State v. Park

• Decision Date: 30 July 1963
• Citation: 159 Me. 328,193 A.2d 1
• Parties: STATE of Maine v. Ralph Thomas PARK, II.
• Court: Maine Supreme Court

Page 1

193 A.2d 1

159 Me. 328

STATE of Maine v. Ralph Thomas PARK, II.

Supreme Judicial Court of Maine.

July 30, 1963.

Jon Lund, County Atty., Kennebec County, Foahd Saliem, Asst. County Atty., Wayne Hollingsworth, Asst. Atty. Gen., Augusta, for plaintiff.

Lewis I. Naiman, Harold Shapiro, Gardiner, for defendant.

Before WILLIAMSON, C. J., and WEBBER, TAPLEY, SULLIVAN, SIDDALL and MARDEN, JJ.

WILLIAMSON, Chief Justice.

The respondent, a boy fifteen years old, was convicted of murder at the October 1962 term of the Kennebec Superior Court on pleas of not guilty and not guilty by reason of insanity. The case is before us on exceptions to the refusal of the presiding Justice to give requested instructions to the jury. The exceptions are overruled.

The jury in reaching its verdict could have found the following facts. The respondent 'bumped into' the victim Avis Longfellow, a girl fifteen years old, on a camp road at Lake Cobbosseecontee. The victim dropped a child about two years old she was carrying and called the respondent 'a queer', a term which he understood referred to a 'filthy thing'--a 'common sexual perversion.' The respondent then drew from his pocket a jackknife and stabbed the victim to death by inflicting more than forty knife wounds. He then pursued and stabbed the young child.

The respondent did not take the stand. The evidence of the physical contact with the victim and her words came from oral admissions and a signed statement by the respondent. Expert evidence of psychiatrists was offered by both State and respondent on the issue of insanity.

On the evidence the jury was fully justified in finding the respondent guilty of murder.

EXCEPTION 1

The error claimed in Exception 1 is that the Court removed the issue of manslaughter from consideration of the jury. The instructions requested and refused raise two points: (1) that the general law of manslaughter (apart from any question of mental condition) was applicable on the evidence; and (2), in the words of his brief, that 'The general law of murder with respect to the alleged commission of the crime by the respondent, while suffering from either a mental disease or defect, as defined by Sec. 38-A, Chap. 149, R.S. of Maine, 1961, (Durham v. United States , 214 F.2d 862 , and McDonald v. United States [113 U.S.App.D.C. ----], 312 F.2d 847), which has the effect of reducing the crime of murder to that of manslaughter, by virtue of the fact that the mental disease or defect wipes out the specific intent of premeditation or deliberation, and malice aforethought.'

In the course of the charge the presiding Justice discussed among other matters the law relating to murder, manslaughter, and insanity or mental responsibility for criminal conduct under the 1961 Act, or Durham Rule as modified by the Legislature. R.S. c. 149, § 38-A. He stated in substance that there was no evidence in the case which could reduce the killing (if established) from murder to manslaughter. Three possible verdicts were submitted to the jury; namely, not guilty, guilty of murder, and not guilty by reason of insanity.

There was plainly no question about the fact of the killing by the respondent. It may fairly be said that the jury was left with the choice of finding the respondent guilty of murder or not guilty by reason of insanity.

Murder and manslaughter are defined by statute in R.S. c. 130 as follows:

'Sec. 1. Murder, definition.--Whoever unlawfully kills a human being with malice aforethought, either express or implied, is guilty of murder and shall be punished by imprisonment for life.'

'Sec. 8. Manslaughter, definition.--Whoever unlawfully kills a human being in the heat of passion, on sudden provocation, without express or implied malice aforethought * * * or commits manslaughter as defined by the common law, shall be punished by a fine of not more than $1,000 or by imprisonment for not more than 20 years.' (Emphasis ours)

The differences between the two offenses have been set forth by our Court in the often cited cases below.

'The jury was instructed that murder was the unlawful killing of a human being with malice aforethought, either express or implied;----

'That when a human being was unlawfully killed without said malice, upon sudden provocation, and in the heat of passion, and under such circumstances that it could not be justified or excused, the crime would be manslaughter; * * *' State v. Conley, 39 Me. 78, 88.

'The jury were instructed that 'where the killing is unlawful, and neither express or implied malice exists, the crime is reduced from murder to manslaughter. But in all cases where the unlawful killing is proved, and there is nothing in the circumstances of the case as proved, to explain, qualify or palliate the act, the law presumes it to have been done maliciously; and if the accused would reduce the crime below the degree of murder, the burden is upon him to rebut the inference of malice, which the law raises from the act of killing, by evidence in defence.'' State v. Knight, 43 Me. 11, 137.

