Walker v. State, No. 97-DP-00763-SCT.

• Court: United States State Supreme Court of Mississippi
• Citation: 740 So.2d 873
• Docket Number: No. 97-DP-00763-SCT.
• Parties: Linnox Marcus WALKER v. STATE of Mississippi.
• Decision Date: 27 May 1999

740 So.2d 873

Linnox Marcus WALKER
v.
STATE of Mississippi

No. 97-DP-00763-SCT.

Supreme Court of Mississippi.

May 27, 1999.

740 So.2d 876

David L. Walker, Batesville, John D. Watson, West Memphis, AR, Attorneys for Appellant

740 So.2d 877

Office of the Attorney General by Leslie S. Lee, Attorney for Appellee

EN BANC.

BANKS, Justice, for the Court:

¶ 1. Appellant Linnox Walker has appealed his conviction of capital murder and sentence to death. We affirm the conviction, remanding for the limited purposes of conducting a hearing as mandated in Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79, 106 S.Ct. 1712, 90 L.Ed.2d 69 (1986). We reverse as to sentencing and remand for a new sentencing hearing.

I.

¶ 2. On May 11, 1994, Linnox Walker and Mario Jeffries, both residents of Marshall County, Mississippi went riding to Oxford, Mississippi to visit friends. On the way to Oxford, they stopped in Abbeville, Mississippi, at their friend Regina Wiley's house for a short visit from around 8:30 p.m. until 9:00 p.m. Around 12:15 a.m., Walker and Jeffries left Oxford because they wanted to buy cold beer, which is not lawfully sold in Oxford.

¶ 3. They drove back toward Waterford, Mississippi, in Marshall County to purchase the beer from a store run by Bobby Dean Henderson. Jeffries told Walker he did not have any money to buy beer, to which Walker responded that he "was going to rob it." Jeffries then informed Walker that Henderson would probably kill him because he always wore a pistol. Walker responded that he would "get him first". No other people or cars were around when they arrived at the store. Walker told Jeffries to "come on in", but Jeffries refused. Jeffries told Walker not to "do it", but was scared to grab him because Walker then had a pistol in his possession. Jeffries saw Walker get the gun as he was getting out of the car and place it inside his belt.

¶ 4. Walker went in the store, but Jeffries could not see inside the store because the store windows were tinted. After Walker went in, Jeffries heard a gunshot. Immediately after Jeffries heard the gunshot, he observed Walker exiting the store with a cash drawer and a pistol. Walker threw the cash drawer and the .357 pistol into the car though Jeffries' window on the passenger side, which was down. Jeffries believed this gun to be that of Bobby Dean Henderson, which he had seen on various trips to the store. Walker went back into the store for a few seconds before getting in the car with the same gun in his hand that Jeffries saw when Walker first got out of the car and went into the store. Walker, who did not come out of the store with any beer, pulled off. As they were leaving the store, Jeffries asked Walker did he kill Henderson. Walker replied, "What do you think?"

¶ 5. Around 1:00 a.m., the body of Bobby Dean Henderson was found by Danny Thomas, who had stopped by the store to speak with Henderson on his way from Oxford. Thomas, who immediately called 911, saw nothing unusual on his way to the store.

¶ 6. Walker and Jeffries returned to Regina Wiley's home in Abbeville. Upon arriving at Wiley's home, Jeffries went in and told her what happened. Walker came into the house about five minutes later. Jeffries did not call the police at that time because Wiley did not have a telephone. He did not try to find a phone because he felt that Walker would wonder what he needed to use the phone for. Jeffries went in the bedroom to go to sleep, while Walker stayed in the living room.

¶ 7. When Jeffries awoke the next morning, he noticed Walker sitting in the floor of the living room counting out money. He also noticed that Walker had both guns and the cash drawer with him in the house. Walker told him there was $1,700 in the cash drawer. Both men then left to go back to Waterford, where Jeffries lived with his parents. On the way there, they pulled off on a dirt road, and Jeffries

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threw the cash drawer down a hill by the road, into a gully-like area. The pistol was not thrown away. Walker then dropped Jeffries off at his parent's home between 10:00 and 11:00 a.m. Before Jeffries exited the car, Walker told Jeffries not to tell anybody what happened. Jeffries interpreted that to mean that if he did tell anybody, Walker would kill him. Nevertheless, later that evening, Jeffries told his brother, Toracco Jeffries, about what happened at the store

¶ 8. Jeffries next saw Walker at a crap game in Holly Springs a couple of days later, but nothing was said about the events that occurred on May 11, 1994. Jeffries did later see Walker target practicing with the pistol that was taken from the store, but never saw the gun after that. About a week after this incident, Jeffries was approached by Anthony Gardner, who informed Jeffries that Walker told him what happened at the store.

