State v. Wilson

• Decision Date: 27 October 1995
• Docket Number: No. C8-94-1679,C8-94-1679
• Citation: 539 N.W.2d 241
• Parties: STATE of Minnesota, Respondent, v. Charles Ray WILSON, Appellant.
• Court: Minnesota Supreme Court

Page 241

539 N.W.2d 241

STATE of Minnesota, Respondent, v. Charles Ray WILSON, Appellant.

No. C8-94-1679.

Supreme Court of Minnesota.

Oct. 27, 1995.

Syllabus by the Court

1. The evidence sustained the trial court's finding that defendant failed to prove mental illness by a preponderance of the evidence.

2. Trial court did not abuse its discretion in sentencing defendant to two consecutive life terms, where consecutive sentences were commensurate with culpability and did not exaggerate appellant's criminality.

3. Trial court erred when it formally adjudicated defendant guilty of all four counts of first-degree murder when there were only two victims.

Susan J. Andrews, St. Paul, for appellant.

Hubert H. Humphrey, III, State Attorney General, St. Paul, Susan Gaertner, Ramsey County Attorney, St. Paul, for respondent.

Heard, considered, and decided by the court en banc.

OPINION

KEITH, Chief Justice.

Defendant appeals from his conviction for two counts of first-degree murder and two counts of felony murder in the killings of Elaine Furey and Alfred Stafki. Three issues are presented on this direct appeal: (1) Whether defendant was so mentally ill or deficient at the time of committing the murders that he did not know the nature of his act or that it was wrong; (2) whether the trial court erred in sentencing defendant to two consecutive life terms; and (3) whether the trial court erred when it formally adjudicated defendant guilty of all four counts of first-degree murder when there were only two victims.

We vacate the two felony murder convictions and otherwise affirm the trial court.

Defendant is an 11-year Navy veteran who was discharged from the service due to obesity on October 2, 1991. He came directly to St. Paul to look for work as a blood lab technician, the position he held while in the Navy. Unable to find work, he lived on his Navy termination pay and unemployment compensation, supplemented by occasional loans from family members.

On December 14, 1992, defendant left his apartment and drove to the vicinity of the Flower Hut, a florist shop located on Rice Street in St. Paul. At approximately 1:00 p.m., he parked his car on Winnipeg Street and, after selling some used books and visiting a pet store, entered the Flower Hut. He browsed in the Flower Hut for approximately five minutes, noting that the sole employee, Elaine Furey, was an "elderly female," and then went to a nearby furniture store.

After visiting the furniture store, defendant returned to his car, drove it around the block, and parked it in the alley behind the Flower Hut. Before reentering the Flower Hut, he took a 12"' Buck hunting knife from his gym bag and hid the knife on his person. He entered the store through the rear entrance and Furey, surprised, asked him what he was doing. He took out his knife, forced her face down on the floor, and stabbed her repeatedly in the back, neck, and head. Defendant later claimed that before he stabbed her he heard thoughts, voices, and feelings that she did not deserve to live. According to the medical examiner's report, defendant stabbed Furey nineteen times, severing her cervical spinal cord. Defendant claimed that Furey's last words were "I forgive you." After stabbing Furey to death, defendant removed a cigarette case from her hand and went to the front counter, where he tried unsuccessfully to open the cash register.

At that point, Alfred Stafki, a 74-year-old delivery man, entered that store and asked, "Where is the gal [Furey]?" Defendant said he did not know. Stafki, apparently thinking she was out back, went to the cooler and began picking up boxes of flowers. Defendant walked towards the front door and, seeing only Stafki's van outside, came up behind Stafki and stabbed him. Defendant then forced him face down on the floor and, according to the medical examiner's report, stabbed him repeatedly in the back, neck, and head. Defendant claims that Stafki's last words were "Bless you."

Defendant then took the keys lying next to the cash register, locked the front door, and turned off the lights. However, before leaving the store, he took Stafki's wallet from the victim's left pocket and unplugged the cash register, carrying it to the rear of the store. He covered the cash register with a coat and a pair of pants he found in the store, and left through the back door, locking it on his way out. He put the cash register in the back of his car and promptly returned to his apartment.

He then took the cash register, wallet, and cigarette case into his apartment and counted the money taken: $10 to $15 from the cash register, $30 to $40 from Stafki's wallet, and $4 to $5 from Furey's cigarette case. He took apart the cash register, carefully cleaning it and other items taken from the crime scene in bleach. He then hid the items in a box in the common area of the laundry room in his apartment building. He also washed the clothes he wore during the crime twice in bleach. He described himself in his police statement as being "totally distraught" and wanting to "wash away the guilt." He threw the clothes away in the trash dumpster located behind his apartment building.

