State v. Massey

• Decision Date: 30 November 1988
• Docket Number: No. 20052-KA,20052-KA
• Citation: 535 So.2d 1135
• Parties: STATE of Louisiana, Appellee, v. Curtis Lee MASSEY, Appellant.
• Court: Court of Appeal of Louisiana — District of US

Page 1135

535 So.2d 1135

STATE of Louisiana, Appellee, v. Curtis Lee MASSEY, Appellant.

No. 20052-KA.

Court of Appeal of Louisiana Second Circuit.

Nov. 30, 1988.

Wilson Rambo, Monroe, for appellant.

William J. Guste, Jr., Atty. Gen., James A. Norris, Jr., Dist. Atty., Joseph T. Mickel, Peggy Sullivan, Asst. Dist. Attys., for appellee.

Before JASPER E. JONES, SEXTON and NORRIS, JJ.

NORRIS, Judge.

The defendant, Curtis Lee Massey Jr., was indicted for second degree murder, LSA-R.S. 14:30.1, arising from the February 1987 stabbing death of his former girlfriend, LaSandra Johnson. On the day after the stabbing Massey was arrested and taken into custody; he gave an inculpatory recorded statement. In May 1987 the trial judge denied his motion to suppress. At trial in October 1987 a jury found Massey guilty as charged and the court ultimately imposed the mandatory life sentence at hard labor without benefit of probation, parole or suspension of sentence. Massey now appeals, urging that the ruling on the motion to suppress was incorrect and that the evidence adduced at trial was insufficient to sustain the conviction. For the reasons expressed, we affirm.

Facts

Around 4:30 in the morning of February 10, the police received a call to the victim's house on Gaston St. in Monroe. LaSandra Johnson lived there in her mother's house with her three small children, her brother and her mother. LaSandra's mother or brother had heard a noise in her bedroom, entered and discovered LaSandra lying bloody and mutilated on her bed. Her six-month old son, Bruce, lay next to her, unharmed. By the time the police arrived, she appeared to have expired; when the coroner came, he confirmed it. An autopsy later showed that she had died from massive blood loss resulting from nine stab wounds.

Investigating the scene, police discovered that someone had cut a screen over a window in the house's back door, pried open the window, unlocked the door and entered the house.

At the hearing on the motion to suppress, the following details about the investigation were adduced. Capt. Smith testified that LaSandra's brother, Cornell Johnson, came in and claimed to know that the assailant was Massey, because Massey had been harassing LaSandra with threatening phone calls. LaSandra had even asked Cornell to make sure the doors and windows were locked that night. Cornell told the officers where Massey lived. LaSandra's mother, Mrs. Earnestine Johnson, verified that Massey had been placing threatening phone calls. She added that LaSandra and Massey had lived together in the past and Massey was the father of Antron, LaSandra's second child, but the pair's relationship had been stormy. Massey had threatened her on several occasions, injured her and spent time in jail for these incidents. Mrs. Johnson stated that Massey was not welcome in her home.

Police were dispatched to the Polk St. address that Cornell Johnson provided. Massey's mother, Mrs. Massey, told Cpl. Harris that he was not at home; she had driven him to a lounge on Renwick St. the previous evening and had not seen him since. She referred the officer, however, to an apartment on Elm St. where Massey's brother, Andrew Tolliver, lived with his girlfriend, Phyllis Holmes.

Police went to the Elm St. apartment and were met by Ms. Holmes. She told the officers that Massey was not there, having stopped by earlier but left; she nevertheless consented to a search of the apartment. Officer Biggars entered the bedroom and found Massey, fully dressed, seated on a couch. Tolliver was in the bed. The police took Massey to the living room for questioning and read him his Miranda rights. Massey was not physically restrained but he was not free to leave. The officers attempted to learn from him what he had done with a particular sweater that, according to Mrs. Massey, he had been wearing that night. Massey said he remembered taking it off and placing it on the sofa, but did not know what happened to it afterwards. With Ms. Holmes's permission, officers searched the apartment. They did not find the sweater but they did uncover, in the bathroom, a towel that appeared to have red stains on it. They seized the towel. Massey agreed to accompany the officers to the police station for questioning.

Massey came to the station and was asked if he would consent to a polygraph test. He agreed and went with the officers to the polygraph facility but changed his mind and refused to take the test. He was returned to the police station and questioned further. He gave a statement that denied any involvement in the stabbing. Feeling they had insufficient evidence to get a conviction, the police released Massey on the afternoon of February 10, 1987.

