Walker v. Lockhart, LR-C-81-280.

Decision Date06 December 1984
Docket NumberNo. LR-C-81-280.,LR-C-81-280.
Citation598 F. Supp. 1410
PartiesJames Dean WALKER, Petitioner, v. A.L. LOCKHART, Director, Arkansas Department of Correction, Respondent.
CourtU.S. District Court — Eastern District of Arkansas

Oscar Fendler, Blytheville, Ark., Bill Bristow, Jonesboro, Ark., L. Gene Worsham, Chip Baker, Little Rock, Ark., Paul N. Halvonik, Berkley, Cal., for petitioner.

Steve Clark, Atty. Gen., State of Ark., Theodore G. Holder, A. Carter Hardage, Asst. Attys. Gen., Little Rock, Ark., for respondent.

MEMORANDUM OPINION

HENRY WOODS, District Judge.

I. HISTORY OF LITIGATION

James Dean Walker was charged with murdering a young North Little Rock Police officer on April 16, 1963. At his trial a year later, Walker pled not guilty and not guilty by reason of insanity. As Judge Henley aptly observed in a later habeas corpus opinion, "Walker did not testify at the first trial and the Court gets the impression from reading the transcript of the trial that the principal defense relied upon was insanity; the fact of the killing of Vaughn by Walker seems not to have been denied seriously." Walker v. Bishop, 295 F.Supp. 767, 771 note 3 (E.D.Ark. 1967).

Walker, Russell Kumpe, and a prostitute, Linda Ford, were fleeing the scene of a shooting incident at a Little Rock night club when they were stopped by two police officers in separate automobiles. The first police automobile on the scene was driven by Officer Gene Barentine, and the second by the deceased, Jerrell Vaughan. The subsequent events were described in the first Arkansas Supreme Court opinion, Walker v. State, 239 Ark. 172, 388 S.W.2d 13 (1965) written by Mr. Oscar Fendler, one of Walker's present lawyers who was serving as a Special Justice of the Arkansas Supreme Court:

Kumpe got out of his car by order of Officer Barentine, and came to the rear of the Oldsmobile; he leaned against Barentine's police car while the officer searched him. As this was being done, Officer Vaughan approached the passenger side of the Oldsmobile from the rear; as he reached the car door, gunfire broke out.
. . . . .
Linda Ford, who was sitting in the front seat with Walker, said that he had a pistol in his hand and started firing when the door was opened. She did not know who opened the door, but the door was not open when Officer Vaughan walked up. Thomas Gerald Short, the cab driver, who was also present with the police, testified that Vaughan had bent over looking into the Oldsmobile window and said a few words. Short also stated that when the door came open, Vaughan was doing a little dance-like jig, trying to get away from the car and backed up on the side of the bank; that there was a shot and Vaughan fell on his chest; that he heard several shots; that he did not see any shots fired. He said that Vaughan had just got his gun out when he was shot.

Id. 388 S.W.2d at 14-15.

In the same opinion it was stated: "A surgeon removed the bullet from the deceased Vaughan, which was identified as having been fired by the .38 S & W 4-inch barrel pistol, which was found beneath Walker's body." Id., 388 S.W.2d at 14. Walker had been shot five times and Vaughan once over the heart. "It can be reasonably inferred that Vaughan shot Walker several times before Walker's one bullet killed Vaughan." Id., 388 S.W.2d at 17. Walker's sentence of death for first degree murder was reversed, principally because the trial judge did not instruct on the lesser degrees of homicide. "This is not to say, however, that the evidence is not sufficient to support a conviction of first degree murder." Id., 388 S.W.2d at 17.

The second trial was begun on November 29, 1965. Walker was convicted of first degree murder and given life imprisonment. The version of the salient events given by Justice Cobb in the second Arkansas Supreme Court opinion, Walker v. State, 241 Ark. 300, 408 S.W.2d 905 (1966), closely parallels that given in the prior opinion:

Officer Barentine stopped his car directly behind the suspect car. Vaughan stopped his car behind and to the left side of the Barentine car. The driver of the Oldsmobile, later identified as Freeman Kumpe, got out and came around to the left rear of the Oldsmobile and met Barentine. While Barentine was beginning a search of Kumpe, Officer Vaughan went around the right rear of the Oldsmobile, ostensibly to check the other passengers in the car. Almost in the instant that Vaughan disappeared around the right rear of the Oldsmobile, a fusillade of gunfire erupted, the autopsy report subsequently reflecting that Officer Vaughan was killed by a bullet entering his body at the front side of his chest in the heart area.
. . . . .
She Linda Ford testified that appellant had a gun in his hand when he opened the right door of the Oldsmobile to meet Officer Vaughan and that appellant started shooting, being the first to fire. Appellant testified briefly in this case but at no time did he attempt to place a gun in the hands of Linda Ford. Since Kumpe was out of the car and unarmed; Linda Ford had no gun and Officer Vaughan was slain by a bullet fired into his body as he faced appellant, the physical facts leave little, if any, doubt as to the fatal bullet coming from a gun fired by appellant.

