State v. Stager

• Decision Date: 14 August 1991
• Docket Number: No. 212A89,212A89
• Citation: 406 S.E.2d 876,329 N.C. 278
• Parties: STATE of North Carolina v. Barbara T. STAGER.
• Court: North Carolina Supreme Court

Page 876

406 S.E.2d 876

329 N.C. 278

STATE of North Carolina v.Barbara T. STAGER.

No. 212A89.

Supreme Court of North Carolina.

Aug. 14, 1991.

Appeal of right pursuant to N.C.G.S. § 7A-27(a) from a judgment imposing a sentence of death upon the defendant's conviction for first-degree murder, entered by Allen (J.B.), Jr., J., in Superior Court, Lee County, on 19 May 1989.Heard in the Supreme Court on 6 May 1991.

Lacy H. Thornburg, Atty. Gen. by William N. Farrell, Jr., Sp. Deputy Atty. Gen., Raleigh, for the State.

Tharrington, Smith & Hargrove by Roger W. Smith, Melissa H. Hill, Douglas A. Ruley, Daniel W. Clark, and Marcus W. Trathen, Raleigh, for defendant-appellant.

MITCHELL, Justice.

The defendant was tried on a true bill of indictment at the 1 May 1989 Criminal Session of Superior Court, Lee County, and was convicted of one count of murder in the first degree.The jury recommended and the trial court entered a sentence of death.On appeal, the defendant brings forth numerous assignments of error.We conclude that the guilt-innocence determination phase of the defendant's trial was free from prejudicial error.However, errors during the sentencing proceeding require that the sentence of death be vacated and that this case be remanded to the Superior Court for a new sentencing proceeding complying with the recent decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in McKoy v. North Carolina, 494 U.S. 433, 110 S.Ct. 1227, 108 L.Ed.2d 369(1990).

The State's evidence in the present case tended to show that in the fall of 1978, the defendant and the victim, Allison Russell Stager III, met and began dating.On 17 March 1979, they were married.

On 1 February 1988, the defendant and Russell Stager resided in Durham.Jason and Brian Stager, the defendant's sons from her previous marriage, had been adopted by Russell approximately eight years earlier.Fourteen-year-old Jason lived with his parents.

At 6:08 a.m. on 1 February 1988, Jason Stager telephoned the 911 emergency operator from his home.Jason told the operator that his father had suffered a gunshot wound and that his mother had asked him to call for an ambulance.A volunteer unit from the Lebanon Fire Department(the "Lebanon First Responders"), an Emergency Medical Services unit, and three deputies from the Durham County Sheriff's Department were dispatched to the residence.

Douglas Griffin of the Lebanon First Responders was the first person to arrive.Jason Stager directed Griffin to a bedroom.The bedroom door was open approximately two inches.When the door opened, the light came on in the darkened bedroom and the defendant appeared at the door.Griffin recalled that she showed "a slight indication of crying but very little."

The defendant backed up and motioned toward the bed as Griffin entered.Russell Stager was lying with his left side on the right side of the bed.He was not lying "cleanly on his shoulder," but was turned slightly toward the pillow with his face in the pillow and his left eye somewhat covered by the pillow.There was a twelve to eighteen inch blood stain on the pillow behind Russell's head, and blood was coming from his nose and mouth.There also was blood on the hair on the back left side of his head.His body was normal in color, but his face was ashen and his eyes were rolled back in his head.

Griffin pivoted Russell so that his face would be out of the pillow and his breathing would be easier.As Griffin was taking the victim's blood pressure and pulse, Doug Wingate, another member of the Lebanon First Responders, entered the room and began to help.In the process of reading Russell's vital signs, they turned his head.This caused the pillow to shift around, thereby exposing a .25 caliber Beretta pistol.Beyond the pistol, and further underneath the pillow, lay a spent shell casing.Noticing that the hammer on the pistol was cocked, Griffin did not move the pistol.The defendant commented that she had already moved the pistol.

When Wingate asked the defendant what had happened, she said that the gun had discharged as she was pulling it out from under the pillow.She said that she had heard her son get up, and she had been trying to remove the gun in case her husband awoke and thought someone was in the house.The defendant told Wingate that they kept a gun because they had heard noises at night and were concerned about burglars.

