State v. Miller
| Decision Date | 29 May 1984 |
| Citation | 674 S.W.2d 279 |
| Parties | STATE of Tennessee, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. David Earl MILLER, Defendant-Appellant. |
| Court | Tennessee Supreme Court |
Andru Volinsky, Public Defender, Manchester, N.H., Mark Evan Olive, U.N.C. School of Law, Chapel Hill, N.C., for defendant-appellant.
William M. Leech, Jr., Atty. Gen., Wayne E. Uhl, Asst. Atty. Gen., Nashville, for plaintiff-appellee.
This is a direct appeal from a conviction of murder in the first degree and sentence of death, based upon the aggravating circumstances that the murder was especially heinous, atrocious, or cruel in that it involved torture or depravity of mind.
The victim, Lee Standifer, had diffused brain damage when born and was mildly retarded. She was twenty-three years old when she was murdered. She had been employed for about two years with a company that hired handicapped persons and was living at the Y.W.C.A. in downtown Knoxville, as a step toward her independence. She called her parents' home in Knoxville two or three times a day and visited them almost every weekend. She had her last conversation with her mother at about 5:30 p.m. on May 20, 1981.
In July 1979, defendant was hitch-hiking through Knoxville and was picked up by Benjamin Calvin Thomas, an ordained minister and school principal. On that occasion defendant cut the grass at Thomas' house in South Knoxville, was paid and resumed his hitch-hiking. Defendant returned to Knoxville a few weeks later and at the time of the murder had been living in the home of Thomas for more than a year. Thomas admitted that he had homosexual drives or inclinations and that early in his acquaintance with defendant they had a homosexual relationship. However, Thomas testified that defendant was not interested or responsive, that such a relationship gave him religious problems and that after a short period they were merely friends living together, and according to Thomas their relationship was almost that of father and son. A book which defendant had checked out of the Knoxville Public Library and other books belonging to him found at the Thomas home would support an inference that defendant had a morbid interest in sex.
In the early evening of May 20, 1981, defendant was at the Hideaway Lounge in downtown Knoxville. Lee Standifer was a few blocks away at the Y.W.C.A. and they conversed by telephone. They had been seen together at the Trailways Bus Station cafeteria prior to that date. After their telephone conversation defendant was seen walking to the Y.W.C.A., the victim awaiting there and the two of them walking away together. Apparently they first went to the Hideaway Lounge. They were next seen at the Knoxville Public Library, and then at the Trailways cafeteria, both in downtown Knoxville. There defendant engaged a taxi driver who drove defendant and Ms. Standifer to a point in South Knoxville near the Thomas residence.
Later that evening Thomas returned from Wednesday night church activities and drove into the basement garage of his home. He noticed that the area was wet, and after he got out of his car he saw defendant on the stairs to the basement. Defendant was not wearing a shirt and was in blue jeans. Thomas asked him why the basement floor was wet and defendant said he had "just hosed it out" because it needed to be cleaned. Thomas found the kitchen floor wet and two streams of blood leading from the living room to the dining room and kitchen area. He testified that when he asked for an explanation defendant said he had gotten into a fight and received a bloody nose. Thomas testified that he thought his carpet was ruined, and he told defendant that he could not "take this mess, you are just going to have to leave." Early the next morning Thomas drove defendant on I-40 to the Mabry Hood Road exit, gave him twenty-five dollars and understood that defendant intended to hitch-hike to Houston, Texas.
Thomas did not return to his home until about 6:30 p.m. on the evening of May 21. As he was going down his driveway he saw a blue T-shirt hanging on a dogwood tree in his backyard. He got out of his car, walked over to examine the T-shirt and saw a nude female body lying face up with dried blood on the face, head and portions of the body. Pieces of rope were wrapped around it and he assumed the person to be dead. He went into his house and called the police.
That night and the next day the investigating police officers found blood spots on the walls of the living room near the fireplace, the kitchen, the inside of the garage door in the basement and other places. There was a poker in the living room and a hammer was found in the yard about fifty feet from the body near a jacket, shoes and panties identified as belonging to the victim and all blood-stained. The body was approximately 100 feet from the house, near a large tree in a sheltered thicket and in an unkept part of the yard with a deep accumulation of leaves. The victim's arms were extended over her head. A large hemp rope had been tied around her neck and extended up to bind her wrists, with sufficient extra length to use to drag the body.
A pathologist, Dr. Evans, testified that the victim had a wound on the right side of the forehead and a wound over the left eye, each of which was approximately three inches long and one-half inch wide. Each resulted in a skull fracture and a subarachnoid hematoma. Dr. Evans was of the opinion that those two wounds could have been caused by the poker kept in the living room of the Thomas residence. A stab wound passed completely through the neck and shattered the jawbone. According to Dr. Evans this indicated the use of an instrument such as a Bowie knife. He testified that substantial force had necessarily been used to pass the instrument through the jawbone. There were a total of five stab wounds in the chest area and one stab wound in the stomach. There was a stab wound into the floor of the mouth made with an instrument similar to that used to produce the neck stab wounds. There was a stab wound over the heart, eight to nine inches in depth that passed through the heart and aorta. Another stab wound went through the rib cage and completely through the fifth rib and a third stab wound went through the center of the chest. Again, Dr. Evans indicated that human strength may have been inadequate to plunge an instrument into a bony rib and that a hammer might have been used to drive a sharp instrument into those wounds.
There were two stab wounds in the back. One passed through the bony rib but the other one hit the left shoulder blade and did not penetrate except to the depth of the blade, approximately one inch. There were multiple bruises on the upper left and right thighs. Two were about the size of a hand that required a great deal of force and were inflicted before death in the opinion of the pathologist. He identified a number of the stab wounds as probably having been inflicted after the death of the victim. There were numerous scrapes and scratches and minor bruises to the legs, knees and upper body front and back, probably caused by dragging the body over rough surfaces. Dr. Evans testified that he found spermatozoa of fairly recent origin in the vagina of the victim.
Defendant was apprehended in Columbus, Ohio, on May 29, 1981, waived extradition and was returned to Knoxville by Detectives Winston and Ailor of the Knoxville Police Department. The officers interviewed defendant on tape in Columbus and again in Knoxville. Miranda rights were read and waived in writing on both occasions. The Columbus tape was not introduced into evidence because, according to Winston, it was of poor quality.
During the Knoxville interview that began at 6 p.m. on May 30, 1981, defendant confirmed prior testimony that he was at the Hideaway Lounge, had a telephone conversation with Lee Standifer and went to the Y.W.C.A.: that they took a taxi at the Trailways Bus station and got out at Wise Hills and Stone Road. He did not remember going to the library but said he might have. He said he got out of the taxi and walked the remainder of the way to Thomas' house to clear his head, that he was drunk and a little sick. He said that when they got to the house Lee wanted to talk, and they went into the living room by the fireplace. She wanted to know what he was going to do and he told her he was going back to Houston. She became upset because she didn't want him to leave, grabbed his arm and he "turned around and hit her." He said he hit her with his fist and she fell down and when asked about additional blows he said he could not remember. At that point the interview continued as follows:
Defendant further related that he went back inside and "started rinsing everything down." His version of what happened after Thomas came home and his leaving the next morning was remarkably consistent with the testimony of Thomas as to what occurred.
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