State v. Vrabel, 2000-0644.

• Decision Date: 02 July 2003
• Docket Number: No. 2000-0644.,2000-0644.
• Citation: 790 N.E.2d 303,2003 Ohio 3193
• Parties: THE STATE OF OHIO, APPELLEE, v. VRABEL, APPELLANT.
• Court: Ohio Supreme Court

Page 1

THE STATE OF OHIO, APPELLEE,v.

VRABEL, APPELLANT.

No. 2000-0644.

Supreme Court of Ohio.

Submitted February 25, 2003.

Decided July 2, 2003.

Criminal law — Aggravated murder — Death penalty upheld, when.

APPEAL from the Court of Appeals for Mahoning County, No. 95 CA 221.

LuWayne Annos, Special Counsel for the Mahoning County Prosecuting Attorney, for appellee.

John B. Juhasz and Mary Jane Stephens, for appellant.

ALICE ROBIE RESNICK, J.

{¶1} On April 10, 1989, appellant, Stephen Vrabel, was indicted by a grand jury on two counts of aggravated murder in the deaths of Susan and Lisa Clemente, each carrying a death-penalty specification alleging that the murders were committed as a course of conduct involving the killing or attempt to kill two or more persons.

I. Facts and Case History

{¶2} Appellant and Susan Clemente lived together in an apartment they rented from Susan's sister and brother-in-law in Struthers, Ohio. Although appellant and Susan were not married, they had a child, Lisa, who was born in 1985.

{¶3} On March 3, 1989, appellant went into the Miller Rod and Gun Store in Youngstown, Ohio, to purchase a gun. He selected a gun; however, when appellant produced his driver's license for identification, he was told he could not make the purchase because his license had expired. Later that afternoon, appellant returned to the gun shop with a valid Ohio ID card. He then purchased a Jennings .22 semiautomatic handgun and ammunition; at that time, there was no waiting period to purchase it. During his visit to the gun shop, appellant appeared to be calm and did not seem nervous, anxious, or intoxicated.

{¶4} Appellant later told police that he had bought the gun for no particular reason except that he had always wanted one. When he returned to the apartment, he loaded the gun and put it in the hallway closet. He then began drinking beer heavily and smoking marijuana. Appellant maintained that on the day of the murders, there was no confrontation between him and Susan. Nevertheless, appellant retrieved the loaded gun and pointed it at Susan as she was walking to the kitchen. He fired one shot at Susan's head, and she fell face down, moaning. Lisa began "freaking out." Appellant then thought to himself that he did not want Susan to suffer, so he shot her in the head again as she lay on the kitchen floor. While trying to calm Lisa, appellant surmised that since Lisa's mother was dead and her father would now go to prison, Lisa would be better off dead. He fired one shot at Lisa's head and "felt that she died immediately."

{¶5} Appellant then left the apartment with the gun and checked into a motel in Liberty Township, where he spent the night. The next morning, he drove Susan's 1976 Plymouth to Wheeling, West Virginia, and left it there. He then took a Greyhound bus to Columbus and spent the night at a hotel near the Ohio State University campus. The following morning, appellant took a bus back to Wheeling, picked up Susan's car, and drove back to his apartment in Struthers. Appellant poured floor stripper over the bodies because they smelled and slept in the apartment that night.

{¶6} The next day, appellant wrapped the bodies in blankets and sheets. He emptied the refrigerator and put Susan's body in the refrigerator and Lisa's body in the freezer compartment. He also put two of Lisa's favorite stuffed animals in the freezer with her. Appellant then tried to clean the blood off the floor with several household cleaning agents. He cut out a bloodstained portion of the hallway carpet and disposed of it in the apartment dumpster.

{¶7} During the rest of March 1989, appellant continued to live in the Struthers apartment. Susan's sister, Linda Aey, attempted to visit Susan at the apartment several times in order to collect the March rent. On one occasion, appellant opened the back window and told Linda that Susan and Lisa were not feeling well. Another time, appellant told her that Susan and Lisa were at the grocery store. On each occasion, appellant seemed "fine" to Linda.

{¶8} On April 4, 1989, appellant again checked into a motel in Liberty Township. The following night, he stayed at a motel in Austintown. Meanwhile, Linda's Aey's husband, Michael Aey, went to appellant's apartment in the early evening of April 5 to collect two months' rent. As he went up the apartment stairs, he noticed a smell of cleaning fluids. When he entered the apartment, he saw that it was "messed up." Before he left, he opened the refrigerator and discovered Susan's body. Aey went home and then to the police, since there was no telephone in the apartment.

