Younie v. State

• Decision Date: 28 November 1973
• Docket Number: No. 131,131
• Citation: 19 Md.App. 439,311 A.2d 798
• Parties: Walter A. YOUNIE v. STATE of Maryland.
• Court: Court of Special Appeals of Maryland

Page 439

19 Md.App. 439

311 A.2d 798

Walter A. YOUNIE v. STATE of Maryland.

No. 131.

Court of Special Appeals of Maryland.

Nov. 28, 1973.

William F. Mosner, Towson, for appellant.

Mary Elizabeth Kurz, Asst. Atty. Gen., with whom were Francis B. Burch, Atty. Gen., Samuel A. Green, Jr., State's Atty., and John J. Lucas, Asst. State's Atty., Baltimore County, on the brief, for appellee.

Argued before MORTON, MOYLAN and MOORE, JJ.

MOYLAN, Judge.

The appellant, Walter A. Younie, was convicted in the Circuit Court for Baltimore County by a jury, presided over by Judge H. Kemp MacDaniel, of first degree murder and armed robbery. He now contends:

(1) That the State deliberately suppressed material evidence favorable to him in contravention of Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83, 83 S.Ct. 1194, 10 L.Ed.2d 215; and

(2) That the court erroneously permitted an interrogating detective to recite to the jury the fact that the appellant refused to answer certain specific questions, which questions and nonresponses were interspersed in a series of admittedly proper questions and answers.

Both issues may be more intelligibly viewed in the context of the total case implicating the appellant. On December 27, 1971, at approximately 7:30 p. m., Reuben J. Kaufman, an employee at the B & F Liquor Store on Pulaski Highway in Baltimore County, was killed by a shotgun blast at close range in the course of an armed holdup. Two hundred and sixty-five dollars was taken in the course of the robbery. A number of witnesses established uncontrovertedly that three men had been observed parked near the store, in a darkcolored Cadillac, shortly before the robbery. Another witness, shortly thereafter, saw two men running out of the store, one of them carrying a shotgun.

At approximately 8:15 that same evening, the police discovered a recently burned out Cadillac abandoned near the intersection of Macon Street and Erdman Avenue in Baltimore City. A computerized records check revealed that the Cadillac had recently been stolen from its owner in Quincy, Massachusetts. It was, however, bearing Connecticut license tags issued on December 9, 1971, to Adelbert Grondin of Hartford, Connecticut. Zeroing in on the name Grondin, the police began to check motels and hotels in the Baltimore area. At approximately 9:30 a. m. on December 28, the police discovered that Adelbert Grondin and an ostensible John McCarron had at 12:45 p. m. on the preceding afternoon checked into the New Motel on Route 40, in the general vicinity where the burned out Cadillac was found. They had checked out, however, at 8:50 a. m. on December 28, some 40 minutes before the police arrived. They had left in a Sun Cab. The motel clerk identified photographs which indicated that the ostensible John McCarron was in fact John D. McCormack. A taxicab driver recalled picking up two men from room 58 (the room where Grondin and McCormack were registered) and driving them 'as far west as they could go for $6.' He dropped them off at the Normandy Shopping Center on Route 40 west of Baltimore. Both Grondin and McCormack were arrested a short time later in Frederick, Maryland.

At shortly before midnight on December 27, the police began discovering parts of a dismantled shotgun and live shotgun shells in the general vicinity of the burned out Cadillac and of the New Motel. Proceeding from the robbery scene westward on Pulaski Highway, the police found one spent shotgun shell near the curb of Pulaski Highway, one and six-tenths miles from the robbery scene. Proceeding further westward on Pulaski Highway and then by way of Erdman Avenue to North Macon Street, the police came to the burned out Cadillac, an additional two and one-half miles from where the spent shotgun shell was recovered. A short distance away from the burned out Cadillac near the Penn Central Railroad tracks, the forestock of the shotgun was found. Across the street, 138 feet away, the double barrel of the shotgun was found. Sixty-seven feet away, the stock was found. The gun was a 16 gauge sawed-off shotgun. It was missing the trigger guard. Within a radius of 100 feet, three live shotgun shells were recovered. From that vicinity, North Kresson Street leads to Monument Street, a tenth of a mile away. Along the North Kresson Street route, a fourth live shotgun cartridge was found. From the intersection of North Kresson Street and Monument Street, it is two-tenths of a mile to the New Motel.

