State v. McClendon
| Decision Date | 07 February 1968 |
| Docket Number | No. 1790,1790 |
| Parties | , 46 A.L.R.3d 537 STATE of Arizona, Plaintiff, v. Randolph McCLENDON, Defendant. |
| Court | Arizona Supreme Court |
J. R. Babbitt, Jr., Kenneth J. Lincoln, Flagstaff, for defendant.
Two questions have been certified to this Court for determination under Rule 346 of the Rules of Criminal Procedure, 17 A.R.S. (1956).
'QUESTION NUMBER 1
'Where an accused is sane and competent in all respects, except that he is suffering from permanent amnesia which prevents him from recalling facts immediately surrounding the alleged crime of first degree murder, and the accused is the only witness as to the alleged crime, and the prosecution's case is otherwise circumstantial and where the accused's plea is one of 'not guilty':
'a) Is such an accused competent to stand trial?
'b) Would the trial of the accused violate his right to due process?
'c) Would the commitment of the accused to the State Mental Hospital violate his right to due process?
'd) If such accused cannot be tried nor committed to the State Hospital, what disposition should be made of him?
'QUESTION NUMBER 2
'Where an accused charged with first degree murder, has been found guilty of second degree murder by a jury and successfully appeals his conviction, does a retrial of such defendant on the original charge of first degree murder violate his constitutional right of appeal?'
The facts of this case are clearly set forth by Justice Udall in our previous decision of State v. McClendon, 101 Ariz. 285, 419 P.2d 69 (1966). Suffice it to say that approximately five hours after the defendant purchased a .22 calibre rifle while on a trip with his ex-wife, both of them were found at a lookout point at the Grand Canyon: defendant on the ground outside his car suffering from an apparently self-inflicted head wound, and his ex-wife inside the car dead from a single bullet in her head. Defendant was subsequently tried for first degree murder and found guilty of murder in the second degree on his plea of not guilty. We reversed the conviction and remanded for a new trial upon the grounds that the trial court abused its discretion in denying the defendant's motion to postpone trial and commit the defendant to an institution when it appeared that defendant was suffering from an amnesic condition of undetermined duration. We held that it would be a reproach to justice '* * * if a man, while suffering from amnesia of an uncertain type and extent, was compelled to go to trial when the possibility existed that a further examination would reveal his condition to be temporary and susceptible to treatment.' State v. McClendon, supra, 101 Ariz. at 288, 419 P.2d at 72.
Subsequent to the reversal a hearing was had pursuant to Rule 250 of the Rules of Criminal Procedure, 17 A.R.S. (1956) to determine the competency of this defendant to stand trial. At the conclusion of the 'After reviewing the reports of the examining physicians and considering the testimony the Court finds that The Defendant is sane, rational and competent in all respects except that he is suffering from amnesia, which prevents him from recalling the facts and circumstances immediately surrounding the alleged crime. This amnesia would appear from the testimony of the experts to be relatively permanent in nature, at least it is apparent that a reasonable amount of treatment will not effectuate a recovery of the Defendant's memory.
hearing and examinations, the trial court made the following findings:
'The Court finds that the Defendant understands the nature of the charges pending against him and is able to assist counsel with the exception of being able to relate to his counsel the facts and circumstances surrounding the alleged crime. Obviously, as counsel has brought to the Court's attention, this creates a problem which has not been determined in this jurisdiction to my knowledge with respect to the disposition that is now to be made of the Defendant.
'It is the Court's feeling that he cannot be committed to a State Hospital in view of the fact that he is not insane, and there is a question as to whether he is now competent to stand trial.' (Emphasis supplied.)
We hold that (a) the defendant is competent to stand trial; (b) the trial will not violate his right to due process; (c) and (d) if there is a reasonable basis that would support a conclusion that commitment to the State Hospital would aid the defendant in some material way, such commitment would not violate due process.
In holding thus, however, we feel constrained to emphasize that each case concerning amnesia must be considered on its own merits and that no absolutes may be justified without investigation. We reaffirm our holding in the first McClendon decision that it is a reproach to justice to try a man suffering from amnesia of an uncertain type and extent when it appears that reasonable continuance of the trial may provide the time needed to effectuate a limited or full recovery from the amnesic state, especially when the amnesia goes to the facts of the crime alleged. State v. McClendon, supra, 101 Ariz. at 288, 419 P.2d at 72. But we underline the obvious in declaring that amnesia 'is nothing more than a failure of memory concerning facts or events to which an individual has been exposed' and that 'every individual's memory process is marked by some distortion which may occur at any point' and 'as a result, No one's memory is in fact complete, even under ideal conditions * * * every one is amnesic to some degree'. (Emphasis supplied.) 71 Yale Law J. 109--111 (1961--62).
Precedent in this area is meager and questionable. One or two courts have expatiated upon the absurdity of assuming that a defendant suffering from amnesia would ever be tried for a crime, and then in the same breath promptly proceeded to uphold the conviction of an amnesic after proper rationalizations have been made. This grandiloquence is exemplified in classic form by the United States District Court of Western Missouri in the case of United States v. Sermon, 228 F.Supp. 972 (W.D.Mo., W.D.1964). In a review of a pre-trial proceeding to determine the defendant's competency to stand trial for violations of the Internal Revenue Code when the defendant's memory was faulty, the court said at page 976, '* * * certainly no one in the 1960's would dream of putting a defendant suffering from established amnesia to trial for a crime of any sort'. Then, after first elaborating on the fact that the defendant was suffering from limited memory due to a 'chronic brain syndrome' and that '(a)ll the doctors ruled out those possibilities' that the defendant was feigning or that he was in any way guilty of malingering, the court held that there was sufficient evidence to conclude 'We cannot conceive that a defendant who is Competent to understand the nature of the proceedings against him is not also mentally alert enough to advise his counsel whether the Broad outline of the evidence that the Government has indicated it will adduce against him is or is not fabricated.' (Emphasis supplied.) Id., at 980.
that the defendant was 'fully able' to furnish his counsel with sufficient factual information to properly prepare his defense. Then the court made the interesting observation that:
There is merit to the last statement, especially when much of the evidence is circumstantial and can be explained away by the accused.
The concern of the courts in this area is the very real danger that amnesia can be feigned easily and that discovery and proof of feigning and malingering is difficult, especially when the defendant refuses to take the stand. The Tennessee Supreme Court, quoting from Gray, Attorneys' Textbook of Medicine, (3rd Edition), in a decision upholding the conviction of a defendant who alleged amnesia concerning the period of time during which the crimes of grand...
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