¶ 9. On the Friday after the murder, Gardner was riding around with Walker, and Walker told Gardner how he had robbed the store and shot Bobby Dean Henderson. About a week later, Gardner asked Jeffries about the events that occurred in the early morning hours of May 12, 1994, and Jeffries confirmed what Walker had told Gardner. In June of 1996, Gardner gave a statement to Marshall County Sheriff Kenneth Dickerson implicating Walker and Jeffries in the robbery of the store and shooting. Based on information obtained in investigation and Gardner's statement, Walker and Jeffries were arrested. Both were indicted for capital murder. Jeffries pled guilty a reduced charge of manslaughter. Walker denied any knowledge of or involvement in the crime.

¶ 10. At trial, Jeffries also testified that he did not flee when Walker pulled up to the store because he did not believe Walker was actually going to rob the store. According to Jeffries, Walker did not have on any kind of mask or gloves. Walker also gave Jeffries $100 on the Saturday after the robbery, which Jeffries claimed Walker owed him. In his statement to Sheriff Dickerson, Jeffries said Walker was supposed to give him $100 of the store money, and that when Walker came out of the store, he claimed, "the dude made a move on him".

¶ 11. Anthony Gardner testified for the State. Gardner has known Walker for approximately five or six years, and testified that he considered both Jeffries and Walker to be his friends. Gardner admitted that he gave conflicting statements to Sheriff Dickerson because he was scared, but that the statements given were substantially the same. At trial, Gardner testified that Walker confided in him that he "went into the store to get a twelve-pack of beer, put it on the counter, went back out, played like he didn't have enough money, went back in the store, shot him." Gardner further testified that he had no involvement in the robbery of the store or the shooting of Bobby Dean Henderson and that he only knew what Walker had told him.

¶ 12. The State's case-in-chief included the testimony of Sheriff Dickerson. During the late hours of May 11, 1994, Dickerson, then a Highway Patrol Officer, was called by the Marshall County Sheriffs Department to assist in an investigation of a homicide at the Speed Shop. Inside the store, Dickerson observed the body of Bobby Dean Henderson behind the store's counter and noticed the cash drawer was missing. Already in the store were Deputies David Pannell and Robert Burke; Chuck Thomas, the county medical examiner; and several officers with the Marshall County Sheriffs Department.

¶ 13. Dickerson proceeded to investigate the crime scene, which included the taking of photographs. These photographs, which were received into evidence at trial, depicted the inside of the store; the counter and the cash register with the missing cash drawer; two weapons found near the body; a twelve-pack of beer that was on

740 So.2d 879

the counter upon the arrival of Dickerson; an enlarged photo that shows Henderson's body lying in the floor; the outside of the store, and the position and location of Henderson's body. Based on the location of the body and blood splattered on the bottom portion of a broom found near the body, the Sheriff Dickerson suggested that the Henderson would have been in a kneeling position at the time he was shot. At this point, the defense objected, arguing that Dickerson was not qualified to state such an opinion. The trial judge allowed Dickerson's statements to stand. There were also photographs depicting the blood-splattered broom. The defense made a motion in limine to exclude the photographs of the body, arguing they were highly prejudicial and cumulative. All except one were introduced into evidence.

¶ 14. No identifiable finger prints were removed from the twelve pack, and no fingerprints were taken from the scene.

¶ 15. The State presented the testimony of Dr. Stephen Hayne as an expert witness in the field of forensic pathology. Dr. Hayne, who examined the body of Bobby Dean Henderson on May 12, 1994, opined that Henderson died from a gunshot wound to the forehead that was near contact and penetrating, meaning the gun was fired at close range with the bullet entering but not exiting the body. His external examination revealed a large abrasion ring (a scraping of the skin) around the gunshot wound, with tattooing located around the entrance gunshot wound as well. The doctor also found that the bullet entered Henderson's body at a forty-five degree angle. Entrance at such an angle would indicate that the shooter was above Henderson, who would have been in a lower position when he was shot.

¶ 16. Cooper Epps testified for the State that he met Walker around June of 1996 while they were cell-mates at the Benton County Jail. He said that Walker confided that he had shot a white man in the head at close range and that the murder weapon would never be found. Epps conveyed this information to Sheriff Dickerson. Epps did not know Walker before they were incarcerated together and had not heard about the robbery or murder before.

¶ 17. The State rested following...