State v. Shockley

• Decision Date: 29 October 2013
• Docket Number: No. SC 90286.,SC 90286.
• Citation: 410 S.W.3d 179
• Parties: STATE of Missouri, Respondent, v. Lance C. SHOCKLEY, Appellant.
• Court: Missouri Supreme Court

410 S.W.3d 179

STATE of Missouri, Respondent,

v.Lance C. SHOCKLEY, Appellant.

No. SC 90286.

Supreme Court of Missouri, En Banc.

Aug. 13, 2013.

Rehearing Denied Oct. 29, 2013.

Michael A. Gross, of Sher Corwin LLC, St. Louis, for Shockley.

Missouri Attorney General, Chris Koster and Daniel N. McPherson, Attorney General's Office, Jefferson City, for the State.

LAURA DENVIR STITH, Judge.

A jury convicted Lance Shockley of first-degree murder for the 2005 shooting death of Missouri highway patrolman, Sergeant Carl DeWayne Graham, Jr. The jury found the facts required by law to be established in order to impose a death sentence but was unable to agree whether to recommend a sentence of death or of life imprisonment. Pursuant to section 565.030.4, RSMo 2000¹, the trial court conducted an independent review of the facts and imposed a death sentence. Mr. Shockley appeals. He argues that errors in the preparation of the trial transcript preclude adequate appellate review, that various evidentiary and instructional errors occurred, that the statute authorizing a trial judge to impose a sentence of death after the jury is unable to agree on punishment is unconstitutional, that a particular juror may have tainted jury deliberations, and that imposition of a death sentence is disproportionate to the strength of the evidence. For the reasons set forth below, this Court finds no reversible error in any of the points raised, finds that the sentence is proportionate to the crime and the defendant and affirms.

I. STATEMENT OF FACTS

Considering the evidence in the light most favorable to the jury's verdict, State v. Davis, 318 S.W.3d 618 (Mo. banc 2010), on the evening of November 26, 2004, Mr. Shockley and his sister-in-law's fiance, Jeffrey Bayless, went for a drive in Mr. Bayless' truck. On their drive back home, Mr. Shockley lost control of the vehicle and crashed it into a ditch. Mr. Shockley got out of the truck and walked to the nearby home of Ivy and Paul Napier. He informed the couple that he had been in an accident and needed help. Ivy noticed blood on Mr. Shockley's hands and invited him inside. Mr. Napier accompanied Mr. Shockley to the accident scene and found Mr. Bayless injured beyond help. The two returned to the Napier residence where Mr. Shockley called his wife. Mr. Napier and Mr. Shockley then left and Ms. Napier called 911. She then set out for the crash site, where she spotted the truck off the side of the road and found Mr. Bayless inside. She checked him for a pulse and found none. In the meantime, Mr. Shockley joined Coree Shockley and her sister, Cindy Chilton, in their vehicle. During the drive, Mr. Shockley told Ms. Chilton that her fiancé Mr. Bayless was dead. The women then left Mr. Shockley at his house and joined Ms. Napier at the accidentscene. By the time they arrived, Mr. Napier had returned to the scene as well. When local police and highway patrol officers arrived at the scene, they discovered Mr. Bayless' body slumped over in the passenger seat of the vehicle. They also discovered beer cans and a tequila bottle inside the truck and a blood smear above the passenger-side wheel well on the outside of the truck. They instructed the three women and Mr. Napier to head home.

Highway patrol Sergeant Carl DeWayne Graham, Jr., headed the investigation of the accident. The night of the accident he spoke with Mr. Shockley at his home. Mr. Shockley did not admit to being involved in the accident. Before leaving, Sergeant Graham consoled Ms. Chilton and gave her his business card. She made no mention of Mr. Shockley's connection to the accident. Sergeant Graham then visited the Napiers. Although Mr. Shockley had previously confessed to Ms. Napier that he had been driving the truck, she said she did not know who was involved in the accident.

Four months later, Sergeant Graham visited Ms. Napier again, this time at her place of work. When he falsely told her that Mr. Shockley had admitted his involvement in the accident, Ms. Napier admitted to Sergeant Graham that Mr. Shockley had showed up at her house and asked for help after he wrecked the truck. Later that afternoon, Ms. Napier spoke with Mr. Shockley and learned that he actually had not confessed anything to Sergeant Graham about the accident.

Later that day, Ms. Chilton's mother informed her that Sergeant Graham wanted to speak with her about the accident. Mr. Shockley told Ms. Chilton that she did not have to talk to Sergeant Graham. Mr. Shockley then obtained Sergeant Graham's home address from Ms. Chilton's stepfather, who was a friend of Sergeant Graham's landlord.

