Opinion
C084765
08-09-2018
THE PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. JUSTIN ANTHONY JESUS, Defendant and Appellant.
NOT TO BE PUBLISHED California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115. (Super. Ct. No. 15F07687)
Defendant Justin Anthony Jesus was convicted by jury of the first degree murder of his estranged wife, the victim, with the personal use of a deadly weapon, a knife (Pen. Code, §§ 187, subd. (a), 12022, subd. (b)(1)), and sentenced to serve an aggregate term of 26 years to life in state prison. Defendant contends the evidence was insufficient to prove premeditation and deliberation. We affirm.
Undesignated statutory references are to the Penal Code.
Defendant was also convicted of corporal injury on a spouse with the infliction of great bodily injury. (§§ 273.5, subd. (a), 12022.7, subd. (e).) The trial court imposed but stayed sentence on that count and allegation pursuant to section 654.
FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND
Prosecution case
Defendant and the victim met in a rehabilitation program. Their drug of choice was heroin, but both also used methamphetamine.
In September 2012, the victim called 911, saying her boyfriend (defendant) had pushed her onto a couch and choked her. Defendant's voice could be heard yelling in the background.
In July 2014, defendant and the victim married. On their wedding night, defendant invited strangers up to their hotel room to party and use drugs, angering the victim. An argument ensued, during which defendant threw clothes around the room, smashed a television, and damaged other items in the room.
On Thanksgiving 2014, the victim's sister noticed the victim was wearing the sister's scarf and tried to grab it. The victim slapped the sister's hand away, but the sister saw the scarf was concealing bruises on the victim's neck; the victim also had a cut lip. The victim said she and defendant had gotten into a fight and he had choked her. The sister saw scrapes and bruises on the victim's arms on other occasions.
The sister disapproved of the victim's relationship with defendant because he was volatile, especially when doing methamphetamine, which made him agitated, aggressive, and paranoid. He often accused the victim of hiding drugs or money from him.
In July 2015, the sister and her mother picked up defendant and the victim at Lake Tahoe. Defendant and the victim asked to stop in Stockton on the way home. After getting out of the car, they started fighting and yelling. Defendant hit the victim and she fell to the ground; the victim then got up and pushed him back.
In the summer or fall of 2015, the victim came to the sister's apartment and asked to stay with her because defendant had again choked her during an argument. A few days later defendant showed up at the apartment. After the sister told defendant to stop disrespecting the victim, he threatened to break into the sister's apartment while she slept and kill her and her dog. The victim, afraid her presence in the sister's apartment would cause trouble, decided to leave with defendant. The sister called the police, but by the time they came defendant and the victim were gone.
On another occasion in the summer or fall of 2015, the victim called the sister and told her defendant had choked her and she thought something was wrong with her throat. She did not see a doctor, despite the sister's advice to do so.
In the fall of 2015, defendant's mother dropped the victim off at her family's home after defendant pushed the victim through a plexiglass window, causing cuts to her arms.
A few months before December 2015, the victim told Folsom Police Officer Laura Janson, who had originally met her on a domestic dispute call and had spoken to her about her situation repeatedly over the last year, that she was afraid for her life but loved defendant and was not ready to give up on him.
According to the sister, the victim was dropped off at the family home after an argument about eight days before the crime, and stayed with the family (her parents, her brother, and sister) from then on. Unlike previous occasions when she had temporarily stayed with them, this time "[s]he seemed just done. She was fed up." Because the house was being remodeled, the family stayed at a motel until December 20, 2015, when they returned to spend the holidays at the house even though the remodeling was not complete.
In the days leading up to the crime, a series of text messages passed between defendant and the victim (defendant borrowing his brother's phone and the victim borrowing the sister's phone). After reading defendant's texts and finding them "threatening," the sister blocked defendant's brother's number in the hope the victim would not see them.
The victim texted defendant that she did not lie to him about money or hide heroin from him; she wanted to take care of him, not to let him suffer the pain of withdrawal. Shortly afterward, she texted that she cared about him and truly loved him, but he was making a mistake and she was leaving.