The next evening, February 11, an anonymous person identifying himself only as a "relative" went to the police with information that he had overheard a conversation between Massey and his mother, Peggy Massey. On this basis he understood Mrs. Massey and one of Massey's brothers would be returning to the Elm St. apartment to discard the sweater he was suspected of wearing and the knife he was suspected of using. The informant advised police to return to the apartment as soon as possible. Capt. Smith testified he recognized the informant from a prior case but did not know him well and could not identify him.

Capt. Smith and Sgt. Pickens went to the apartment and, on first arrival, found no one home. They returned to the apartment around 9:30 p.m., reinforced by Detectives Peel and Stewart, to find Ms. Holmes and two other women present. They admitted the officers. Ms. Holmes told the police the sweater was under a couch cushion. Detective Peel looked, found and seized the sweater. It was damp, as though someone had tried to wash it. A few moments later, Andrew Tolliver appeared and handed officers a butterfly-style knife that he found on top of the refrigerator after Massey left the apartment. Mrs. Massey verified it was Massey's knife. The officers told them they would find Massey and arrest him for first degree murder. Mrs. Massey told them Massey was at her house on Polk St.; she led them there. She went inside the house and brought Massey to the front porch, where he surrendered peacefully.

Massey was taken to the station, advised of his Miranda rights and interrogated. He gave a recorded statement in which he stated he had telephoned LaSandra from his brother's apartment and that she had refused to interrupt a phone call with someone else. He admitted going to Gaston St., cutting the screen and entering the house, going to LaSandra's bedroom, and asking her whom she was talking to when she refused to take his call. According to the statement, they talked a few minutes and then she asked him to leave; at trial, he added that she taunted him. Massey admitted he then began stabbing her; afterwards he returned to Tolliver's Elm St. apartment. As noted, the autopsy showed that the victim died from massive blood loss resulting from nine stab wounds, at least two of which could have been fatal. One of the fatal wounds was so forcefully inflicted that it broke the victim's ninth rib. One wound to the left forearm indicated the victim had made a pathetic attempt to defend herself from the attack. Three wounds were in the victim's back.

Massey was indicted for second degree murder. Before trial he moved to suppress all evidence gathered from the investigation, urging that his arrest had been unsupported by probable cause and his confession was involuntary. The district court conducted a hearing at which the details of the investigation related above were adduced. At this hearing, Massey testified that he confessed only because the police threatened to arrest and jail his brother and Phyllis Holmes for helping him conceal evidence, and to leave them alone if Massey told what happened. There was no mention of this, however, in the recorded confession. The court denied the motion, refusing to suppress any of the evidence. At trial the state did not reiterate the investigative details but relied on the taped confession. The state introduced the knife into evidence but not the sweater or the towel, which were found not to have bloodstains. Massey waived his fifth amendment rights and took the stand, admitting all the pertinent points in his confession. He added that LaSandra taunted him that night by pulling down her panties, squeezing one of her buttocks and saying, "Look at these cheeks." He insisted he "didn't know why" he stabbed her, except perhaps to clear his memory of catching her in bed with another man some five months earlier; he related this encounter. The jury found Massey guilty as charged and the court imposed the mandatory sentence.

Probable Cause

By his first assignment Massey urges the trial court erred in ruling that his statements were admissible and in further ruling that probable cause existed for his arrest. A peace officer may, without a warrant, arrest a person when the officer has reasonable cause to believe that the person to be arrested has committed an offense, although not in the presence of the officer. LSA-C.Cr.P. art. 213. Reasonable cause has been judicially recognized as equivalent to probable cause. State v. Weinberg, 364 So.2d 964 (La.1978). Reasonable cause exists when the facts and circumstances known to the arresting officer and about which he has reasonably trustworthy information are sufficient to justify a man of ordinary caution in believing that the person to be arrested has committed a crime. State v. Johnson, 422 So.2d 1125 (La.1982); State v. Hathaway, 411 So.2d 1074 (La.1982). Mere suspicion cannot justify an arrest. State v. Randolph, 337 So.2d 498 (La.1976). However, an arrest may be supported by less evidence than would justify a conviction. State v. Billiot, 370 So.2d 539 (La.1979), cert denied 444 U.S. 935, 100 S.Ct. 284, 62 L.Ed.2d 194 (1979); State v. Scott, 389 So.2d 1285 (La.1980). Probable cause to arrest is not...