At approximately 12:20 p.m. the next day, March 20, 2005, Mr. Shockley borrowed his grandmother's red 1995 Pontiac Grand Am. The car had a bright yellow sticker on the driver's side of the trunk. Between about 1:45 p.m. and 4:15 p.m. that afternoon, various witnesses noticed a red Pontiac Grand Am—with a bright yellow sticker affixed to the driver's side of the trunk—parked on the wrong side of the road a few hundred feet from Sergeant Graham's residence. Mr. Shockley returned the Grand Am to his grandmother between 4:15 p.m. and 4:30 p.m. that same day. Investigators calculated that it took approximately 18 minutes to drive from Mr. Shockley's grandmother's house to the location where the red Grand Am with the yellow sticker had been parked near Sergeant Graham's house.

At 4:03 p.m. that day, Sergeant Graham had returned home, backed his patrol car into his driveway, and radioed dispatch that he was ending his shift. As Sergeant Graham exited his vehicle, he was shot from behind with a high-powered rifle that penetrated his Kevlar vest. The bullet severed his spinal cord at the neck, immediately paralyzing him. He fell backward and suffered fractures to his skull and ribs upon impact with the pavement. At this point, Sergeant Graham was still alive. The killer then approached Sergeant Graham and shot him twice more with a shotgun—into the face and shoulder. Sergeant Graham's body was discovered around 5:15 p.m. that day. The recovered rifle bullet was deformed, but ballistics experts determined that it belonged to the .22 to .24 caliber class of ammunition that would fit a .243 caliber rifle. Investigators later learned that around 7:00 p.m. on the evening of Sergeant Graham's murder, Ms. Shockley gave Mr. Shockley's uncle a box of .243 caliber bullets and stated, “Lance said you'd know what to do with them.”

That night, two Highway Patrol investigators went to the Shockley residence to interview Mr. Shockley. They were accompanied by S.W.A.T. members, who concealed themselves in the woods around the property. Before approaching the door, the investigators called Mr. Shockley on the telephone and informed him that they wanted to speak about the murder of Sergeant Graham. Mr. Shockley refused to talk, stating that he was a busy man and that they should visit him at work.

After the telephone call ended, the investigators saw Mr. Shockley walk out the front door of his house. They approached and identified themselves. Mr. Shockley immediately denied killing Sergeant Graham and stated that he had spent all day working around his house with his neighbor Sylvan Duncan. Mr. Shockley then told the investigators that the conversation was over and to get off of his property.

Shortly after the investigators departed but before all S.W.A.T. members had left, Mr. Shockley saw a S.W.A.T. member and yelled at him. When the members of S.W.A.T. started to leave, one S.W.A.T. member accidentally discharged his weapon while getting up off of the ground, injuring another S.W.A.T. member.

At about 11:30 a.m. the next day the two investigators with whom Mr. Shockley had spoken the night before approached him outside his workplace, where he was sitting in his car eating lunch with his cousin. Mr. Shockley told the officers he would speak with them when he finished eating. While the investigators waited by their car, Mr. Shockley called his wife on his cousin's cell phone and asked whether she had spoken with the police. She said that she had told the police that Mr. Shockley had been at home the day of the shooting until almost 5:45 p.m., when he went to his uncle's for a few minutes. Mr. Shockley responded, “Okay, that will work, that will be fine.”

Mr. Shockley then met with the investigators and elaborated on the alibi he had given them the night before, claiming that he had spent the previous day visiting relatives, including his grandmother, and that he watched from his living room as his neighbor, Sylvan Duncan, pushed brush. He also said he knew Sergeant Graham was investigating him for the fatal truck accident and, without prompting, declared that he did not know where Sergeant Graham lived. Mr. Shockley's parting words to the investigators were, “Don't come back to my house without a search warrant, because if you do there's going to be trouble and somebody is going to be shot.”

Later that day, Mr. Shockley visited his grandmother and instructed her to tell the police that he had been home all day on the day Sergeant Graham was murdered. When his grandmother told Mr. Shockley she would not lie for him, he put his finger over her mouth and said, “I was home all day.” He also told his cousin, who had overheard his lunch break telephone call with Mrs. Shockley, not to say anything about it.

Police arrested Mr. Shockley March 23, 2005, for leaving the scene of the November 26, 2004, car accident that resulted in Mr. Bayless' death. On March 29, the State charged Mr. Shockley with leaving the scene of a motor vehicle accident, armed criminal action and first-degree murder for the death of Sergeant Graham and sought the death penalty. The State proceeded to trial only on the first-degree murder charge. Its case theory was that Mr. Shockley killed the sergeant to stop the investigation into the death of Mr. Bayless. Mr. Shockley's defense was that it would have been ridiculous for...