State v. Link

• Decision Date: 21 January 1999
• Docket Number: No. 97-664,97-664
• Citation: 293 Mont. 23,974 P.2d 1124
• Parties: STATE of Montana, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Roy A. LINK, Defendant and Appellant.
• Court: Montana Supreme Court

Page 1124

974 P.2d 1124

1999 MT 4

STATE of Montana, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Roy A. LINK, Defendant and Appellant.

No. 97-664.

Supreme Court of Montana.

Submitted on Briefs Oct. 22, 1998.

Decided Jan. 21, 1999.

Craig R. Buehler, Attorney at Law, Lewistown, Montana, for Appellant.

Joseph P. Mazurek, Attorney General, Joseph E. Thaggard, Ass't Attorney General, Helena, Montana, James A. Hubble, County Attorney, Stanford, Montana, for Respondent.

Justice W. WILLIAM LEAPHART delivered the Opinion of the Court.

¶1 The State of Montana (the State) charged Defendant, Roy A. Link (Link), by amended information filed in the District Court of the Tenth Judicial District, County of Judith Basin, with Count 1--Arson by Accountability, Count 2--Deliberate Homicide by Accountability, and Count 3--Deliberate Homicide. The charges arose from a mobile home fire that resulted in the death of Link's stepfather, Leonard Theis (Leonard). The State alleged that Link had acted in concert with his sister, Donna June Enright (Enright), and her boyfriend, John Kozlowitz (Kozlowitz), to intentionally start the fire so the parties could collect on a number of life insurance policies purchased on Leonard's life. Link pleaded not guilty to the charges. Following a trial by jury, Link was found guilty of Counts 1 and 3, but acquitted of Count 2. Link appeals his conviction and sentence. We reverse the judgment of the District Court, and remand for a new trial.

¶2 For purposes of this appeal, there are two dispositive issues:

¶3 (1.) Did the District Court abuse its discretion in admitting evidence of the 1995 Gore Hill fire as other crimes, wrongs, or acts pursuant to Rule 404(b), M.R.Evid.?

¶4 (2.) Was there sufficient evidence to support the jury's verdict?

Factual and Procedural Background

¶5 Early in the morning of October 17, 1996, Leonard died in a mobile home fire in Stanford. At the time of his death, Leonard was married to Faye Theis (Faye), who presently resides in a nursing home in Great Falls. Although the couple conceived no children during their marriage, Faye had four children from a previous marriage, including Link and Enright. For a number of years, Faye and Leonard lived in Great Falls, in a mobile home located on Gore Hill.

¶6 Leonard was a slightly mentally retarded adult who, at the time his of death, also suffered from the early stages of Alzheimer's disease or a related form of dementia. Although early in his life Leonard worked at the Anaconda Company in Great Falls long enough to qualify for a pension, he was incapable of work by 1988 and began to collect social security benefits. Leonard was briefly confined to a nursing home in 1993. Enright and Link obtained co-power of attorney over Leonard that same year. At that time, it was agreed among the family members that Enright would reside with Leonard in the mobile home on Gore Hill. In 1994, Enright also obtained guardianship over Leonard.

¶7 On February 16, 1995, Link signed a quitclaim deed on behalf of Faye, ¹ and Enright signed that same deed on behalf of Leonard, transferring the couple's interest in their Gore Hill mobile home to Enright's boyfriend, Kozlowitz. Pursuant to this transfer, Kozlowitz became the named insured on the homeowner's insurance policy for the Gore Hill mobile home. A few days later, on February 22, 1995, the Gore Hill mobile home was badly damaged by fire (the Gore Hill fire). Neither Leonard nor anyone else was in the mobile home at the time of the fire. The Cascade County Sheriff's Department was unable to determine the cause of the blaze, and the fire was therefore classified as accidental. The insurer subsequently approved funds for debris removal at the fire site, and Link bid for and received the clean-up job on the Gore Hill fire. However, Link only oversaw the clean-up job; apparently, most of the insurance funds went to a man named Rex.

¶8 The insurance proceeds that Kozlowitz received from the Gore Hill fire were largely used to purchase the Sundown Inn, a bar and restaurant located in Stanford. In August of 1995, Leonard, Enright, and Kozlowitz moved from Great Falls to Stanford to pursue this business endeavor. The parties purchased three contiguous trailer lots; two trailers owned by Kozlowitz were kept on the lots, with Leonard and Enright residing in one, and Kozlowitz living in the other. By April of 1996, however, the business failed and the parties were forced to close the Sundown Inn.

