State v. Schantz

• Decision Date: 23 June 1965
• Docket Number: No. 1322,1322
• Citation: 98 Ariz. 200,403 P.2d 521
• Parties: STATE of Arizona, Appellee, v. Joseph Alvin SCHANTZ, Appellant.
• Court: Arizona Supreme Court

Page 521

403 P.2d 521

98 Ariz. 200

STATE of Arizona, Appellee, v. Joseph Alvin SCHANTZ, Appellant.

No. 1322.

Supreme Court of Arizona, In Banc.

June 23, 1965.

Rehearing Denied July 13, 1965.

Darrell F. Smith, Atty. Gen., Robert W. Pickrell, former Atty. Gen., Paul G. Rosenblatt, Asst. Atty. Gen., for appellee.

Lewis, Roca, Scoville, Beauchamp & Linton, John J. Flynn and James Moeller, Phoenix, for appellant.

STRUCKMEYER, Vice Chief Justice.

The defendant Joseph Alvin Schantz was informed against and tried for the murder of his wife, Matilda Schantz. The trial court directed a verdict of not guilty of first degree murder and the jury returned a verdict of murder in the second degree on his plea of not guilty. From the judgment and sentence thereon he appeals.

On March 24, 1962, defendant and his wife resided at 1440 South 41st Place in the City of Phoenix. At about the hour of 12:30 a. m. several neighbors were awakened by Mrs. Schantz screaming. They looked into the kitchen window of the Schantz' residence and saw the defendant and his wife struggling over a butcher knife held by the defendant. The deceased in the course of the struggle fell to the floor and defendant was observed stabbing her repeatedly in the back and neck. Thereafter, defendant seized a ten-inch cast-iron skillet and beat deceased about the head and body. When the police arrived, they found the deceased on the floor, cut and bleeding, and the skillet broken into pieces. At that time, defendant's demeanor was described as calm and a little talkative. Defendant pleaded not guilty and subsequently, pursuant to Rule 192, Rules of Criminal Procedure, 17 A.R.S., served a written notice of his intention to show in evidence that at the time of the offense he was insance or mentally defective.

Doctor Maier Tuchler, a psychiatrist, was called by defendant and he testified that he had examined defendant on numerous occasions since the offense and gave as his opinion that defendant at the time of the offense did not know the nature and significance of his acts and did not know right from wrong. He further testified that defendant had total amnesia for the events related to the homicide and that his efforts to bring back defendant's memory were unsuccessful; that an amnesia state exists where the emotional state predominates without the conscious awareness of the individual; that actions in such a state are outside the person's deliberate volitional conscious awareness.

At the conclusion of the evidence, defendant moved that the jury be directed to return a verdict of acquittal. The motion was granted as to the charge of first degree murder and denied as to second degree and manslaughter. The issues of deliberation and premeditation arising out of the charge of first degree murder could have been submitted to the jury since the jury was not compelled to accept the uncontradicted opinion testimony of an expert, Sapp v. Lifrand, 44 Ariz. 321, 36 P.2d 794, and see Commonwealth v. Carroll, 412 Pa. 525, 194 A.2d 911, nor the uncorroborated testimony of a party to an action, Rowe v. Goldberg Film Delivery Lines, Inc., 50 Ariz. 349, 72 P.2d 432. However, where the trial judge has a conscientious conviction that all the elements of an offense have not been established beyond a reasonable doubt, e. g., premeditation or deliberation, he has not only the right but the duty to direct a verdict of acquittal.

The defendant then proposed that there be submitted to the jury his requested instruction No. 30 ¹ which the trial court refused. Defendant thus raises the question whether the evidence of Dr. Tuchler, that the defendant's acts were without his deliberate volitional conscious awareness, may be considered by the jury to negate malice aforethought. The issue presented requires a somewhat extended examination of the law of homicide as it exists in this jurisdiction.

The legislature has prescribed a simple and complete system of laws for the handling of homicides in Arizona. It presents no paradoxes or dilemmas although the application of the facts to the law is not always simple or easy. By A.R.S. § 13-451 et seq., the unlawful killing of a human being with malice aforethought is murder. The killing is unlawful if it is not excused by § 13-460 or justified under §§ 13-461 and 13-462. ² Malice aforethought is more than ill will, hatred or revenge. It means the intent to kill without legal justification. ³ State v. Hudson, 85 Ariz. 77, 331 P.2d 1092; Bennett v. State, 15 Ariz. 58, 136 P. 276.