On the evening of December 19, 2015, defendant texted the victim accusing her of having given him or attempted to give him "arsenic Lyme disease," "lacing [his] food with lead paint and lightbulb powder," and "don't forget the mold or battery alkali, too." Shortly afterward, defendant texted that the victim hid drugs from him all the time, "just like you hide your real evilness and hate for your husband," and that she made him unwillingly take "acid and Molly trip." Five minutes later, defendant sent additional texts to the victim along the same lines.
"Molly" is a stimulant similar to Ecstasy.
Two minutes after that, defendant sent a text insinuating the victim was cheating on him because she had texted a number he did not know; she denied the charge. Defendant replied that he had given her everything but she did not do the same; she wanted to deny cheating but "couldn't think of a lie to explain who you were texting"; she would never find anyone who loved her as much as he did; he was "done being lied to"; and she would not hear from him again until she "g[o]t [her] papers in the mail." She replied: "Don't do this, Justin. I'm nothing but good to you. I miss you bad." He responded: "We're both happier. Now you don't have to lie, cheat or be sketchy. Now everything is out in the open. Have fun ruining someone else's life, and go use them."
The parties stipulated that the number belonged to the victim's female cousin.
On December 20, 2015, around 10:00 p.m., the sister returned home from work and saw the victim outside the house (even though it was raining) on the phone with defendant, who planned to come over so they could talk. Defendant arrived shortly before 11:00 p.m., apparently on foot. The victim met him at the door. They went out and sat under the garage overhang, talking and smoking.
Because most of the rooms still lacked locks on the doors due to the incomplete remodel, the victim's father went outside and said this was not a good time for defendant to be there. The father also felt defendant should not be there because the sister had said earlier that day that he scared her. Neither defendant nor the victim seemed to the father to be under the influence of a drug.
Defendant and the victim got into the family's parked Ford Expedition. Assuming the victim would stay with the family, the father followed them, told defendant he could take an hour to decide what to do next, and offered to drive him anywhere he wanted to go. The father then went back inside.
Around midnight the father came back out and asked where defendant wanted to be taken. Defendant and the victim said: "[W]ell, we'll just go." The father said he did not want them to do that, but the victim assured him they would be fine.
The victim went back inside to pack a bag. The father and the sister asked her to stay. After saying she would come back in the morning, she walked out and went down the street to join defendant. The father fell asleep on the living room couch, then got up and went to bed around 2:00 a.m.
In the early morning hours of December 21, 2015, a neighbor heard a man and woman yelling for five minutes. When the yelling stopped, the neighbor went back to sleep, but was awakened by a car horn's erratic honking.
At around 4:00 a.m., the victim's brother woke up the father, saying something was going on outside and the father should investigate. At the same time, the sister woke up to the sound of someone rattling garbage cans and the fence. Looking out the window, she saw defendant hopping the fence and heard her brother yelling for their father to follow him. The father and brother ran out into the front yard. The brother said he thought he saw defendant dragging a comforter to the right side of the house. Hearing a commotion on the other side of the house, they ran over, followed by the sister.
The father saw defendant throw a beanbag chair, then look under it. Defendant had a knife in his hand. When the father went to look under the chair, defendant, who seemed to be in a frenzied state, said: "I know you're out to get me." The father and the sister asked defendant, "Where's [the victim]?" and, "What did you do to my sister?" He replied: "She's gone. She's gone. She's never coming back." He pointed the knife toward them.
Running around toward the other side of the house, the father saw the victim's blonde hair near honeysuckle bushes that had been pulled over her. The victim was lying on the ground, looking as though she had been dragged; she was wearing only a sweatshirt and her face was covered in mud and leaves. She was cold, and the father could not detect a pulse. When he tilted her head back to try CPR, he saw a deep wound on her neck, from which no blood was coming out. He told the sister to call 911 and to get a glass of water to clean the victim's face. When the sister brought the water out and he used it, the victim did not react.
Officer Janson was dispatched to the scene on December 21, 2015, at 4:29 a.m. It was very dark, windy, and pouring rain. She and the other officers dispatched there learned defendant had been seen moments before in the backyard with a knife.
