Walker v. State

• Citation: 88 So.3d 128
• Decision Date: 19 April 2012
• Docket Number: No. SC10–638.,SC10–638.
• Parties: Robert Shannon WALKER, II, Appellant/Cross–Appellee, v. STATE of Florida, Appellee/Cross–Appellant.
• Court: United States State Supreme Court of Florida

88 So.3d 128

Robert Shannon WALKER, II, Appellant/Cross–Appellee,
v.
STATE of Florida, Appellee/Cross–Appellant.

No. SC10–638.

Supreme Court of Florida.

April 19, 2012.

[88 So.3d 130]

Bill Jennings, Capital Collateral Regional Counsel, Raheela Ahmed and Carol C. Rodriguez, Assistant CCR Counsel, Middle Region, Tampa, FL, for Appellant/Cross–Appellee.

[88 So.3d 131]

Pamela, Jo Bondi, Attorney General, Tallahassee, FL, and Barbara Curtis Davis, Assistant Attorney General, Daytona Beach, FL, for Appellee/Cross–Appellant.

PER CURIAM.

Robert Shannon Walker, II, was convicted of the 2003 first-degree murder, kidnapping, and aggravated battery of David “Opie” Hamman and sentenced to death. On direct appeal, this Court affirmed Walker's convictions and death sentence. Walker v. State, 957 So.2d 560, 570 (Fla.2007). Walker later filed a motion for postconviction relief pursuant to Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.851. Walker appeals from the postconviction court's denial of his guilt-phase claims, and the State cross-appeals the postconviction court's grant of a new penalty phase.¹

I. FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

The facts of this case were fully set out in this Court's opinion on direct appeal:

In the late evening hours of January 26, 2003, the victim, David “Opie” Hamman, arrived at the second-floor apartment of Joel Gibson in the city of Palm Bay, located in Brevard County, Florida. Accompanying Hamman were two women, Leslie Ritter and Hamman's girlfriend, Loriann Gibson. The appellant, Robert Shannon Walker, II, was waiting inside the apartment with his girlfriend, Leigh Valorie Ford, and Joel Gibson.

Immediately after Hamman entered Joel's apartment, Walker and Ford viciously attacked Hamman, beating him with various objects including the head of a metal Maglite flashlight, a baton type weapon, and a blackjack. Although not actively participating, Joel seemed to be supervising the attack. The attack on Hamman was drug-related. About a half hour into the attack, Joel, Walker, and Ford forced Hamman to strip down to only his socks to ensure he was not wearing a wire because they suspected that Hamman was a Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) agent. They also forced Ritter and Loriann Gibson to strip down to their underwear in order to check for wires but permitted the women to redress.

After being searched, the women went to the back bedroom. They last saw Hamman lying on a bloody sheet on the living room floor, naked, with one of his eyes halfway hanging out. There was blood all over the apartment. From the back bedroom, the women heard Walker and Ford asking Hamman, “Are you ready to die?” and heard Joel saying Hamman was going to die that night. They also heard Hamman plead for his life and scream, “Please, stop, I don't want to die. Please don't kill me. It hurts.”

The attack on Hamman at Joel's apartment lasted between two and three hours. Sometime around midnight, Hamman tried to escape. While Walker and Ford were distracted, Hamman ran out of the apartment and made his way down the stairs, leaving a trail of blood behind him. When Walker and Ford discovered Hamman had escaped, Ford said, “Get the bag and stuff and put them in the trunk,” and “get the tarp and lay it in the trunk.” Hamman made it a short distance down the road leading away from Joel's apartment before being caught by Walker and Ford. He had left drops of blood on the parking lot and the road at the point where Walker and Ford caught him, near the apartment mailboxes.

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Walker and Ford put the tarp in the trunk of Ford's automobile and forced Hamman to get in. Walker told Ford to find a remote spot to take Hamman. Ford drove her car with Hamman in the trunk, and Walker drove Hamman's pickup truck. On the way, they stopped at the house of Joel Gibson's girlfriend, Lisa Protz. Protz saw that Walker had a gun. Walker asked Protz for gasoline, rope, and tape, but she only gave him tape. A few minutes later, Ford arrived, and not long after that, Joel called on Protz's phone. While talking to Joel, Walker wrapped the tape around his fingers.

Walker and Ford then left and drove to a remote area down a dirt road just outside the gates to the Tom Lawton Recreation Area, a state park. At some point between Joel Gibson's apartment and the park, Hamman's hands were bound behind his back with a plastic cable tie. Just outside the park gates, Hamman was taken out of the trunk and forced to lie down with his back on the ground. Walker then shot Hamman six times in the face with a Llama .45 pistol. Walker left Hamman on the road and drove back to Joel Gibson's apartment.

