State v. Williams

• Decision Date: 06 September 2022
• Docket Number: SD 37221
• Citation: 651 S.W.3d 234
• Parties: STATE of Missouri, Plaintiff-Respondent, v. Lonnie Leroy WILLIAMS, Defendant-Appellant.
• Court: Missouri Court of Appeals

651 S.W.3d 234

STATE of Missouri, Plaintiff-Respondent,
v.
Lonnie Leroy WILLIAMS, Defendant-Appellant.

No. SD 37221

Missouri Court of Appeals, Southern District, In Division.

Filed: September 6, 2022

JEDD C. SCHNEIDER, Columbia, Mo, for Appellant.

NATHAN J. AQUINO, Jefferson City, Mo, for Respondent.

DON E. BURRELL, J.

Lonnie Leroy Williams ("Defendant") challenges his convictions, following a jury trial, of one count of first-degree murder and one count of unlawful use of a weapon for fatally stabbing MacKenna Milhon ("Victim") on or about December 20, 2019. See sections 565.020 and 571.015.¹

In two points relied on, Defendant claims the circuit court erred in: (1) overruling his motion to suppress "statements" and in admitting into evidence the video recording of his interrogation by the police, in which he confessed to the murder; and (2) overruling his objection and refusing to grant a "mistrial" when the prosecutor in voir dire told the first of two groups of potential jurors that the case they would be sitting on was not a death-penalty case. Because neither challenge was preserved for appeal, we affirm.

Background²

Surveillance cameras showed Defendant with Victim at various gas stations in Springfield on the evening of December 19, 2019. Victim's mother ("Mother") last spoke to Victim by phone at around 2:15 a.m. the next morning. After that one

651 S.W.3d 237

phone call, Mother called the police when she was unable to reach Victim again.

Defendant lived with his girlfriend, Olivia Vega ("Girlfriend"), and they had argued earlier in the evening of December 19, 2019. Defendant left the house and would not answer Girlfriend's calls or texts. When Defendant returned home, he was upset and had blood on his hands. He told Girlfriend that he had killed someone, and he started crying. Defendant then told Girlfriend that he had killed "Kenna" during "a robbery gone wrong[.]" Defendant also motioned to his throat and said that "all of this was gone."³

Girlfriend also saw blood stains in Defendant's car, a set of Defendant's clothes in its trunk, including boots that had blood on them, and that Defendant had a knife inside his backpack. Within a couple of weeks, police located Victim's body outside the city limits in an area cluttered with a lot of trash and other debris.

GPS data showed that around 2:30 a.m. on December 20, 2019, Defendant's car had been near the area in which Victim's body had been found, and the police interviewed Defendant on January 2, 2020.⁴ The approximately five-hour interview was videotaped, and it took place at the jail in which Defendant was being held on an unrelated matter. During that interview, Defendant eventually confessed to taking part in Victim's murder. A court-edited version of the recorded interview was introduced into evidence as State's Exhibit 201, and it was played for the jury over Defendant's objection that incorporated the arguments he had made before trial in support of his pretrial motion to suppress Defendant's statements. The objection was to the admission of the exhibit "in its entirety."

We will recite additional evidence, and the attorneys’ interactions with the circuit court at trial, as needed to address Defendant's points on appeal.

Analysis

Point 1 – Suppression of Evidence

Involuntarily obtained confessions are barred from being admissible at trial by the Due Process Clause. State v. Faruqi , 344 S.W.3d 193, 203 (Mo. banc 2011) (citing Ashcraft v. Tennessee , 322 U.S. 143, 155, 64 S.Ct. 921, 88 L.Ed. 1192 (1944) ). "The test for whether a confession is voluntary is whether the totality of the circumstances created a physical or psychological coercion sufficient to deprive the defendant of a free choice to admit, deny, or refuse to answer the examiner's questions." Id. (internal quotation and citation omitted). "In determining whether a defendant's confession resulted from improper coercion, this Court

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considers a range of factors relating to the defendant, including his or her age, experience, intelligence, gender, lack of education, infirmity, and unusual susceptibility to coercion." Id. (internal quotation and citation omitted). "The Court also considers whether the defendant was advised of his rights, the length of the detention, the repeated and prolonged nature of the questioning, and the use of coercive techniques such as deprivation of food or sleep." Id.

State v. Hines , No. SD 37164, 648 S.W.3d 822, 829–30 (Mo. App. S.D. May 26, 2022).

"Our review of the trial court's ruling on a...