State v. Smith

• Decision Date: 17 May 1999
• Citation: 993 S.W.2d 6
• Parties: STATE of Tennessee, Appellee, v. Leonard Edward SMITH, Appellant.
• Court: Tennessee Supreme Court

Page 6

993 S.W.2d 6

STATE of Tennessee, Appellee, v. Leonard Edward SMITH, Appellant.

Supreme Court of Tennessee at Knoxville.

May 17, 1999.

J. Robert Boatright, Kingsport, Larry S. Weddington, Bristol, for Appellant.

John Knox Walkup, Attorney General and Reporter, Michael E. Moore, Solicitor General, Amy L. Tarkington, Senior Assistant Attorney Genera, Nashville, H. Greely Wells, Jr., District Attorney General, Blountville, for Appellee.

O P I N I O N

DROWOTA, Justice.

In this automatic appeal, ¹ the defendant, Leonard Edward Smith, raises numerous challenges to the decision of the Court of Criminal Appeals which affirmed his sentence of death for the 1984 murder of Novella Webb. After carefully examining the entire record and the law, including the thorough opinion of the Court of Criminal Appeals and the briefs of the defendant and the State, this Court entered an Order limiting review at oral argument to the following three issues: ²

(1) Whether the trial court was correct in allowing the defendant to control the presentation of mitigating evidence and to waive closing argument against counsel's advice;

(2) Whether the admittance of victim impact testimony and argument at the sentencing hearing constituted reversible error;

(3) Whether the sentence of death is arbitrary or disproportionate in violation of Tenn.Code Ann. § 39-13-206(c)(1)(A)-(D) (1997 Repl.).

After fully considering the record and the defendant's claims, we conclude that none of the alleged errors have merit. Contrary to Smith's assertions, the trial court had no authority to override the will of a competent and informed defendant and force Smith to present mitigation evidence and closing argument in his capital sentencing hearing. Moreover, the trial court did not err in allowing the State to present victim impact evidence and argument during the capital sentencing hearing. Finally, the evidence supports the jury's findings as to the aggravating and mitigating circumstances, and the sentence of death is not arbitrary or disproportionate to the sentence imposed in similar cases, considering the nature of the crime and the defendant. Accordingly, the judgment of the Court of Criminal Appeals upholding the defendant's sentence of death is affirmed.

BACKGROUND

In 1984 the defendant, Leonard Edward Smith, his friend, David Hartsock, and his girlfriend, Angela O'Quinn, robbed two small grocery stores in rural Sullivan County. Armed with a .32 caliber pistol, Hartsock entered Malone's Grocery alone, while Smith and O'Quinn waited for him outside the store in Smith's car. During the course of the robbery, Hartsock shot and killed John Pierce. The trio left Malone's Grocery and proceeded to Webb's store near the Carter-Sullivan County line. Both Smith and Hartsock entered Webb's store. ³ Smith was carrying the gun, and during the robbery, he shot and killed Novella Webb. The victim and her husband owned and operated the store.

The defendant was charged with two counts of first degree murder for the killings of Pierce and Webb. The offenses were joined for trial, and, at Smith's request, venue for the trial was changed from Sullivan to Hamblen County. Smith was convicted on both counts of first degree felony murder. At the conclusion of the proof, the State withdrew its notice of intent to seek the death penalty with respect to the Pierce murder, and the trial court imposed a life sentence. However, the jury imposed a sentence of death for the Webb murder. On his first direct appeal, this Court affirmed Smith's conviction and life sentence for the killing of Pierce, but reversed Smith's conviction of first degree murder and sentence of death for the Webb murder. Concluding that the offenses should not have been joined for trial and also finding prosecutorial misconduct during final argument, this Court reversed and remanded the case for a new trial. State v. Smith, 755 S.W.2d 757 (Tenn.1988) ("Smith I").

Smith was re-tried and again convicted of first degree felony murder and sentenced to death for the Webb killing. On the second direct appeal, this Court affirmed the conviction, but again vacated the death sentence, finding that the jury had been improperly allowed to consider the life sentence imposed for the Pierce murder in considering whether or not Smith should be sentenced to death for the Webb murder, and that the felony supporting the conviction of first degree murder had been improperly used to establish the felony murder aggravating circumstance in violation of State v. Middlebrooks, 840 S.W.2d 317 (Tenn.1992). The case was remanded to the trial court for a third sentencing hearing. See State v. Smith, 857 S.W.2d 1 (Tenn.1993) ("Smith II").

