Wood v. State

• Court: United States State Court of Appeals of Oklahoma. Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma
• Writing for the Court: A. Johnson
• Citation: Wood v. State, 2007 OK CR 17, 158 P.3d 467 (Okla. Crim. App. 2007)
• Decision Date: 30 April 2007
• Docket Number: No. D-2005-171.,D-2005-171.
• Parties: Tremane WOOD, Appellant v. STATE of Oklahoma, Appellee.

158 P.3d 467

2007 OK CR 17

Tremane WOOD, Appellant v. STATE of Oklahoma, Appellee.

No. D-2005-171.

Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma.

April 30, 2007.

An Appeal from the District Court of Oklahoma County; The Honorable Ray C. Elliott, District Judge.

TREMANE WOOD,

Appellant, was tried by jury and convicted of First Degree Murder, Robbery with Firearms, After Former Conviction of a Felony and Conspiracy, After Former Conviction of a Felony, in the District Court of Oklahoma County, Case No. CF-2002-46. The Honorable Ray C. Elliott, District Judge, presided and imposed the jury's verdict. He sentenced Wood to death for the murder and life imprisonment for robbery and conspiracy. Wood perfected this appeal. Judgment and Sentence is

AFFIRMED.

Johnny Albert, Lance Phillips, Attorney at Law, Oklahoma City, OK, attorneys for Wood at trial.

Perry W. Hudson, Jason J. Spanich, Attorney at Law, Oklahoma City, OK, attorneys for appellant on appeal.

Fern Smith, George Burnett, Asst. District Attorneys, Oklahoma City, OK, attorneys for the state at trial.

W.A. Drew Edmondson, Attorney General of Oklahoma, Preston Saul Draper, Attorney General, Oklahoma City, OK, attorneys for appellee on appeal.

OPINION

A. JOHNSON, J.

¶ 1 Tremane Wood¹ was tried by jury in the District Court of Oklahoma County, Case No. CF-2002-46, and was found guilty of Count 1 — First Degree Felony Murder in violation of 21 O.S.2001, § 701.7(B), Count 2 — Robbery with Firearms, After Former Conviction of a Felony in violation of 21 O.S.2001, § 801, and Count 3 — Conspiracy to Commit a Felony, After Former Conviction of a Felony in violation of 21 O.S.2001, § 421. The jury recommended the death penalty on Count 1 after finding that Tremane knowingly created a great risk of death to more than one person, that the murder was especially heinous, atrocious, or cruel, and that Tremane posed a continuing threat to society. See 21 O.S.2001, §§ 701.12(2), (4) and (7). The jury fixed his punishment on Counts 2 and 3 at life imprisonment. The Honorable Ray C. Elliott, who presided at trial, sentenced him accordingly and ordered the sentences to be served consecutively. From this Judgment and Sentence, he appeals raising seven claims of error. We find none of these claims merit relief and affirm his judgment and sentence.²

I. FACTS

¶ 2 Appellant Tremane Wood and three others were involved in and charged with the murder of Ronnie Wipf and the robbery of Arnold Kleinsasser. Clarity requires us to set forth the relationship between these defendants and the outcome of their cases. In addition to Tremane Wood, the defendants include Tremane's older brother Zjaiton Wood, Zjaiton's girlfriend Lanita Bateman, and the mother of one of Tremane's sons, Brandy Warden.³ Brandy Warden entered into a plea agreement, cooperated with the State and testified against her co-defendants. She pled guilty to Accessory After the Fact and Conspiracy.⁴ Zjaiton and Lanita were each found guilty in separate trials of felony murder, robbery with firearms, and conspiracy.⁵

¶ 3 On New Years Eve 2001, Ronnie Wipf and Arnold Kleinsasser went to the Bricktown Brewery in Oklahoma City where Zjaiton, Tremane, Lanita and Brandy were celebrating. Near closing time, Wipf and Kleinsasser met Lanita and Brandy believing they were two ordinary girls celebrating the new year together. Lanita and Brandy agreed to accompany Wipf and Kleinsasser to a motel on the pretext of continuing to celebrate the new year. Brandy, Lanita, Tremane, and Zjaiton then made a plan whereby the women would pretend to be prostitutes and the brothers Wood would arrive at the motel later and rob Wipf and Kleinsasser.

¶ 4 Once in their room at a Ramada Inn, Lanita made a telephone call to Zjaiton to let him know where they were, ending her conversation by saying, "Mom, I love you" so the victims would not be suspicious. The call to "Mom" was followed by some general conversation among the four which included a discussion of what each did for a living. Lanita told Kleinsasser that "this" is what she did and he realized that she meant she earned her living by having sex with men. That revelation was followed by a negotiation whereby the two women agreed to have sex with Wipf and Kleinsasser for $210.00. Since neither man had that much money, Brandy drove Kleinsasser to a nearby ATM. He gave her the money he withdrew and they returned to the room.

