Walton v. Com.
| Decision Date | 05 June 1998 |
| Docket Number | Record No. 980011.,Record No. 980010 |
| Citation | 256 Va. 85,501 S.E.2d 134 |
| Parties | Percy Lavar WALTON v. COMMONWEALTH of Virginia. |
| Court | Virginia Supreme Court |
Lawrence D. Gott, Danville, for appellant.
Donald R. Curry, Senior Assistant Attorney General (Mark L. Earley, Attorney General, on brief), for appellee.
Present: All the Justices.
In this appeal, we review the capital murder convictions, the related felony convictions, and the death sentences imposed upon Percy Lavar Walton for the murders of Elizabeth W. Kendrick, Jessie E. Kendrick, and Archie D. Moore, Jr.
Walton, age 18 at the time of the offenses, pled guilty to the following: four charges of capital murder, three charges of robbery, one charge of burglary, and six charges of using a firearm in the commission of a felony. Before accepting the guilty pleas, the trial court questioned Walton and made a determination that his guilty pleas were made voluntarily, intelligently, and knowingly. Walton and the Commonwealth stipulated evidence that would have been adduced had the case been tried.
The trial court scheduled a separate sentencing hearing. The defendant and the Commonwealth presented evidence, and the trial court received the probation officer's report in the manner prescribed by law. After considering the evidence and argument of counsel, the trial court stated orally that Walton's conduct in each murder involved depravity of mind, and his conduct associated with each capital offense indicated that there is a probability that he will commit criminal acts of violence that would constitute a continuing, serious threat to society. However, the trial court entered a sentencing order which did not mention depravity of mind, but stated that "there is a probability that the defendant would commit criminal acts of violence that would constitute a continuing serious threat to society." The trial court fixed Walton's punishment at three separate death sentences and imposed three separate life sentences for each of the three robbery convictions, ten years' imprisonment for the burglary conviction, and three years' imprisonment for each of the six firearms convictions.1 We have consolidated the automatic review of Walton's death sentences with his appeal of right of his capital murder convictions, Code §§ 17-110.1(A) and -110.1(F). We have also consolidated Walton's appeal to the Court of Appeals of Virginia from his non-capital convictions, and we have given his appeals priority on our docket. Code § 17-110.2.
On November 16, 1996, Barbara K. Case, who was in Mississippi, made a telephone call to her parents, Elizabeth and Jessie Kendrick, who resided in Danville. Mrs. Case informed her parents during this telephone conversation that she planned to visit them during the approaching Thanksgiving holiday season. Mr. and Mrs. Kendrick agreed to meet their daughter at an airport in Greensboro, North Carolina, on November 25, 1996, three days before Thanksgiving, and return to Danville for the holidays. Mrs. Case made several attempts to reach her parents by telephone between November 16 and 25, 1996, but no one answered the telephone. Mrs. Case did not consider her parents' failure to answer the telephone unusual because her parents "traveled a lot."
When Mrs. Case arrived at the airport in Greensboro on November 25, 1996, her parents failed to meet her. She waited several hours, and then she became alarmed and disturbed. A woman at the airport gave Mrs. Case a ride to Danville.
When Mrs. Case arrived at her parents' home in Danville, their townhouse was dark, and their car was missing. Mrs. Case then went to her aunt's home, which is across the street from her parents' townhouse. Mrs. Case and her aunt went to the Kendricks' residence, but no one answered the door.
Mrs. Case spent the night of November 25, 1996, with her aunt, and she contacted the Danville Police Department the next morning. Several police officers arrived at Mr. and Mrs. Kendricks' townhouse and eventually entered the residence. The police officers found the body of Mr. Kendrick, lying face down on a living room floor. Mr. Kendrick's hands were "clasped, and above his head, clinched together." The police found the body of Mrs. Kendrick on the floor in the den. A portion of her body was covered with a sheet, and the upper portion of her body was wrapped in a "pinkish-orange material." Mrs. Kendrick's shirt had "been rolled up, and then taped" and was loosely tied around her neck with a slipknot. She had on undergarments below her waist, her pants had been cut from her body, and her body had been dragged across the floor.
Mr. Kendrick, who was 80 years old at the time of his murder, had been shot in the top of the head at close range. He suffered a very large explosive type of wound where the bullet entered his head. A "star-shaped appearance" and the presence of soot on his head indicated that a muzzle of a gun was pressed tightly against the top of Mr. Kendrick's head when the gun was discharged and that gases emitted from the muzzle caused the skin around the entry point to "tear and rip." Mr. Kendrick also suffered superficial non-lethal cuts on the front of his neck and the palmar side of his left wrist.
Mrs. Kendrick, who was 81 years old at the time of her death, also suffered a tight contact gunshot wound to the top of her head. Her shirt, which was fashioned into a slipknot and tied around her neck, did not cause or contribute to her death.
The Kendricks were last seen alive on November 19, 1996, when Mrs. Kendrick, accompanied by her husband, went to a hospital in Danville. The police officers found the Kendricks' car a short distance behind their townhouse.
