State v. Mytych

• Decision Date: 04 February 1972
• Docket Number: No. 41956,41956
• Citation: 292 Minn. 248,194 N.W.2d 276
• Parties: STATE of Minnesota, Respondent, v. Eleanor Theresa MYTYCH, Appellant.
• Court: Minnesota Supreme Court

Page 276

194 N.W.2d 276

292 Minn. 248

STATE of Minnesota, Respondent, v. Eleanor Theresa MYTYCH, Appellant.

No. 41956.

Supreme Court of Minnesota.

Feb. 4, 1972.

Syllabus by the Court

1. In reviewing the sufficiency of evidence to support findings in criminal cases, this court applies the same standards to cases heard before the court without a jury as to cases heard by a jury.

2. Where the defendant in a criminal case denies responsibility because of insanity, it is not a violation of the due process clause of the Federal Constitution to require him to prove insanity by a fair preponderance of the evidence.

3. The fact that a person with a mental disturbance evinces a depraved mind by shooting and injuring one person and killing another does not necessarily mean that such killing was committed with such particularity as to exclude a conviction of third-degree murder. Each case must be determined on its own facts and issues.

C. Paul Jones, Public Defender, G. Thomas MacIntosh, II, and Richard B. Allyn, Asst. Public Defenders, Minneapolis, for appellant.

Warren Spannaus, Atty. Gen., James M. Kelley, Asst. Atty. Gen., William B. Randall, County Atty., Steven C. DeCoster, Asst. County Atty., St. Paul, for respondent.

Heard before KNUTSON, C.J., and MURPHY, OTIS, KELLY, and ODDEN, JJ.

OPINION

DONALD C. ODDEN, Justice. ^*

Defendant appeals from a judgment entered pursuant to a verdict, reached by the court without a jury, finding her guilty of third-degree murder and aggravated assault.

Defendant, Eleanor Theresa Mytych, met Sam Pulford in May 1964 in Bensenville, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago. At that time defendant had been a divorcee for 6 months and Pulford was estranged from his wife. Initial casual dating soon became frequent so that, by the fall of 1965, the two saw each other almost every day. They were occasionally intimate and there was discussion of marriage. Pulford was divorced from his wife in May 1966. In December 1966, while continuing to date defendant and apparently making plans for a January 1967 marriage to her, Pulford met an old acquaintance, Janet Williams, and began to date her. At that time neither woman knew of the other. After April 1967 Pulford saw Janet Williams exclusively and married her on July 22, 1967. As a result of a series of job transfers just prior to the marriage, Pulford and his new wife moved into an apartment in St. Paul. When defendant called him in St. Paul he told her that he was now married and he wrote her to the same effect. She was shocked and insisted upon seeing him. She flew to St. Paul on September 20, 1967, where Pulford picked her up at the airport, took her to several bars, and after telling her that his marriage to Janet was merely platonic, took her to a motel where they engaged in sexual relations. Communication for the next 4 months consisted largely of efforts by defendant to learn when Pulford would see her again. In February 1968 he visited Chicago where he again saw defendant. Telephone conversations continued thereafter between them until March 14, 1968, the date of the homicide and the assault.

In February 1968 defendant, while in Chicago, purchased a revolver. Her expressed reason for doing so was for selfprotection in her home, which is located in a wooded area with few close neighbors. On the Tuesday prior to March 14, 1968, defendant made a plane reservation to St. Paul under an assumed name. On the morning of March 14, 1968, after calling her employer and reporting that she was ill and would not come to work, she went to the airport, purchased a ticket under the assumed name, and flew to St. Paul. She took her revolver with her. Upon arrival at the Twin Cities International Airport, she went to a rest room, loaded the revolver, and took a cab to the St. Paul Bus Depot. From there, she took another cab to the Pulford apartment and rang the bell. Pulford, in bed at the time, opened the door at his wife's insistence but only after his wife had gone to the bathroom. After letting defendant into his apartment, he walked down a short hallway to get a cigarette and had turned back toward defendant when she shot him in the side. Pulford heard two more shots while lying on the floor. When he arose he found his wife's body in the bathtub, lifeless as a result of two bullet wounds. Defendant denied any memory of taking the gun from her purse and firing it.