¶ 5 Back at the motel, the women went into the bathroom together, and shortly after, someone pounded on the door and called out, "Brandy, are you in there? Brandy, are you ready to go home?" Wipf refused to open the door and urgently told Kleinsasser to call the police. Before he could reach the phone, Lanita picked it up and pretended to call the police. Since it was now clear that the women were not going to have sex with them, Wipf demanded the return of their money. After a brief period of pandemonium in the room, Wipf opened the door and the women ran out. Recognizing a white car as the one Zjaiton and Tremane were driving, they got in and waited. Meanwhile, two masked men rushed into the motel room, a larger man, subsequently identified as Zjaiton Wood, holding a gun and a smaller man, subsequently identified as Tremane Wood, brandishing a knife.⁶ Zjaiton pointed the gun at Kleinsasser's head and demanded money. Kleinsasser gave him the rest of the money in his wallet. Zjaiton then joined Tremane in his attack on Wipf. As the three struggled, Kleinsasser heard one of the intruders say, "Just shoot the bastard" and then a gunshot. Tremane then turned his attention to Kleinsasser, demanding more money. Kleinsasser showed him his empty wallet, and Tremane hit him on the head with the knife. Tremane rejoined the struggle with Wipf and the fight moved into the bedroom area. Kleinsasser could see Wipf was bleeding and knew that he was seriously injured. While the two intruders struggled with Wipf, Kleinsasser escaped and sought help from the motel office. Before anyone could unlock the office door and help him, however, Kleinsasser fled to a nearby apartment complex to hide. From his vantage point there, he watched the motel and saw a white car leave the parking lot. He saw people come and go throughout the night, but, with no sense of whom they were, remained in hiding. It was 6:00 a.m. before he returned to the scene of the attack and learned of Wipf's death from a police detective.

¶ 6 The medical examiner concluded that Wipf died as the result of a stab wound to the chest. There was no evidence he had sustained any kind of gunshot wound. Surveillance videotape from the motel's camera showed Brandy and Lanita renting the room with Wipf and Kleinsasser. The motel's phone records showed that three calls were made from the room to Zjaiton's pager and one to the house where Tremane lived. Surveillance videotape from a local Wal-Mart showed Brandy, Lanita, Zjaiton, and Tremane buying ski masks and gloves earlier in the evening.⁷ As part of her plea bargain, Brandy testified against Tremane detailing the events of the evening from buying the masks and gloves through their actions the morning after the murder.

¶ 7 Zjaiton testified for the defense, against the advice of counsel. He said that it was he who stabbed Wipf, aided in the crime by a man named Alex. Zjaiton claimed that he took the knife from Alex and stabbed Wipf with it. He testified that Tremane was not involved in the crime.

II. FIRST STAGE ISSUES

¶ 8 In his first proposition, Tremane argues that his felony murder conviction must be reversed because the State failed to prove that he or anyone engaged with him attempted to rob Wipf. This Court reviews the trial evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution to determine whether any rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime charged beyond a reasonable doubt. Garrison v. State, 2004 OK CR 35, ¶ 61, 103 P.3d 590, 603. We accept all reasonable inferences and credibility choices that support the jury's verdict and must affirm the conviction so long as from the inferences reasonably drawn from the record evidence the jury might fairly have concluded the defendant was guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. Davis v. State, 2004 OK CR 36, ¶ 22, 103 P.3d 70, 78.

¶ 9 To convict Tremane of felony murder, the State had to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Wipf was killed while Tremane or someone engaged with him was wrongfully attempting to take and carry away Wipf's personal property from either his person or immediate presence by force or fear through the use of a gun or some other type of dangerous weapon. The trial evidence showed that Tremane and his brother Zjaiton devised a plan with Lanita and Brandy to rob Wipf and Kleinsasser at the motel. Kleinsasser, the surviving victim, testified that two men rushed into the motel room brandishing a gun and a knife and demanded money. Although the focus of his testimony about the robbery was on the demands made to him by Zjaiton, and later by Tremane, a rational jury could reasonably conclude that the same demands were being made of Wipf. The fact Tremane became involved in a struggle with Wipf at the same time Zjaiton was robbing Kleinsasser supports a finding that Wipf tried to resist Tremane's attempt to rob him. During his trial testimony, Kleinsasser noted that at one point the larger man with the gun (Zjaiton) went to aid the smaller man (Tremane) who was "robbing" Wipf. In addition to Kleinsasser's testimony, Zjaiton testified that he and his accomplice went to the motel to rob the men. He admitted that he robbed Kleinsasser and that his accomplice struggled with Wipf. While Zjaiton tried to implicate someone he called "Alex" as his accomplice instead of his brother, the evidence from Brandy and Casey Odell (Tremane's girlfriend) refuted that claim and provided the necessary evidence to show that it was Tremane who committed the crime with Zjaiton. On this record the jury was...