The officers found the victim in the front yard, nonresponsive, pale, naked from the waist down, with a bruised and bloody face and a ripped and blood-soaked upper garment. When they tried to pick her up, her head fell back so far it looked as though it would come off. A deep laceration stretched across her throat. Concerned defendant was on the loose, the officers provided cover to the medics who removed the victim from the front yard.
Defendant was found hiding in a doghouse at a nearby residence. After he did not respond to an order to come out, a canine officer was sent in after him. When pulled out, he tried to resist arrest. Inside the doghouse, officers found a folding knife with blood on the blade and handle.
The paramedic who transported the victim to the hospital observed she had no pulse or respiration and was showing no signs of life. She had multiple stab wounds to the head and neck, and evidence of blunt force trauma to the head. Her visible injuries included a half-inch-wide deep cut from the midline of the neck to the left ear, three or four stab wounds on her neck, bruising around the eyes indicative of brain injury, bleeding from the top of the skull, a skin tear above the left eye, and multiple stab wounds to the right hand and forearm.
A crime scene investigator dispatched to the scene observed a great deal of blood dripping on the running board of the driver's side of the Ford Expedition, and a large puddle of blood on the cement below it. There were also bloodstains on other locations on the premises. The knife found in the doghouse where defendant had hidden had blood on it and a small piece of blonde hair stuck to it.
Police officers dispatched to the scene shortly afterward examined the interior of the Expedition. There was a large amount of blood throughout, and light-colored hairs were strewn about. Methamphetamine and smoking paraphernalia were also found in the vehicle. Later DNA analysis showed that defendant and the victim's DNA profiles were on the inside of the vehicle and on items found in the vehicle, and defendant's DNA was the major contributor on portions of the handle of the knife found in the doghouse.
One officer, a certified drug recognition expert, met with defendant at the police department around 8:00 a.m. on December 21, 2015. After conducting tests, the officer concluded defendant did not show signs of impairment or appear under the influence of a stimulant, heroin, or alcohol. Defendant spontaneously said to the officer: "I don't know why you guys want to talk to me. You know I did it."
Analysis of defendant's blood showed positive results for amphetamine, methamphetamine, opiates, and marijuana, but the methamphetamine level was low for a chronic user. The victim's blood showed she had ingested methamphetamine, opiates, and marijuana immediately before her death.
During a jail visit with his family, which was recorded and played for the jury, defendant rejected his mother's suggestion that the crime could be reduced to manslaughter: "It's not gonna be manslaughter, you kidding me. I stabbed her to death." He showed his brother a cut on his hand that he got "from fucking dragging her. I cut my—my hand on her fucking spine." Each time, his mother told him to "shut up."
The autopsy report showed the victim's death resulted from both sharp force and blunt force injuries. The victim suffered 21 stab wounds, 43 cut wounds, and blunt force injuries to the face, head, brain, and body; it would have taken a fair amount of time to inflict so many injuries to so many body parts. Some of the stab wounds and blunt force injuries to the hands and wrists were probably defensive. Four stab wounds appeared focused on a tattoo of defendant's name. The large gaping wound across the throat followed numerous wounds, cuts, and attempts to open the neck. The inner surface of the wound showed it was inflicted while the victim was still alive, but because that wound would have caused death quickly, it must have come last.
Defense case
Defendant did not testify.
Defendant's brother, with whom defendant and the victim sometimes lived, testified defendant and the victim often argued and fought physically. The victim once stabbed defendant in the arm with a knife that they used at other times to scratch off lottery tickets.
Defendant's mother, with whom defendant and the victim lived at other times, testified they were welcome when sober and working, but when they went back to using drugs, fighting, and destroying property she would throw them out and they would become homeless. Sometimes she would drop the victim off at her family's home.
On December 20, 2015, defendant's mother heard defendant talking on the phone with the victim. Later, he asked his mother to drive him to the victim's family home. When she said she would not do so until the next day, he walked there.
Defense counsel's argument
Counsel asked for a verdict of voluntary manslaughter. According to counsel, defendant's deranged texts before the crime showed a state of mind consistent with imperfect self-defense: his belief the victim had sought to kill him was unreasonable but genuine. His conduct just after the killing, when he brandished the knife at the victim's family and accused them also of trying to kill him, further showed he had genuinely though unreasonably believed his life was in danger.