{¶9} Upon arriving at appellant's apartment, police found it to be "a mess," with beer cans in every room. During their investigation at the scene, police found Lisa's body in the freezer compartment wrapped in a blanket along with a pillow that was later found to have gunshot residue on it. Police also found three shell casings in plain view. The deputy coroner later determined that both Susan and Lisa had died of gunshot wounds to the head.

{¶10} On the morning of April 6, 1989, appellant was driving Susan's car to Parma when he heard on the radio that the bodies of Susan and Lisa had been discovered and that police were looking for the victim's boyfriend. He then went to St. Charles Catholic Church in Parma and approached the pastor, Father John T. Carlin. Appellant told Father Carlin that he had been involved in the homicides of his wife and child. Appellant asked Father Carlin to accompany him to the Parma police station.

{¶11} Parma police informed Struthers police that they had appellant in custody. The Parma police advised him of his Miranda rights, which he waived. Appellant gave an oral statement that was then reduced to writing. He admitted shooting Susan and Lisa but claimed he did not know why he had shot Susan. He stated that the gun used in the shootings was in a gray duffel bag in the back seat of the Plymouth that he had parked outside the station. Police obtained a search warrant and found the gun where appellant said it would be.

{¶12} Struthers police also advised appellant of his Miranda rights, which he again waived, before giving a statement. When asked what caused the incident, appellant responded, "Sometimes when I drink, things happen." He then admitted committing the murders and described to police the events surrounding the murders and his actions during the month leading up to his surrender and arrest in Parma.

{¶13} Ballistics testing and comparisons made on the cartridge casings found in appellant's apartment, as well as the bullet fragments recovered in the autopsy of Susan Clemente, were consistent with the characteristics found on the bullets test-fired from the murder weapon belonging to appellant.

{¶14} On April 10, 1989, the grand jury indicted appellant on two counts of aggravated murder, each carrying a death-penalty specification alleging that the murders were committed as a course of conduct involving the killing or attempt to kill two or more persons pursuant to R.C. 2929.04(A)(5). Each count also carried a firearm specification.

{¶15} Former R.C. 2945.37(A) provided:

{¶16} "A defendant is presumed competent to stand trial unless it is proved by a preponderance of the evidence in a hearing under this section that because of his present mental condition he is incapable of understanding the nature and objective of the proceedings against him or of presently assisting in his defense." Am.Sub.H.B. No. 565, 137 Ohio Laws, Part II, 2937, 2943.

{¶17} Following appellant's indictment for aggravated murder in 1989, the trial court appointed mental health professionals to evaluate him, and psychologist Nancy Huntsman found appellant incompetent to stand trial. Appellant was committed to the Timothy B. Moritz Forensic Center in 1990 and remained there until 1994. On August 30, 1994, the Western Reserve Psychiatric Hospital notified the Mahoning County Prosecutor in a psychiatric report that appellant was then competent to stand trial and had no active mental illness.

{¶18} Following his reindictment, both the state and defense agreed to have Dr. Otto Kausch examine appellant to evaluate his competency to stand trial. At a November 3, 1994 competency hearing, Dr. Kausch, a psychiatrist at Western Reserve Psychiatric Hospital, testified that, based upon a reasonable medical and psychiatric certainty, appellant possessed the capacity and willingness to assist in his own defense. Dr. Kausch further observed that appellant has personality problems that may, under stress, cause him to act in ways that could be potentially disruptive to the trial proceedings. Dr. Kausch noted that while appellant was in the hospital, Dr. Phillip Resnick, a professor of psychiatry at Case Western Reserve University, and others examined him as well. Taking into consideration all of the evaluations performed up to that time, Dr. Kausch concluded that appellant was malingering and that he was not mentally ill. At the conclusion of the hearing, the court held appellant competent to stand trial and ordered a mental exam pursuant to his plea of not guilty by reason of insanity.

{¶19} At a February 7, 1995 hearing on competency, both sides stipulated to the reports of Dr. Giannini and the Forensic Psychiatric Center of Northeast Ohio. The court again declared appellant competent to stand trial. At that time, appellant also moved to withdraw his insanity plea.

{¶20} At a hearing on March 21, 1995, upon defendant's advisory counsel's motion, the court ordered appellant's competency to stand trial reevaluated. At a March 24, 1995 hearing, the court admitted the report of Dr. Brian Sullivan, who concluded that appellant was competent to stand trial. Dr. Sullivan specifically found that appellant "is able to understand the charges against him and participate meaningfully in his defense." Also at that hearing, appellant acknowledged that his motion to...