Hendrickson v. State

719 S.W.2d 420, 290 Ark. 319, 1986 Ark. LEXIS 2188
CourtSupreme Court of Arkansas
DecidedNovember 17, 1986
DocketCR 86-119
StatusPublished
Cited by8 cases

This text of 719 S.W.2d 420 (Hendrickson v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Arkansas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Hendrickson v. State, 719 S.W.2d 420, 290 Ark. 319, 1986 Ark. LEXIS 2188 (Ark. 1986).

Opinions

George Rose Smith, Justice.

The appellant, Patricia Hendrickson, was charged with capital murder in that she conspired with Norma Foster and Mark Yarbrough, a college student, to hire a second student, Howard Vagi, to murder the appellant’s husband, Orin Hendrickson, for $16,000. At the appellant’s first trial she was found guilty and sentenced to death. We reversed that conviction because the State was allowed to introduce a statement that the police had taken from her immediately after she had been warned of her rights and had said that she wanted to talk to her lawyer. Hendrickson v. State, 285 Ark. 462, 688 S.W.2d 295 (1985). Upon a retrial she was again found guilty of capital murder and was sentenced to life imprisonment without parole. This appeal is from that conviction.

Yarbrough, one of the students, was the State’s principal witness as to the events leading up to the crime. He had known Norma Foster, a college house mother, and through her had come to know the appellant. He testified that Norma approached him about arranging a killing. He mentioned it to Vagi, who wanted to do it for the money. The crime was planned in detail. The appellant supplied a picture of her husband and a key to the Hendricksons’ house. She made a down payment of $5,000 or more. Yarbrough showed the house to Vagi.

Vagi, who entered a negotiated plea in return for a life sentence, testified about the crime itself. He bought a shotgun. On the afternoon of the murder he went to the house, entering with the key. He waited until Hendrickson came home in the evening. After Hendrickson entered the kitchen through a door from the garage, Vagi shot him in the chest, as he had been instructed to do. Hendrickson fell to the floor. Vagi then ransacked drawers to create the appearance of a robbery. He thought the victim might still be alive and shot him a second time. After that he left the house. The appellant had been in Hot Springs that afternoon. She and Norma found the body when they went to the house together. The police were notified. The facts were eventually discovered. The informations were filed about eight months after the homicide.

It is first argued that two photographs of the victim’s body, clothed and lying face down on the kitchen floor in an extensive area of blood, should not have been introduced by the State. The medical examiner had already testified about the cause of death and had presented two pictures taken after the body had been cleaned. Both pictures are of the upper part of the body. One, taken from the front, shows the entry points of the two shots. The other, taken from the back, shows small spots where pellets left the body.

There was no objection to the pictures taken by the medical examiner, but it is argued that the prejudicial effect of the two pictures of the body on the floor outweighéd whatever probative value they might have. The point is made that the cause of death had already been proved, so the pictures were not needed to establish that fact. We have held that it is immaterial that photographs are cumulative to other evidence. Perry v. State, 277 Ark. 357, 642 S.W.2d 865 (1982). Here the two photographs corroborate Vagi’s account of the crime. We do not regard them as being especially inflammatory, but even if they were, their admissibility would still be a matter lying within the trial court’s discretion. Fairchild v. State, 284 Ark. 289, 681 S.W.2d 380 (1984), cert. denied, 105 S. Ct. 2346 (1985). Here we find no abuse of discretion.

The appellant’s second argument is that the court was wrong in ruling that the appellant’s statement to the police, although inadmissible as evidence during the State’s case in chief, could nevertheless be used by the prosecuting attorney in cross-examination of a defense witness, Dr. Stevens.

We hold that the trial court’s ruling was right, but the facts must be examined in some detail. About eight months after the crime was committed, the police obtained from the appellant an inculpatory statement, which was recorded on tape. That is the statement we found to be inadmissible on the first appeal. In that statement the appellant admitted having planned the murder, having supplied the photograph of her husband and the key to the house, and having paid $5,000 to Yarbrough as a down payment. She said that when she arrived at the house that night with Norma she did not know “for sure” that her husband was dead. At the first trial she testified in her own defense. She denied any complicity in the crime, saying that the various witnesses who testified to her connection with the killing were lying. She did not testify at the second trial.

Dr. Stevens, a psychologist, was called as a defense witness at the second trial. He said he had consulted with Mrs. Hendrickson four times, all while she was confined. The first interview occurred in August after we had reversed the conviction in April. The interviews were conducted at the request of the defense counsel. In addition to talking with the appellant Dr. Stevens administered several tests, which he described. He found her IQ to be 81, which is well below average. He doubted if she could compete at the college level. He said she does not have a dominant personality. She tends to be “a very feminine, mousey, passive, dependent kind of person who would be expected to be very easily led.” He thought her to be open and straightforward in talking about situations.

Toward the end of his direct examination he was asked about Mrs. Hendrickson’s knowledge of events immediately before and after her husband’s death. He said she could remember the activities of that day up until the time she found him, but from that point on her memory was very sketchy for months after-wards. He said she had no memory about having been incarcerated in certain places and could give him no information about it. The doctor’s direct examination ended in this manner:

Q. Doctor, did you make a determination as to whether she had any guilty knowledge in connection with the death of Orin Hendrickson?
A. I did. It was my determination that she does not have.

The prosecutor, before undertaking any cross-examination, argued in chambers that defense counsel should make the defendant herself available for cross-examination. The court disallowed that, but ruled that the prosecutor could take the defendant’s statements from the transcript of the first trial and question the witness about that information. Defense counsel then announced that Dr. Stevens was withdrawn as a witness, because the court had ruled that he could be cross-examined about the defendant’s statement to the police and about her testimony at the first trial. The court instructed the jury not to consider any of Dr. Steven’s testimony.

Counsel argue that when the court ruled as it did, the defendant had to withdraw Dr. Stevens as a witness or submit to the introduction of inadmissible evidence. “This ruling, in effect, would have denied the Defendant her right not to take the witness stand.”

We disagree.

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Related

Duncan v. State
831 S.W.2d 115 (Supreme Court of Arkansas, 1992)
Hughes v. State
797 S.W.2d 419 (Supreme Court of Arkansas, 1990)
Robertson v. State
765 S.W.2d 936 (Supreme Court of Arkansas, 1989)
Harris v. State
726 S.W.2d 267 (Supreme Court of Arkansas, 1987)
Foster v. State
720 S.W.2d 712 (Supreme Court of Arkansas, 1986)

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Bluebook (online)
719 S.W.2d 420, 290 Ark. 319, 1986 Ark. LEXIS 2188, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/hendrickson-v-state-ark-1986.