....

After waiving his Miranda rights and signing a waiver-of-rights form, Walker gave a taped statement to Agents Herrera and Heyn in which he confessed to beating, kidnapping, and shooting David Hamman. Walker admitted to beating Hamman with a Maglite flashlight when Hamman arrived at Joel's apartment but claimed that they mainly argued. Walker said that he made Hamman sit on the couch and questioned Hamman about being wired and about being a “cop.” He told Hamman to strip, and Hamman complied. Walker claimed that he hit Hamman only three to four more times before Hamman ran naked from the apartment. Walker explained he “just wanted to slap the piss out of [Hamman] because he scared me.”

Walker also admitted to chasing Hamman down and taking him for a ride in the trunk of Ford's car, but claimed that Hamman got in and out of the trunk on his own. Walker claimed that when they arrived outside the state park, Hamman told Walker that he knew the address of Walker's parents and was going to rape Walker's mother while he videotaped it. Walker then admitted to binding Hamman's hands and shooting Hamman with the Llama .45. Walker said that Hamman's body was lying face up beside the truck at the time he was shot. Walker said that he only meant to scare Hamman and humiliate him by driving him out to a remote location and forcing him to walk back naked. He explained that he only killed Hamman after Hamman scared him by making threats to harm his family. After that, Walker confirmed that he went back to Joel Gibson's apartment and asked Ritter and Loriann Gibson to take him for a ride in Hamman's truck. When they stopped in Live Oak, the women left Walker at the gas station.

Walker, 957 So.2d at 565–67 (footnotes omitted).

At the penalty phase, Walker presented testimony from two mental health experts, which this Court summarized as follows:

Both Dr. Radin and Dr. Bernstein diagnosed Walker as having bipolar disorder. Dr. Radin admitted that he “hardly observed” Walker's mood swings and did not really have evidence of bipolar disorder apart from Walker's self-reporting. Walker had never been previously diagnosed as bipolar. Although Walker reported that he had seen someone for therapy for eight to ten months

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when he was fifteen years old, Dr. Radin did not perceive Walker's condition as being longstanding.

Dr. Radin also testified that people facing serious charges often manifest anxiety or depression and that some people with Walker's bipolar condition might self-medicate with alcohol, marijuana, cocaine, or methamphetamines. He testified that consumption of these types of drugs alters one's thinking capacity. Dr. Bernstein also testified that people who are depressed tend to self-medicate with something that is fast acting, such as crack cocaine, methamphetamines, or “speed.” He further testified that speed is not a narcotic but a central nervous system stimulant, and if a bipolar person used speed for a few days, the person's mental activity would likely become more hyperactive. He further testified that ingestion of drugs would aggravate the bipolar disorder.

Id. at 583. The jury recommended death by a seven to five vote. Id. at 569.

At the Spencer² hearing, the trial court indicated that it received letters from Walker's sister and Walker's friend requesting that the trial court show mercy on Walker. At the sentencing hearing, another one of Walker's friends, Jean Rebert, testified that Walker had been addicted to drugs and that the drugs made him violent. Rebert had a counseling background but had only, in her words, a “grandmotherly-type” relationship with Walker that lasted “on and off for about three years.”

The trial court found three aggravators ³ and four mitigators. ⁴ The trial court followed the jury's recommendation and imposed the death penalty. And on direct appeal, this Court affirmed Walker's convictions and death sentence. Id. at 570.⁵

Walker subsequently filed a motion for postconviction relief in the trial court alleging numerous instances of ineffective assistance of counsel. He also raised various constitutional challenges to the death penalty. The postconviction court denied the guilt-phase and constitutional claims but granted a new penalty phase after finding that defense counsel was ineffective at the penalty phase for failing to

[88 So.3d 134]

investigate mitigating evidence. Walker now appeals the denial of postconviction relief on his guilt-phase claims. The State cross-appeals the trial court's decision to grant relief on Walker's penalty-phase claim.

II. MOTION FOR POSTCONVICTION RELIEF

On appeal from the partial denial of postconviction relief, Walker claims that the trial court erred in summarily denying his claim that counsel was ineffective for (A) failing to object to evidence on possible blood stains outside the apartment; and (B) failing to present evidence to the jury that Walker's statement to law enforcement was involuntary. Walker also alleges (C) cumulative error. We affirm the trial court's denial of relief on these issues.

Following the United State Supreme Court's decision in Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668, 687, 104 S.Ct. 2052, 80 L.Ed.2d 674 (1984), this Court has held that for ineffective assistance of counsel claims to be successful, two requirements must be satisfied:

First, the claimant must identify...