On November 28, 1996, Thanksgiving Day, Roxanne Moore, who was in Greensboro, North Carolina, placed a telephone call to the Danville Police Department. Ms. Moore informed the police personnel that her brother, Archie Moore, who lived at the Cabin Lake Apartment Complex in Danville, was supposed to have met her at an airport in Greensboro on November 27, 1996, but he failed to appear. Ms. Moore informed the police personnel that neither she nor her parents in North Carolina were able to contact Archie Moore by telephone at his Danville apartment.
Danville police officers entered Archie Moore's apartment around 8:00 a.m. on November 28. While searching the apartment, they found Archie Moore's body in a closet behind a suitcase. A plastic bag had been placed over Mr. Moore's head, and his feet were "propped up" against the closet wall. There was a strong odor of cologne in the closet and on the victim's body. The cause of Mr. Moore's death was a gunshot wound to his head, immediately above his left eye. A bullet was found on the floor in his apartment.
Shortly after Moore's body was discovered, two witnesses informed the Danville Police Department that they had recently observed Walton driving Moore's Ford Mustang automobile. Other witnesses had also observed Walton walking on a sidewalk from the area near Mr. and Mrs. Kendricks' townhouse toward Cabin Lake on several occasions between November 19 and November 26, 1996.
Subsequently, the police found Moore's Mustang, "parked right across the street from [Walton's] house." Walton lived in a condominium with his parents a short distance from Moore's apartment and the Kendricks' townhouse.
Lieutenant Kenneth D. Fitzgerald, a Danville police detective, went to Walton's home, spoke with Walton, and asked him if he knew Moore. Walton denied that he knew Moore, and he denied "ever [having] been in Archie Moore's car." Walton agreed to go to the police department for further questioning. Detective Fitzgerald left Walton's home and later, Walton, accompanied by his father, went to the police department.
The police obtained a search warrant for Walton's residence. During a search of Walton's bedroom, police personnel found a silver metal box inside one of Walton's boots. The box contained a diploma and an "ATM card," both bearing Archie Moore's name. The police also found a set of car keys; one key fit Moore's Mustang and two other keys fit locks on the doors of Moore's apartment. The police also found a ring, which contained a very distinctive letter "A", which was similar to a ring that Moore had been wearing before his death.
When the police officers searched Moore's car, they found a box containing two dozen.32-caliber bullets as well as keys that fit locks in the Kendricks' car and home. The police officers also found a plastic bag which contained a "plastic sleeve" from a wallet. Jessie Kendrick's driver's license and his "Knights of Columbus" card were inside the "plastic sleeve." Walton's fingerprints were identified on the "plastic sleeve." Walton's fingerprints were also found on numerous items at various locations in Moore's apartment and car.
When the police searched the Kendricks' car, they found a shotgun that had been stolen from the Kendricks' townhouse. Walton's fingerprint was found on the shotgun. A knife, found in a toolbox in the trunk of the Kendricks' car, contained blood which matched Mr. Kendrick's DNA.
The police officers recovered two .32-caliber bullet cartridges that had been partially submerged near the shoreline of Cabin Lake. The lake was drained, and the police officers recovered a .32-caliber pistol that Mr. Kendrick had purchased in 1970. Ballistic tests conducted on a bullet that had been removed from Mr. Kendrick's head revealed that the bullet "matched" the .32-caliber pistol recovered from the lake and was consistent with the bullets that had killed Moore and Mrs. Kendrick. The pistol contained four bullets and two spent cartridges. The lead contained in the bullets found in Moore's car, the bullets recovered from the heads of the victims, and the bullets in the revolver originated from the same...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Juniper v. Com.
...a victim are admissible to show motive, intent, method, malice, premeditation, and the atrociousness of the crime. Walton v. Commonwealth, 256 Va. 85, 92, 501 S.E.2d 134, 138, cert. denied, 525 U.S. 1046, 119 S.Ct. 602, 142 L.Ed.2d 544 (1998). The fact that the photograph also relates to an......
-
Burns v. Com.
...257 Va. 328, 338, 513 S.E.2d 634, 639,cert. denied, 528 U.S. 952, 120 S.Ct. 376, 145 L.Ed.2d 294 (1999); Walton v. Commonwealth, 256 Va. 85, 91-92, 501 S.E.2d 134, 138,cert. denied, 525 U.S. 1046, 119 S.Ct. 602, 142 L.Ed.2d 544 (1998); Gains v. Commonwealth, 251 Va. 442, 459, 470 S.E.2d 114......
-
Walker v. Com.
...them into evidence. We disagree. Admission of photographs is within the discretion of the trial court. Walton v. Commonwealth, 256 Va. 85, 91, 501 S.E.2d 134, 138 (1998). Photographs of crime scenes are admissible to show motive, intent, method, malice, premeditation, and atrociousness of t......
-
Teleguz v. Com.
...are admissible to show the atrociousness or vileness of a crime. Juniper, 271 Va. at 413, 626 S.E.2d at 415-16, Walton v. Commonwealth, 256 Va. 85, 92, 501 S.E.2d 134, 138, cert. denied, 525 U.S. 1046, 119 S.Ct. 602, 142 L.Ed.2d 544 (1998). Such photographs must nevertheless be excluded if ......