In the alternative, counsel argued for second degree murder on a theory of provocation and lack of premeditation and deliberation. Counsel asserted defendant's conduct on the night of the crime showed he planned to reconcile with the victim, but some unknown circumstance, probably brought on by the couple's use of drugs in the Ford Expedition, suddenly provoked him into lethal rage.
DISCUSSION
Defendant contends the evidence was insufficient to prove premeditation and deliberation. We disagree.
To find a defendant guilty of first degree murder, the trier of fact must determine the defendant acted with premeditation and deliberation. Premeditation means "thought over in advance." (People v. Koontz (2002) 27 Cal.4th 1041, 1080.) Deliberation "refers to careful weighing of considerations in forming a course of action." (Ibid.) Both may occur in a very short time. (People v. Solomon (2010) 49 Cal.4th 792, 812.) The test for premeditation and deliberation in an intentional killing is whether it occurred " 'as the result of preexisting thought and reflection rather than unconsidered or rash impulse.' " (People v. Pearson (2013) 56 Cal.4th 393, 443.)
In People v. Anderson (1968) 70 Cal.2d 15, 26-27 (Anderson), our high court stated that " 'planning' activity," " 'preexisting motive,' " and "manner of killing" could all go to show premeditation and deliberation. However, these categories were not meant to be exhaustive, and it is not necessary to find substantial evidence of all three Anderson factors in order to uphold a first degree murder verdict. (People v. Mendoza (2011) 52 Cal.4th 1056, 1069; People v. Solomon, supra, 49 Cal.4th at p. 812.)
On reviewing a claim of insufficient evidence, we consider the whole record in the light most favorable to the judgment to determine whether it discloses substantial evidence in support of each element of the verdict. (People v. Crittenden (1994) 9 Cal.4th 83, 139.) The standard of review does not differ where the People rely mainly on circumstantial evidence. (People v. Bean (1988) 46 Cal.3d 919, 932.) We may not reweigh the evidence, but must accord deference to the trier of fact's determinations. (People v. Ochoa (1993) 6 Cal.4th 1199, 1206.) The possibility that the jury could have reached a different verdict does not show the verdict it did reach was unsupported by substantial evidence. (People v. Snow (2003) 30 Cal.4th 43, 66.)
Viewing the evidence most favorably to the verdict, substantial evidence exists to support each of the Anderson factors. As to planning activity, the evidence shows defendant took pains to persuade the victim to see him again after she had apparently left him for good, walked to her family home late at night with the murder weapon (a folding knife that would have had to be unfolded in order to be used) concealed on his person, then coaxed her into leaving the safety of her home and family and accompanying him into an enclosed space from which she could not escape or seek help once his attack began. (See People v. Sanchez (1995) 12 Cal.4th 1, 34 [obtaining kitchen knife to commit murder], overruled on other ground in People v. Doolin (2009) 45 Cal.4th 390, 421, fn. 22; People v. Wharton (1991) 53 Cal.3d 522, 547 [retrieving hammer beforehand].)
With regard to motive for murder, the evidence that defendant committed domestic violence against her throughout their relationship (continuing until shortly before she left him, supposedly for good), accused her of everything from cheating on him to withholding drugs from him to attempting to poison him, yet nevertheless could not accept her decision to leave him even after ostentatiously parting with her by text, pointed to a combination of rage, jealousy, and paranoia. (See People v. Streeter (2012) 54 Cal.4th 205, 242-244; People v. Kovacich (2011) 201 Cal.App.4th 863, 882-883.)
Lastly, his manner of killing, a protracted and brutal infliction of dozens of sharp force and blunt force wounds, focusing inter alia on a part of the victim's body bearing a tattoo of his own name, and culminating in a neck-slashing wound (inflicted after numerous trial attempts) so savage that it nearly cut her head off while she was still alive, was powerful evidence in support of "a preconceived design to kill" (People v. Elliot (2005) 37 Cal.4th 453, 471) when viewed together with the evidence of motive and planning activity. (Id. at p. 471, People v. San Nicolas (2004) 34 Cal.4th 614, 657-658.)