Defendant left the apartment, called a cab from a drugstore, and rode to the St. Paul Bus Depot. From there, she took another cab to the airport. She was arrested shortly after her arrival there. A search of her purse at that time revealed a .38-caliber revolver, loaded, except for three spent cartridges. It was stipulated that a crime laboratory analyst had concluded after appropriate scientific investigation that the bullets fired in the Pulford apartment came from this gun. Defendant was brought into the St. Paul Police Department and given a Miranda warning. She then answered questions concerning her name, age, and marital status. She expressed concern for her daughter in Chicago, asked to contact an Illinois attorney with whom she was acquainted, and refused to permit a nitrate test on her hands. When she refused to answer questions about the events surrounding the shooting and because her memory appeared to be 'spotty,' defendant was transferred to the mental ward at the St. Paul-Ramsey Hospital for examination.

On March 19, 1968, defendant was indicted for murder in the first degree and aggravated assault. Upon her plea of not guilty to both charges, she voluntarily waived her right to a jury trial in open court and the case proceeded to trial before the Hon. John W. Graff, Chief Judge of the Ramsey County District Court. The court found her guilty of murder in the third degree and aggravated assault and ordered her to serve concurrent indeterminate sentences.

On appeal defendant raises three issues:

(1) Was the trial court in error when it found that defendant had not proved by the required degree of proof that at the time the acts were committed she was laboring under such a defect of reason from insanity as not to know the nature of her acts or that such acts were wrong?

(2) Was defendant denied due process of law when she was required to carry the burden of proving her defense of insanity by a fair preponderance of the evidence?

(3) From the evidence in this case, was the trial court in error when it found defendant guilty of third-degree murder?

1. The trial court found that defendant had not established her defense of insanity by the required degree of proof. Defendant argues that this finding is in error, and that she did, in fact, meet her burden. In reviewing the sufficiency of the evidence in criminal cases, this court applies the same standard to cases heard before the court without a jury as to those heard by a jury. State v. Gardin, 251 Minn. 157, 161, 86 N.W.2d 711, 715 (1957); State v. Crosby, 277 Minn. 22, 24, 151 N.W.2d 297, 299 (1967).

Defendant seems to believe that the trial judge was dutybound to accept the opinions of the expert witnesses who testified in her behalf and to ignore expert testimony produced by the prosecution. There were three expert opinions rendered; two witnesses called by the defendant stated that in their opinion defendant at the time of the crimes was insane, and a rebuttal witness called by the state testified that in his opinion defendant was sane. There was vigorous cross-examination of all three experts.

This court's responsibility is not that of trying the facts again but of making a rigorous review of the record to determine whether the evidence, direct and circumstantial, viewed most favorably to support a finding of guilt, was sufficient to permit the trial court to reach its conclusion. State v. Thompson, 273 Minn. 1, 36, 139 N.W.2d 490, 515, certiorari denied, 385 U.S. 817, 87 S.Ct. 39, 17 L.Ed.2d 56 (1966); State v. Kline, 266 Minn. 372, 374, 124 N.W.2d 416, 418 (1963), certiorari denied, 376 U.S. 962, 84 S.Ct. 1124, 11 L.Ed.2d 980 (1964).

We have made a rigorous review of the record and find that the trial court's finding on this issue is well-founded. Defendant's actions prior to and after the commission of the crime established that she knew full well what she was doing. It is sufficient to state that we are convinced that the evidence sustains the court's finding on this issue.

2. Defendant further contends that she was denied due process of law when she was required to prove her defense of insanity as required under Minn.St. 611.025 and Minn.St.1969, § 611.026, because to do so denied her the right to the presumption of innocence and relieved the state from proving an essential element of the crime. She further claims that, as a result of the burden of proving insanity, she was forced to forego her right to remain silent and, thus, was placed in jeopardy of establishing that she had a depraved mind which resulted in her conviction of murder in the third degree. The pertinent statutes read as follows:

Minn.St. 611.025. 'Except as otherwise provided by law, in every criminal proceeding, a person is presumed to be responsible for his acts and the burden of rebutting such presumption is upon him.'

Minn.St.1969, § 611.026. 'No person shall be tried, sentenced, or punished for any crime while in a state of idiocy, imbecility, lunacy, or insanity, so as to be incapable of understanding the proceedings or making a defense; but he shall not be excused from criminal liability except upon proof that at the time of committing the alleged criminal act he was laboring under such a defect of reason, from one of these causes, as not to know the nature of his act, or that it was wrong.'

The statutes, in effect, state the so-called M'Naghten rule. It has been the law of this state since 1885 and has been commonly referred to as the 'right-and-wrong' test of criminal insanity. For many years the M'Naghten rule has been...