Id., 408 S.W.2d at 908-09.

Judge Henley analyzed the defense raised in the second trial as follows:

It was the theory of the defense at the second trial that Vaughan was killed by a bullet fired from Barentine's gun which bullet had struck the Oldsmobile on the rear bumper and had, according to the defense, ricocheted striking Vaughan and inflicting a mortal wound. At the second trial Walker took the stand in his own defense and denied that he had fired any shots; he also denied that he had more than one gun; it was the State's theory that he had two.

Walker v. Bishop, 295 F.Supp. 767, 771.

In Walker v. State, 408 S.W.2d 905, 917 the Supreme Court of Arkansas affirmed the conviction in these words:

Appellant had no known reason to fear for his personal safety when his car was caused to slow down and pull over and stop by the police car behind it. Appellant opened the car door with a drawn gun in his hand and started the shooting with deadly accuracy. There is no suggestion in this record that he did not act of his own volition and with deliberation. The evidence in the case was certainly sufficient to authorize the jury in finding that appellant killed Officer Vaughan with deliberation, premeditation and malice aforethought.

The Supreme Court denied certiorari, Walker v. Arkansas, 386 U.S. 682, 87 S.Ct. 1325 (1967), and also denied rehearing and overruled his motion to present argument in support, 387 U.S. 926, 87 S.Ct. 2027, 18 L.Ed.2d 987 (1967).

The Honorable J. Smith Henley, then Chief Judge of the Eastern District of Arkansas, conducted an extensive habeas corpus hearing on August 28-30, 1967. It is not an exaggeration to say that Judge Henley virtually retried this case. Judge Henley's statement as to the crucial facts closely accords with that given in the two opinions of the Supreme Court of Arkansas:

Barentine had caused Kumpe to get out of the Oldsmobile and come back to the Barentine car to be searched ....
Vaughan left his car, walked between the Barentine car and the Oldsmobile and approached the right front door of that vehicle. That door was opened either by Vaughan or Walker and firing broke out. At the commencement of the shooting Kumpe either ran from Barentine or threw himself to the ground; Barentine fired twice at Kumpe; he then fired four shots into the Oldsmobile; reloaded and fired a fifth isolated shot into that vehicle.

Walker's case in the habeas proceeding was principally based on the testimony of two witnesses, Mary Louise Roberts and a cab driver, Paul Alderman.

Mary Louise Roberts and Linda Ford, two prostitutes, had been with Walker and Kumpe at the Little Rock night club when Walker accidentally shot one patron while pistol-whipping another. Walker and Kumpe went to their motel, packed, and checked out. In the meantime Walker called Linda Ford at her mother's apartment and requested that she join them at the motel, which she did. Mary Louise Roberts went to the motel in a cab driven by Paul Alderman. "She undertook to join the two men and the Ford woman but was ordered back into the cab. The two men and Linda Ford entered the Oldsmobile and Kumpe took the wheel; all three occupied the front seat with the woman in the middle." Id. at 770. Kumpe drove through North Little Rock onto a narrow highway leading to England, Arkansas, where the vehicle was stopped by the two police vehicles. Alderman had attempted to follow but could not keep up with the Oldsmobile. His dispatcher alerted the North Little Rock police officer and instructed a cab driver by the name of Thomas Short to take up the chase. Short managed to keep contact with the Oldsmobile and arrived at the scene shortly after the police vehicles had stopped the Oldsmobile. The Alderman cab arrived a few seconds thereafter with Mary Louise Roberts, a passenger therein. "Mary Louise Roberts testified at the first trial that she and Alderman drove up to the other vehicles before the shooting started; however, she stated that when the firing began, she threw herself down in the back seat of the cab and did not witness the details of the shooting." Id. at 771.

Although the two women were subpoenaed by the State and police officials testified that diligent efforts were made to locate them, neither was served. Their prior testimony was read into the record. In the habeas hearing Mary Louise Roberts testified:

That if she had been called as a witness at the second trial, she would have stated truthfully that she watched the entire shooting and never saw Walker do any shooting; that certain police officers knew that her second trial testimony would be favorable to the defense, and that she was made to understand that if she appeared and testified she would be subjected to repeated arrests.

Judge ...

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  • Walker v. Lockhart
    • United States
    • U.S. Court of Appeals — Eighth Circuit
    • June 10, 1985
    ...evidence did not sufficiently tip the balance of the "ends of justice" standard to require that a new trial be held. Walker v. Lockhart, 598 F.Supp. 1410 (E.D.Ark.1984). This matter is now before us for further review in light of the evidence presented and the district court's II. DISCUSSIO......

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