This case is Smith's appeal from the third sentencing hearing which was held in Hamblen County. ⁴ The State again sought and obtained the death penalty for the murder of Novella Webb. The State introduced very little proof regarding the circumstances of the offense at this third sentencing hearing. ⁵ After waiving opening statement, the State introduced proof to establish the single aggravating circumstance upon which it relied to support imposition of the death penalty--"[t]he defendant was previously convicted of one (1) or more felonies, other than the present charge, which involve the use or threat of violence to the person." Tenn.Code Ann. § 39-2-203(i)(2) (1982 Repl.) [currently Tenn.Code Ann. § 39-13-204(i)(2) (Supp.1998) ] ⁶

The State's proof consisted of copies of indictments and judgments reflecting that the defendant had been convicted of robbery in Carter County on October 13, 1980, and on February 21, 1985, and that the defendant had been convicted of first degree murder for the killing of John Pierce on March 20, 1985. The reference to the life sentence imposed for the Pierce murder conviction had been redacted from the copy of the judgment passed to the jury. The State also introduced the judgment which established that the defendant had been convicted of the first degree murder of the victim in this case on August 23, 1989. With respect to each of these convictions, the State offered identification testimony to establish that Leonard Edward Smith is the same person who was previously convicted of the robbery and murder offenses.

As its final witness, the State called Katy Mahoney, the daughter of the victim in this case. Mahoney testified that her father and mother had operated the country store Smith robbed for many years and that her mother had been fifty-nine-years-old when she was murdered. Mahoney testified that her father was seventy-eight-years-old at the time of the robbery and murder and that his ribs had been broken during the episode when he was pushed into a trash can. According to Mahoney, her father's health had declined "drastically" after the robbery and murder. He was never able to work again and eventually sold the store. He died the next year from a brain tumor. When asked how the family had been affected by her mother's murder, Mahoney testified that the murder "won't go away," that "we live with it all the time" and that "it's caused problems now for eleven years." The State rested its case-in-chief at the conclusion of Mahoney's testimony.

In mitigation the defense called Sullivan County Sheriff Keith Carr, who in 1984 had been the detective in charge of investigating the Webb murder. Shortly after his arrest, Smith had given Sheriff Carr a statement recounting his involvement in the murders of both John Pierce and Novella Webb. The entire statement, which the detective read to the resentencing jury at the request of defense counsel, is set forth below.

I, Leonard Edward Smith, am giving this statement of my own free will and without any threats or promises being made to me. On Monday, May 21, 1984, I was with my girlfriend Angie O'Quinn and David Hartsock, and, we went and got some liquor and went to a road near the Sullivan-Carter County line. We parked and were just drinking and talking and smoked some joints. While we were on that road in my black Ford Pinto which I had painted black because it used to be orange, David said "Get out, I want to talk to you." He and I got out and walked a ways from the car where Angie couldn't hear us talking and David said, "I can get us a little bit of money here at this store." He said, "It's the store down at the county line." I asked him if it was Shorty Malone's and he said, "Yes." Angie and I drove David down there, and let him off a little ways from the store. I parked on a little paved road beside the store. David had a .32 caliber chrome-plated pistol with him. The pistol was his pistol. I heard several shots fired and just a few seconds later David came running around the store. David jumped into the car and said, "Get the hell out of here, I had to shoot him." I figured it was Shorty because he ran the store. We drove out the road that goes beside of Malone's Grocery and it dead ends and you can turn left to the Wautauga area, or right back to Sullivan County. We turned onto the Wautauga Highway and drove to what is known as Mountain Road. I asked David if he shot the man, and he said, he shot him one time and the man pulled a gun and started shooting at him. I don't remember if he said what money he got. I drunk some more liquor, and made Angie get out of the car. I started drinking and was just going to drive us out of the mountain. We came out at some store, and I turned left and, drove until I realized I was going to [sic] wrong way, and I pulled it in at Webb's Store to turn. I stopped the car at Webb's and David jumped out, and I ran in the store behind him. David ran and jumped on the counter, and knocked the old man over and yelled to me to, "get that bitch" referring to an old woman at the end of the counter. I started towards her, and she started throwing things at me and started spraying paint on me. I fired one shot just to scare people, but, the old woman just kept spraying orange...