Astute police work tracked the investigative spore back to Hartford, Connecticut. Two separate witnesses established that 1) the appellant, 2) McCormack, 3) Grondin and 4) the appellant's traveling companion named Loretta Scully had been together in Hartford throughout the week preceding Christmas and had left on or about December 26. One witness testified that the foursome drove around Hartford in a blue Cadillac and that the Cadillac was bearing Connecticut license tags which had been issued to Grondin. Both witnesses, who knew the appellant well, identified the reassembled shotgun as similar to the sawed-off, 16 gauge shotgun which each had seen on separate occasions, in the apartment of one and in the place of business of the other, in the possession of the appellant. One was aware that the appellant's shotgun lacked a trigger guard and testified further that the appellant was very reluctant to let gun out of his own hands and refused to permit anyone else to touch it.

Loretta Scully was granted immunity and testified as a State's witness. She testified that she left Hartford on December 26 in the company of the appellant, McCormack and Grondin. They first drove to Boston to pick up her pocketbook and then drove to Baltimore. The appellant drove the Cadillac and Miss Scully thought that the car was his. They checked into the New Motel in Baltimore in the early afternoon of December 27, all four of them sharing the room which was registered only to McCormack and Grondin. Miss Scully took a nap after her three male companions left the motel room at approximately 3 p. m. They returned at approximately 8:30. Because of their loud and excited conversation, Miss Scully asked the three what was wrong. McCormack informed her that they had robbed a liquor store and that in the process, a man had been shot. The appellant confirmed the robbery and told Miss Scully that he had done the shooting. She had seen the appellant with the sawed-off shotgun in Connecticut but had not seen it in the car during the trip to Baltimore. Her three male companions told her that they had stopped on the way back from the robbery and set the car on fire. They had then returned to the motel on foot. She observed them place approximately $200 on the bed. It was separated into three piles. Each of the three men took one of the piles. After hearing a news broadcast about the murder on the following morning, it was agreed that the party would split up into two groups and meet later in Columbus, Ohio. Miss Scully left with the appellant and drove to the Greyhound Bus Terminal in downtown Baltimore. They took a bus to Wheeling, West Virginia, and then hitchhiked on toward Columbus, finishing the journey in a stolen car. When Grondin and McCormack failed to show up for the rendezvous, Miss Scully and the appellant continued westward. They were ultimately arrested in Putnam, Indiana, when they pulled away from a gas station without paying.

The appellant, furthermore, after having been given full Miranda warnings, had made incriminating admissions to the police to the effect that he knew both McCormack and Grondin, that he drove the dark blue Cadillac to the armed robbery scene although he denied going in, that the Cadillac had been stolen from Quincy, Massachusetts, that the Cadillac had been left near a railroad underpass after being set on fire, that he had come from Hartford with Loretta Scully who stayed at the New Motel, and that Loretta Scully did not know that there was going to be a holdup. He does not now attack the admissibility of those statements.

The Suppression Question

Added to that overwhelming evidence of guilt was the testimony of an eyewitness, Irvin Lambdin. It is on the periphery of Mr. Lambdin's testimony that the suppression issue is raised.

Mr. Lambdin, a regular patron of the B & F Liquor Store, drove up to the store on the evening of December 27 with the intention of purchasing a case of beer. As he approached the front door, some unarticulated premonition caused him to hesitate. He had observed that only two cars were on the parking lot, one of which he assumed to be the store manager's and the other of which was a Cadillac. He discerned a male form in the Cadillac. From the silence in the store and from the holiday season (which he described as a time of high incidence for robberies), he felt a sixth sense awareness that trouble was afoot. He retreated to the rear of his own automobile. He was standing there, curious and observant, when he saw two men burst from the store and run for the Cadillac. The second of the two men was carrying a sawed-off shotgun. The gun was thrown on the floor of the car, the two men jumped into the Cadillac, and the Cadillac took off at a high rate of speed. Mr. Lambdin later identified the burned out Cadillac as the one which he had observed in the front of the liquor store. He identified the reassembled shotgun as similar to the one he had seen in the hand of one of the robbers.

Mr. Lambdin also testified that as the second of the two men, the one carrying the gun, ran for the Cadillac, he pulled a stocking cap off his head, revealing long, shoulder-length blonde hair. Although Mr. Lambdin could not identify any of the assailants by face, he did give the following response at trial:

'Q. Would you describe the color of the hair of the person you saw carrying the shotgun?

A. I did.

Q. Repeat it.

A. Ash-blonde down to shoulder level, blonde hair.

Q. Would you look at the hair of the Defendant in this...