If the killing is wilful, deliberate and premeditated or committed during the perpetration of certain specified crimes, i. e., robbery, it is of the first degree. If the unlawful killing lacks wilfulness, deliberation or premeditation and is not in the commission of one of the specified crimes but if accompanied by malice aforethought, it is murder of the second degree. If an unlawful killing lacks the element of malice aforethought, it is still the lesser offense known as manslaughter which if committed upon a sudden quarrel or heat of passion is known as voluntary manslaughter. It may be here observed that while technically manslaughter is not a degree of murder, in substance they are different degrees of the single crime of criminal homicide, Chisley v. State, 202 Md. 87, 95 A.2d 577; State v. Hutter, 145 Neb. 798, 18 N.E.2d 203; and see Rhea v. Territory, 3 Okl.Cr. 230, 105 P. 314.

Murder of the first degree is punishable by death or imprisonment in the State Prison for life at the discretion of the jury trying the person charged or the judge upon a plea of guilty. Murder in the second degree is punishable by imprisonment in the State Prison for not less than ten years, and a conviction for manslaughter subjects the accused to imprisonment in the State Prison for not to exceed ten years. A.R.S. §§ 13-452, 13-454 and 13-456.

In the past, Arizona has uniformly adhered to what is known as the Rule of M'Naghten's Case as the test for criminal insanity. State v. Preis, 89 Ariz. 336, 362 P.2d 660, cert. den. 368 U.S. 934, 82 S.Ct. 372, 7 L.Ed.2d 196; State v. Crose, 88 Ariz. 389, 357 P.2d 136; State v. Coey, 82 Ariz. 133, 309 P.2d 260; State v. Eisenstein, 72 Ariz. 320, 235 P.2d 1011; State v. Macias, 60 Ariz. 93, 131 P.2d 810; Burgunder v. State, 55 Ariz. 411, 103 P.2d 256; Judd v. State, 41 Ariz. 176, 16 P.2d 720; Foster v. State, 37 Ariz. 281, 294 P. 268; Lauterio v. State, 23 Ariz. 15, 201 P. 91.

In 1843, in M'Naghten's Case, one Daniel M'Naghten killed a man with a shot intended for Sir Robert Peel. M'Naghten was tried for murder. The Queen v. M'Naghten, 4 St.Tr. (N.S.) 847. It was established that he was laboring under an insane delusion and in a seriously disordered mental condition. He was found not guilty under an instruction which told the jury to acquit him if he 'had not the use of his understanding, so as to know he was doing a wrong or wicked act.' The House of Lords, 10 Clark & Fin. 200, 8 Eng. Reprint 718, put certain questions to the judges who answered:

'[T]o establish a defence on the ground of insanity, it must be clearly proved that, at the time of the committing of the act, the party accused was labouring under such a defect of reason, from disease of the mind, as not to know the nature and quality of the act he was doing; or, if he did know it, that he did not know he was doing what was wrong.' 8 Eng. Reprint at p. 722.

This was in substance the test of legal insanity as it was known to the common law of England. See Rex v. Arnold, 16 Howell St.Tr. 695, 764 (1724).

This test of legal insanity has two elements. An accused must have had at the time of the commission of the criminal act:

(1) Such a defect of reason as not to know the nature and quality of the act, or

(2) If he did know, that he did not know he was doing what was wrong.

Where insanity is an issue, the burden of the State is to establish beyond a reasonable doubt the converse; that is, that the defendant knew the nature and quality of his act and that he knew that what he was doing was wrong. Whereas the M'Naghten test for criminal responsibility involves a defect in perception or cognition, the requested instruction permits the jury to find the defendant not guilty of second degree murder if he was suffering from a mental impairment, defect, disorder, or deficiency so as to be incapable of entertaining malice aforethought, the intent to kill. This adds a third element, defect in volition.

The defendant states that the principle embodied in the requested instruction 'has been variously referred to as the 'doctrine of diminished responsibility,' 'doctrine of partial responsibility,' 'partial insanity,' and otherwise.' But whatever name may be used, in this appeal we take it to mean mental derangement distinguishable from the cognitive insanity as understood in the common law and contemplated by the rule of M'Naghten's Case. The practical result is that in the case of first degree murder the jury could consider defects in the volitional processes to determine the lack of deliberation and premeditation and, as here, in the case of second degree murder, the lack of malice aforethought necessary to establish the unlawful killing as murder.

Defendant urges that the Model Penal Code of the American Law Institute, by § 4.02(1), Proposed Official Draft, May 1962, supports his position. That section provides:

'Evidence that the defendant suffered from a mental disease or defect is admissible whenever it is relevant to prove that the defendant did or did not have a state of mind which is an element of the offense.'

To determine the propriety of the evidence introduced § 4.02(1) must be examined in the light of § 4.01, 'Mental Disease or Defect Excluding Responsibility.'

'(1) A person is not responsible for criminal conduct if at the time of such conduct as a result of mental disease or defect he lacks substantial capacity either to appreciate the criminality [wrongfulness]...