¶9 In July of 1996, Enright purchased an insurance policy to cover the Stanford mobile home in which she and Leonard resided. From July to early October 1996, Enright also purchased a number of life insurance policies on Leonard's life. Enright completed the applications for these policies and signed Leonard's signature to them in a way that made it appear that Leonard had actually completed the applications. Two of these policies named Enright as the beneficiary, and two of these policies named Link as the beneficiary. Enright testified at trial that, as of August 3, 1996, Link was aware that one of the insurance policies named him as the beneficiary that two of the policies named Enright as the beneficiary. However, the two insurance policies naming Link as the beneficiary were not issued until September 17 and 18, 1996.

¶10 On August 1, 1996, shortly before his death, the Anaconda Company paid Leonard two lump sum distributions of his pension benefits, totaling over$30,000 after taxes. Enright, as Leonard's legal guardian, obtained control over these funds and purportedly used the money to pay bills. On September 3, 1996, due to the business failure of the Sundown Inn, Enright and Leonard decided to move back to Great Falls. Over the course of the next six weeks, Link helped Enright and Leonard move various belongings from the Stanford mobile home to a house that Enright owned in Great Falls.

¶11 On October 16, 1996, Link and his wife went to the Stanford mobile home to pick up Leonard's favorite recliner chair. Link and his wife then went to Jim's Water Hole, a Stanford bar, where they knew they would find Enright. While inside the bar, Link and Enright spoke privately with each other for approximately fifteen minutes. The precise nature of this communication is unknown. Apparently, at some point during this conversation, Enright instructed Link to give Leonard some Tylenol with codeine; however, it is unclear whether Link ever did so. Following this conversation, Link and his wife returned to their own home in the Great Falls area, where they remained for the rest of October 16, 1996.

¶12 After gambling at Jim's Water Hole until 9:30 p.m. on October 16, 1996, Enright and Leonard returned to the Stanford mobile home to do some laundry and spend the night. At 3:40 a.m. on October 17, 1996, Enright called 911 to report that the mobile home was on fire. An undersheriff who resided nearby was the first to arrive at the fire scene, at which time he observed Enright and Kozlowitz standing casually outside the burning mobile home. Enright then mentioned that Leonard was still in his bedroom.

¶13 At 3:51 a.m., Enright called Link from Kozlowitz's telephone to inform him that the Stanford mobile home was burning. During this conversation, Enright apparently informed Link that Leonard had died in the fire. However, at about this same time, emergency personnel were just arriving at the fire scene and Leonard's body had not yet been recovered from the mobile home. Following this phone call, Link and his wife immediately drove up to Stanford. Later that day, Link went to a mortuary in Great Falls to make arrangements for the cremation of Leonard's body.

¶14 Fire officials located Leonard's body, coated with soot, on a couch in the living room of the mobile home. An autopsy indicated that he died--without any indication of struggle--from carbon monoxide poisoning due to smoke inhalation. The doctor who performed the autopsy discovered an abnormally large amount of soot in Leonard's trachea, which was unusual because a person would normally wake up and "cough a great deal" when exposed to a substantial amount of smoke. The doctor noted, however, that a person in a sedated state might not wake up under such circumstances. A subsequent toxicology report on Leonard's blood revealed that he had consumed a "therapeutic amount" of Diphenhydramine (known commercially as Benadryl), an antihistamine that can have a sedative effect on certain individuals, and also had traces of Acetaminophen, an analgesic, in his blood-stream. Another toxicology report of a urine stain found on Leonard's jeans also revealed the presence of Benadryl, as well as codeine, a narcotic drug with a sedative effect.

¶15 Fire officials questioned Enright at the scene of the fire, and became suspicious of many inconsistencies in her story. Two separate investigations concluded that the fire had originated roughly two feet off the floor in the unoccupied, middle bedroom of the mobile home. Initially, neither investigation could determine the precise cause of the fire. Investigators did recover some "beaded" wire from the middle bedroom, which suggested that the wire might have melted due to an electrical short. After further investigation, however, fire officials were able to rule out all possible natural or accidental causes of the fire. They determined that the fuel source for the fire consisted of wadded newspapers contained in cardboard boxes located in the middle bedroom, which had been intentionally lit; and that the fire was "incendiary in nature," suggesting an act of arson. Similarly, insurance officials who investigated the fire concluded that the cause of the fire was arson. Insurance officials also noted that it was significant that Enright had failed to initially acknowledge that Link had removed Leonard's chair from the Stanford mobile home the day before the fire, since the removal of property from a residence immediately prior to a fire...