Woodson v. Com.

• Decision Date: 12 October 1970
• Citation: Woodson v. Com., 176 S.E.2d 818, 211 Va. 285 (1970)
• Parties: George Deiano WOODSON v. COMMONWEALTH of Virginia.
• Court: Virginia Supreme Court

Page 818

176 S.E.2d 818

211 Va. 285

George Deiano WOODSON v. COMMONWEALTH of Virginia.

Supreme Court of Appeals of Virginia.

Oct. 12, 1970.

Donald G. Pendleton, Amherst, Richard S. Pendleton, Madison Heights, for plaintiff in error.

A. R. Woodroof, Asst. Atty. Gen., (Andrew P. Miller, Atty. Gen., on brief), for defendant in error.

Before SNEAD, C.J., and I'ANSON, CARRICO, GORDON, HARRISON, COCHRAN and HARMAN, JJ.

COCHRAN, Justice.

George Delano Woodson, the defendant, was indicted for the murder of his wife, Yvonne. A jury tried and convicted him of murder in the second degree and fixed his punishment at imprisonment for ten years in the penitentiary. From the judgment of the trial court sentencing him in accordance with the verdict we granted Woodson a writ of error.

In his assignments of error Woodson contends that his conviction should be reversed because (1) it was obtained in violation of his rights under the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution and under §§ 19.1--241.1 through 19.1--241.6 of the Code of Virginia and (2) it was contrary to the law and the evidence.

The evidence was uncontradicted that Mrs. Woodson was shot by her husband in their home in Amherst County at about 2:00 a.m. on Sunday, April 14, 1968, Woodson's defense being that the shooting was accidental. The local rescue squad, when called at Woodson's request, asked for police assistance, and Deputy Sheriff B. W. Bailess arrived soon after the shooting to investigate. He found Mrs. Woodson lying on her living room floor, still alive but seemingly in a state of shock. Removed by ambulance to Lynchburg General Hospital she died there about two hours later.

When Deputy Bailess inquired of him about the weapon with which Mrs. Woodson was shot, Woodson went into another room and brought to Bailess a six-shot, .22-caliber pistol, from which four shots had been fired. As the pistol was not an automatic, the trigger had to be released after each firing before another shot could be fired.

Deputy Bailess drove Woodson to the hospital and, after warning him of his constitutional rights, took a statement there from Woodson which the latter signed at about 3:15 a.m. This statement, read to the jury by Deputy Bailess, was to the effect that Woodson had come home late and found his wife drinking, got his pistol from a shelf in the bedroom and accidentally shot her twice when she grabbed his right hand.

The Medical Examiner and Sheriff M. S. Bryant, in examining Mrs. Woodson's body after her death, found that she had been shot three times. The same day, April 14th, Woodson was arrested and charged with the murder of his wife.

The next day Sheriff Bryant, after advising him of his constitutional rights, took a statement signed by Woodson, similar to his first statement, which was also read to the jury. In it Woodson stated that his wife had grabbed his hand and the gun 'and the gun went off, twice.' The Sheriff testified that Woodson explained that he was carrying the pistol to his car to lock it in the trunk so he 'couldn't get killed or kill anyone else.'

Finally, on the evening of April 16th Woodson, after having been warned a third time, gave another statement to Sheriff Bryant in which he described the shooting as follows:

'* * * I was going to take the pistol and try to scare her. I walked into the middle room and she was at the door. I held the gun up so that she could see it; and asked her if she was going to stop drinking. She said, no that she was going to drink as much as she wanted to. I lost control of myself and started shooting. I didn't stop until she fell against the wall and slid to the floor. I suddenly realized that I had done shot her. I dropped the gun and went to get help.'

It is this third unsigned statement of Woodson's, also read to the jury by Sheriff Bryant, of which Woodson complains.

The record shows that Woodson was warned of his constitutional rights, as required by Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966), before making the statement. It also shows that he not only understood the warnings but that he freely and voluntarily gave the statement. Woodson maintains, however, that Code § 19.1--241.2, as amended in 1966, specified the manner in which the right to counsel under the Sixth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States and the privilege against self-incrimination under Section 8 of the Constitution of Virginia are to be enforced. He contends that protection of his constitutional rights required compliance with this statute, which reads as follows:

' § 19.1--241.2. When such person to be brought before court not of record and informed of right to counsel and amount of bail; affording opportunity to employ counsel or execute statement of indigence.--Every person charged with the commission of a felony not free on bail or otherwise shall be brought before the judge of a court not of record on the first day on which such court sits after the person is charged. ...