Defendant asserts the above evidence could also be viewed as consistent with a rash, impulsive killing, and cites cases in which evidence somewhat similar to certain facts in this case was not found to support premeditation and deliberation. Defendant's argument depends on viewing the evidence and the inferences to be drawn from it in the light most favorable to himself, which we may not do on substantial evidence review. (People v. Crittenden, supra, 9 Cal.4th at p. 139; People v. Ochoa, supra, 6 Cal.4th at p. 1206.)
For instance, defendant attempts to rebut the reasonable inference that bringing the murder weapon to the scene showed planning activity by asserting it was a "mere possibility" he did so as part of a preconceived design to kill, and he and the victim had previously used the murder weapon to scratch lottery tickets. But defendant cites no evidence suggesting any reason for carrying a folding knife concealed on his person on the night of the crime other than a design to catch the victim off guard and kill her. What he and she may have done with the knife on some other occasion (assuming his brother's uncorroborated testimony on that point was credible) is immaterial.
Defendant insists he could not have been planning to kill the victim or have had a motive to do so because he went to her family's home to reconcile with her and had achieved that goal when they left the house together. But while the victim may have thought or hoped reconciliation was in the offing, in light of all the other evidence the jury could reasonably have inferred that defendant's talk of reconciliation was a ruse designed to ensnare the victim by separating her from her family, and his other conduct prior to the crime showed his real state of mind.
Moreover, there is no evidence of any provocation or rash impulse occurring after defendant and the victim left the house. The neighbor who heard an argument and the sounds of a struggle coming from the Ford Expedition could not hear what was actually going on. To infer this evidence might have shown provocation by the victim or a homicidal change of heart by defendant is mere speculation.
Defendant asserts there is no evidence he ever threatened or attempted to kill the victim before the night of the crime. However, he cites no authority holding that such evidence is required in order to establish premeditation and deliberation, and we know of none.
Defendant relies heavily on People v. Boatman (2013) 221 Cal.App.4th 1253 (Boatman), in which the appellate court reduced a first degree murder conviction to second degree murder because it found no substantial evidence of premeditation and deliberation. Aside from the fact that in Boatman, as here, the victim was the defendant's significant other (id. at p. 1257), that case bears almost no resemblance to this one.
In Boatman, the defendant killed his girlfriend with a single gunshot to the face. (Boatman, supra, 221 Cal.App.4th at pp. 1257, 1258, 1259.) He told the police he knew the gun was loaded and intentionally cocked the hammer back " 'jokingly,' " but claimed the hammer slipped. (Id. at p. 1263.) The appellate court found this evidence sufficient to show murder with malice aforethought. (Ibid.) However, the court found: (1) Nothing in any of the defendant's statements indicated he considered shooting the victim beforehand or carefully weighed considerations for and against killing her. (Id. at p. 1265.) (2) There was no evidence of planning. The defendant brought the victim to his house, where four other people were living who could identify him; he did not leave the room or the house to get the gun, but took it away from the victim just before the shooting; and he testified he did not intend to shoot her. (Id. at p. 1267.) (3) His behavior just after the shooting showed he was "horrified and distraught," not that he "had just fulfilled a preconceived plan." He tried to resuscitate the victim and told his brother to call the police. He could be heard crying during the 911 call. His first statements to the police were full of anguish and remorse. (Ibid.) (4) There was "little or no relevant motive evidence." (Ibid.) (5) The manner of killing was not " 'so particular and exacting' " as to support the inference of a preconceived design. (Id. at p. 1269, quoting People v. Anderson, supra, 70 Cal.2d at p. 27.)
In our case, the evidence of planning activity and motive absent in Boatman, supra, 221 Cal.App.4th 1253 are abundantly present, and the manner of killing was as far removed from the single gunshot in Boatman as can possibly be imagined. Furthermore, rather than calling 911 after the killing or asking anyone else to do so, defendant tried to escape the scene and hide from the police, then resisted arrest. And although he admitted the killing, he never showed remorse. For all these reasons, Boatman does not assist defendant.
DISPOSITION
The judgment is affirmed.
/s/_________
HOCH, J. We concur: /s/_________
HULL, Acting P. J. /s/_________
RENNER, J.