on her side on the bed which was partially broken down at the foot. On the bedroom floor, they found an old aluminum pot and a piece of curtain rod with a jagged end. Both items were stained with a reddish brown material. There was blood on Mrs. Curtis' hands, arms, and face and on the pillow, bedcover, and mattress. Mrs. Curtis had bruises on her hands, arms, and face and a large knot on her left shoulder. The bedroom appeared to have been ransacked, and the doors of a wooden wardrobe were hanging open. Mrs. Curtis was taken to the Haywood County Hospital where she remained until her death on 3 August 1983.

An investigation of the Curtis home was conducted by the Canton Police Department and the SBI. A small, white cardboard box was found on top of the dresser in Mrs. Curtis' bedroom. It contained several items, including the butt of a Marlboro Light cigarette. Mrs. Curtis did not smoke. A piece of asphalt was found in the living room. Broken glass was found on the living room floor between the broken window and the couch. The curtain rod on the front window was broken down and one of the curtains was lying on the living room floor. When Sergeant Rhinehart picked up the curtain, he discovered a footprint on a portion of the backside or window side of the curtain that had been folded under before he picked it up. SBI Agent Elliott was able to lift only two fingerprints from the scene, neither of which, when analyzed by the SBI latent print examiner, was found to be of suitable quality for identification purposes.

Mrs. Rochelle Robinson, a daughter of the victim, testified that on the Wednesday prior to the assault, she had driven her mother to the Clyde Savings and Loan to make a $1,500 deposit. Mrs. Robinson further stated that her mother had "at least five hundred dollars left," which she placed in a large plastic mayonnaise jar in the bedroom wardrobe "where she always kept it." Mrs. Robinson said her mother put "a couple of hundreds and some fifties and some twenties" in the mayonnaise jar. During the crime scene investigation, Officer Stroup found one twenty-dollar bill and some change in a jar inside the wardrobe; neither the plastic mayonnaise jar nor any other money was found in the house during the investigation.

The State also presented the testimony of Gene Ledford, the defendant's cousin. Ledford testified that at approximately 2:00 a.m. on 23 July, he and his stepfather were standing outside the Road Runner, a local store, when they saw the defendant. The defendant came over to them and displayed a roll of paper money. He said the money had been given to him by a man named Bryson so that they would not "rat" on him about the "gun deal." Shortly thereafter, the defendant walked away in the direction of his home.

Larry Kuykendall, a cab driver, testified that he was driving down Pisgah Drive just before 2:00 a.m. on 23 July. He stated that at that time, he saw the defendant, whom he knew well, stepping onto the sidewalk in front of Mrs. Curtis' house. Kuykendall stated that he waved at the defendant but that the defendant did not acknowledge him. He also testified that he saw the defendant push something up underneath the plaid flannel shirt he was wearing.

Sergeant Troy Rhinehart of the Canton Police Department testified that on the evening of 23 July 1983, the defendant accompanied him and Lieutenant Scott Ashe to police headquarters where defendant was advised of his constitutional rights and informed that the officers were investigating the break-in and assault at Mrs. Curtis' home. Defendant stated that he knew nothing about the incident and that he had been at the Game Room that night and had returned to his home at approximately 11:00 p.m. While defendant was being questioned at the police station, the officers asked him to put his feet on the desk so that they could look at the soles of the boots he was wearing. The officers visually compared the tread on defendant's boots with the footprint on the curtain taken from Mrs. Curtis' house. Defendant agreed to give the officers his boots and the clothing he was wearing. The officers accompanied defendant back to the mobile home where he was living so that he could change clothes. In the bedroom of the mobile home, the officers noticed an ashtray containing cigarette butts. Defendant agreed to allow the officers to take the cigarette butts.

Rhinehart further testified that on 24 July, he spoke with Gene Ledford and Larry Kuykendall. The police then obtained warrants for defendant's arrest. They went to defendant's home very early on Monday morning, 25 July 1983; when two officers knocked on the front door, defendant ran out the back door where he was stopped by Sergeant Rhinehart. The officers searched the defendant and found $422.49 in his pockets. Defendant stated that he had earned the money mowing yards and doing other work.

Mrs. Curtis remained in the hospital following the assault. She had recovered sufficiently by 30 July 1983 that the attending physician, Dr. Bill Owen, left her in the care of Dr. Stuart Harley while Dr. Owen took his vacation. Mrs. Curtis began receiving physical therapy in the hospital, but her condition worsened and she died on 3 August 1983. Dr. Robert Boatright, a pathologist, performed an autopsy on Mrs. Curtis. He testified that Mrs. Curtis' death was caused by a blood clot that had formed in her leg and, in passing through her body, became lodged in the major artery from her heart to her lungs. In his opinion, the injuries Mrs. Curtis suffered in the assault caused her death because they resulted in a decrease in her usual activities, thereby restricting the movement of the muscles in her legs that would pump the blood out of the veins in her legs.

The defendant testified that he lived with his parents in Canton and had known the deceased, Mrs. Curtis, all his life, had been in Mrs. Curtis' home on a number of occasions, and had done odd jobs for her in the past. He last visited her home approximately three to four weeks prior to the assault. Defendant further testified that he had gone to his girlfriend's house on the night of 23 July and stayed until 1:30 a.m., although police officer Grant Parrott testified in rebuttal that he had seen the defendant and three others drinking beer behind a feed store on Penland Street at approximately 10:45 p.m. Defendant testified that he went from his girlfriend's house to the Road Runner by walking down Academy Street and that he was not on Pisgah Drive that night.

On the Judgment and Commitment form, it appears that defendant was sentenced to life imprisonment on the consolidated charges of first-degree felony murder and assault with a deadly weapon inflicting serious injury. He was separately sentenced to a consecutive ten-year term on his conviction for felonious larceny.

Defendant has brought forward four issues for review by this Court. First, he argues that the evidence presented at trial was insufficient to support convictions for any of the offenses with which he was charged. Second, he contends that the trial court erroneously admitted testimony of the State's pathologist that the injuries inflicted on the decedent on 23 July 1983 were the proximate cause of her death because that testimony constituted an opinion as to a question of law and as to the ultimate issue in the case. Third, defendant argues that the trial court erred in sentencing him to a term of imprisonment in excess of the presumptive term for the felonious larceny by failing to make findings in aggravation or mitigation of punishment. Finally, defendant urges this Court to reconsider its ruling in several recent cases and find that the imposition of a sentence based upon a verdict of guilty returned by a jury drawn from a venire from which potential jurors were excluded because of their scruples against capital punishment deprives defendant of his right to due process of law and his right to trial by jury. We find no error in the guilt phase of defendant's trial, but remand the case to the trial court for a new sentencing hearing on defendant's conviction for felonious larceny. We also vacate the defendant's conviction for assault with a deadly weapon inflicting serious injury.

I.

Defendant was charged in an indictment, proper in form, with the first-degree murder of Mrs. Nora Curtis. The indictment alleges that a burglary and an assault occurred on 23 July...