The first law enforcement officer to arrive on the scene was Deputy Sheriff Clark Green.When he arrived shortly after 6:15 a.m., the defendant was sitting on the edge of the bed and had changed into blue jeans, a sweat shirt, and tennis shoes.Her appearance was neat.Deputy Green secured the area and, together with Deputy Sheriff Paul Ernest Hornbuckle, interviewed the defendant.

Before they began the questioning, the defendant repeatedly said, "I kept telling him about those damn guns."The officers asked the defendant for some general information such as the victim's full name and age, and she was able to answer their questions without difficulty.They asked her about the gun, and the defendant stated that her husband was "in a stage about guns" and occasionally slept with a pistol.At that time, the defendant's son Jason came up and she directed Jason to tell the officers "about him having these stages about guns, he carries guns in the cars, leaves them under the pillow, he is scared [sic] about somebody coming into the house."Both Jason and the defendant said that the victim occasionally slept with a gun under his pillow.Deputy Green asked the defendant if there were any marital problems, and she said no.

While the officers were questioning the defendant, one of the emergency medical technicians interrupted to ask if one of the officers would remove the gun from the bedroom.Deputy Hornbuckle removed the gun from beneath the pillow; the gun pointed toward the victim.The shell casing was also removed from under the edge of the pillow.

Michael Kevin Wilson, a member of the Lebanon First Responders and also an emergency medical technician with Durham County Hospital, arrived at the scene after Deputy Hornbuckle had removed the gun.When Wilson arrived, the defendant was standing in the bedroom to the left of the bed.The defendant became such a distraction to the medical personnel that they asked Deputy Hornbuckle to remove her from the room.The defendant repeatedly made statements such as "I'm scared of these things, my God I wish we didn't have them....I wish he wouldn't have these things under there, I'm scared of guns, guns are not safe, you know, there are kids in the house."Wilson described the repetitious nature of these statements as like a "chant."

Wilson was a member of the same church as Barbara and Russell Stager and Russell's parents.After Russell was treated at the Stager residence and transported to Duke Medical Center, Wilson told the defendant that he would be happy to contact her husband's parents or their pastor and drive them to the hospital.The defendant responded that she did not want Russell's father called and told Wilson not to call anyone.Wilson testified that the defendant's response startled him.He later asked Douglas Griffin, the first person to arrive at the scene, to go home and immediately prepare a report concerning what he had observed at the scene that morning.Griffin's report indicated that the defendant had stated to the emergency medical personnel that her husband had been hearing sounds outside of the house during the night and had placed the pistol under his pillow.The next morning, upon hearing her son awake in the house, the defendant reached under the pillow to remove the pistol and it fired.

Phyllis Hunnicutt Cagle, secretary to the principal at Durham High School, testified that the defendant telephoned her at home around 7:00 a.m. on 1 February 1988.The defendant informed Cagle that the victim, a coach and teacher at the school, would not be at work that day.When Cagle asked the defendant if the victim was sick, the defendant hesitated and then said "yes."

Doris Stager, the mother of the victim, testified that she last saw her son alive on 31 January 1988, the day before his death.She recalled that after supper, while they were sitting around, the defendant asked Russell to move from a chair at the end of the couch to a chair sitting across from his mother.After he moved to the chair across from his mother, the defendant sat down on the floor beside the chair, reached up and held his hand.As the defendant reached up and grabbed Russell's hand, she looked directly at Doris.Russell did not respond to the defendant's display of affection.

On 1 February 1988, at approximately 8:45 a.m., Doris received a telephone call from the defendant's mother, Marva Terry.She told Doris that the victim was in the emergency room at Duke Hospital and that the defendant wanted Doris there.As Doris walked into the room at the hospital, the defendant began saying, "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to do it, forgive me."Russell Stager died around noon that day.

Doris Stager testified further that on 2 February 1988, she and her husband were at the funeral home assisting the defendant with the funeral arrangements when she heard the defendant speaking with the funeral director about drawing Social Security on the two boys.On 5 February, the defendant called Doris and informed her that she had been to the Veterans Administration.The defendant wanted to know if Russell had ever been in the regular Army.She said that she had been told that she could draw insurance only if Russell had been in the regular Army.Doris responded that he had been in the Army Reserves and the National Guard.On the following Tuesday, 9 February 1988, the defendant told Doris that she had given all of Russell's clothes to two churches.On 15 February 1988, the defendant and Doris had a conversation at Doris' home.The defendant again told Doris that...