Defendant read about the killings in the St. Paul Pioneer Press the following day. He claims to have spent the three days after the killing in terrible mental anguish, and contacted a minister to act as a mediator between him and the victims' families. On or about December 28, 1992, he sold his car, claiming that he no longer needed it because he planned to turn himself in in a few days.

On December 31, 1992, defendant went to the Veterans Administration Hospital in Minneapolis and confessed to the murders to a social worker, a psychiatrist, and two St. Paul police officers. He gave detailed statements concerning the murders and robbery to the police on that day and on the following day, January 1, 1993. On January 20, 1993, defendant was indicted on two counts of first-degree murder and two counts of felony murder. On March 29, 1993, after withdrawing his motion for a contested hearing on the issue of his competency to stand trial, he notified the state that he intended to rely on the defense of not guilty by reason of mental illness.

The facts of the guilt phase of the bifurcated trial were stipulated to and submitted to the trial court, which found defendant guilty of two counts of first-degree murder and two counts of felony murder for the deaths of Alfred Stafki and Elaine Furey. Defendant waived his right to a jury trial during the insanity phase. The defense presented expert testimony from one psychiatrist who concluded that defendant did not understand that killing Elaine Furey and Alfred Stafki was wrong when he did so and that, therefore, he was legally insane. The state offered expert testimony from two forensic psychiatrists and a neuropsychologist, all of whom concluded that defendant was not legally insane at the time he committed the murders. The court found that defendant should not be excused from criminal responsibility by reason of mental illness. We affirm.

I.

In order to be excused from criminal responsibility, a defendant must demonstrate that "at the time of committing the alleged criminal act [she or he] was laboring under such a defect of reason, from [mental illness or deficiency] as not to know the nature of the act, or that it was wrong." Minn.Stat. § 611.026 (1994) (the M'Naghten rule). The defendant bears the burden of showing by a preponderance of the evidence that he was mentally ill at the time of the crime. DeMars v. State, 352 N.W.2d 13, 16 (Minn.1984). Both expert and lay testimony is admissible on this issue. State v. Schneider, 402 N.W.2d 779, 784 (Minn.1987). In determining whether a defendant has met his burden, the fact-finder may consider evidence that relates to cognition, volition, and capacity to control behavior. State v. Rawland, 294 Minn. 17, 46, 199 N.W.2d 774, 790 (1972).

This court has consistently held that the issue of legal mental illness is a question for the fact-finder to resolve. See State v. Brom, 463 N.W.2d 758, 764 (Minn.1990), cert. denied, 499 U.S. 940, 111 S.Ct. 1398, 113 L.Ed.2d 453 (1991); Rawland, 294 Minn. at 45, 199 N.W.2d at 789. This court has also granted broad deference to the fact-finder in determining the appropriate weight to assign expert psychiatric testimony. See DeMars, 352 N.W.2d at 16.

Defendant claimed at trial that he demonstrated his legal mental illness by a preponderance of the evidence and that his convictions should therefore be reversed. The experts were divided on the question of the type and severity of mental illness. One of defendant's two expert witnesses testified that defendant was suffering from the major mental illness of paranoid schizophrenia, based on defendant's reported voices (auditory hallucinations) which compelled him to kill. By contrast, defendant's other expert witness, as well as the state's three expert witnesses, concluded that defendant suffered some sort of personality disorder, but not paranoid schizophrenia, and that he showed no signs of delusions or hallucinations.

Even if all the other expert witnesses agreed that defendant was a paranoid schizophrenic, this alone would not have required a finding by the trial court that he was mentally ill. See DeMars, 352 N.W.2d at 13 (holding evidence sufficient to support finding of sanity where sole expert witness testified that defendant was paranoid schizophrenic and in an "active psychotic state" at the time of killing). Moreover, this court has only reversed one murder conviction where a defendant suffered from both paranoid schizophrenia and delusions. See Rawland, 294 Minn. at 46-47, 199 N.W.2d at 790. However, in Rawland the long history of mental illness was extreme, and all four expert witnesses diagnosed the defendant with paranoid schizophrenia. Id. at 41-42, 199 N.W.2d at 788. In this case, defendant has never been committed to a mental...