'Malice is implied by law from any deliberate, cruel act, committed by one person against another, suddenly, without any, or without a considerable provocation. And all homicide is, as a general rule, presumed to be malicious, until the contrary appears from circumstances of alleviation, to be made out by the prisoner, unless they arise out of the evidence produced against him. 1 Russ. on Crim. 183, and authorities there cited.' State v. Neal, 37 Me. 468, 470; State v. Arsenault, 152 Me. 121, 124 A.2d 741.

Setting aside any question arising from the respondent's mental condition, we find in the record no evidence from which the jury could have found that the homicide was committed without implied malice. '[Malice] is implied when there is no showing of actual intent to kill, but death is caused by acts which the law regards as manifesting such an abandoned state of mind as to be equivalent to a purpose to murder. Malice includes intent and will.' State of Maine v. Merry, 136 Me. 243, 248, 8 A.2d 143, 146.

At best for the respondent, he 'bumped into' the deceased and was angered by her calling him 'a queer'. There is not the slightest evidence that the physical contact was an offensive act by the deceased against the respondent. If the words of the deceased angered the respondent, he is faced with the plain rule of law that words alone do not constitute sufficient provocation to reduce homicide from murder to manslaughter.

'In considering what is regarded as such adequate provocation, it is a settled rule of law, that no provocation by words only, however opprobrious, will mitigate an intentional homicide, so as to reduce it to manslaughter.' Commonwealth v. Webster, 59 Mass. (5 Cush.) 295, 305.

'The principle * * * that an affray may occur or sudden provocation be given which, if acted on in the heat of passion produced thereby, might mitigate homicide to manslaughter, yet if the provocation, though sudden, be not of that character which would, in the mind of a just and reasonable man, stir resentment to violence, endangering life, the killing would be murder, applies here.' Holmes v. State (Ala.) 7 So. 193, 194.

See Commonwealth v. York, 50 Mass. (9 Metc.) 93; People v. Marrow, 403 Ill. 69, 85 N.E.2d 34; Commonwealth v. Cisneros 381 Pa. 447, 113 A.2d 293; 1 Wharton's Crim.Law (12th ed.) §§ 584, 585; 40 C.J.S. Homicide §§ 46, 47; 26 Am.Jur., Homicide §§ 25, 29.

Whether there was any evidence from which the jury could find provocation and other elements reducing the offense to manslaughter, was a question of law for the determination of the Court. The jury is the judge of the facts and must take the law from the Court. State v. Wright, 53 Me. 328, 345. In the absence of any evidence from which the jury could find manslaughter, the Court properly withdrew the issue from their consideration. There was no error in failing to give the requested instructions. Foster v. State, 37 Ariz. 281, 294 P. 268; Singh v. State, 35 Ariz. 432, 280 P. 672, 67 A.L.R. 129; Sparf and Hansen v. United States, 156 U.S. 51, 62, 103, 15 S.Ct. 273, 39 L.Ed. 343; State v. Nelson, N.H., 175 A.2d 814; Commonwealth v. Cisneros, supra; State v. Prescott, 70 R.I. 403, 40 A.2d 721; State v. Cianflone, 98 Conn. 454, 120 A. 347; Commonwealth v. Moore, 323 Mass. 70, 80 N.E.2d 24; Commonwealth v. Heinlein, 256 Mass. 387, 152 N.E. 380; 16 C.J., Criminal Law § 2485; 26 Am.Jur., Homicide §§ 555, 559; 41 C.J.S. Homicide §§ 390, 395; Abbott, Criminal Trial Practice (4th ed.) § 674, p. 1266; 2 Bishop's New Criminal Procedure § 980.

We are aware that under our practice as a matter of custom the jury in murder cases is generally given the opportunity to find manslaughter. In State v. Albanes, 109 Me. 199, 83 A. 548, however, the Court with one Justice dissenting upheld a conviction of murder when manslaughter was not given as a possible verdict.

In State v. Duguay, 158 Me. 61, 178 A.2d 129, it was urged on appeal that the homicide was manslaughter and not murder. The case does not hold, as suggested by the respondent, that in every case an instruction permitting a manslaughter verdict must be given, but only that, such an instruction having been given, the verdict of murder was fully justified.

The respondent further contends that mental disease or defect as defined in our 1961 statute compels the reduction of homicide from murder to manslaughter. He would have us adopt a rule of partial or limited responsibility, bearing upon the degree of the offense. This we are not prepared to do.

The line between criminal responsibility and lack of criminal responsibility is drawn by our 1961 statute. We then discarded the McNaghten Rule and adopted the Durham Rule with modifications.

The statute in R.S. c. 149 reads:

'Sec. 38-A. Responsibility. An accused is not criminally responsible if his unlawful act was the product of mental disease or mental defect. The terms 'mental disease' or ...