Lentz v. State

604 So. 2d 243, 1992 WL 124781
CourtMississippi Supreme Court
DecidedJune 10, 1992
Docket07-KA-59640
StatusPublished
Cited by28 cases

This text of 604 So. 2d 243 (Lentz v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Mississippi Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Lentz v. State, 604 So. 2d 243, 1992 WL 124781 (Mich. 1992).

Opinion

604 So.2d 243 (1992)

Mona Kianne LENTZ a/k/a Mona L. Morris a/k/a Mona Kianne Morris
v.
STATE of Mississippi.

No. 07-KA-59640.

Supreme Court of Mississippi.

June 10, 1992.

*244 Robert M. Ryan, Senatobia, for appellant.

Michael C. Moore, Atty. Gen., Charles W. Maris, Jr., Sp. Asst. Atty. Gen., Jackson, for appellee.

Before DAN M. LEE, P.J., and SULLIVAN and PITTMAN, JJ.

DAN M. LEE, Presiding Justice, for the Court:

On April 28th 1988, Mona Kianne Lentz was convicted in the Tate County Circuit Court of manslaughter for the fatal shooting of Christopher Wayne Hudspeth, her former boyfriend and father of her unborn child. On May 20th 1988, she was sentenced to eighteen (18) years confinement, with six (6) years suspended. Feeling aggrieved, she appeals and assigns three errors.

1. The Court erred in ruling that expert testimony concerning the Battered Women's Syndrome would not be admissible.
2. The Court erred in not appointing [an] expert witness.
3. The Court erred in refusing to allow into evidence the results of the drug screen analysis.

We have carefully reviewed the record of the proceedings and tragic facts of this case which involved a woman who, while admitting to killing the man who had repeatedly battered her, claimed she killed in self-defense. While we might wish for the power to make damaged souls whole, our duty is to review the proceedings conducted in the lower court to insure the defendant was fairly tried and afforded all of her constitutional rights. With this duty in mind, we find the first two assignments of error are without merit. Regarding the third assignment of error, we find that, while the circuit court erred in ruling the results of a drug screen analysis were inadmissible, the results were only peripherally relevant, and the evidence overwhelmingly supported the jury's verdict. Therefore, the error does not rise to a level requiring reversal of Lentz's conviction. Accordingly, *245 we affirm the judgment of the Circuit Court.

FACTS

Lentz met Hudspeth in June of 1986, and began living with him in August of that year. Lentz testified that during this relationship, Hudspeth repeatedly battered her. She briefly separated from him in March of 1987, but resumed the relationship in April or May of 1987, until July 10th 1987, when she and her children moved to the home of her second cousin.

On September 5th 1987, Lentz decided to take her own life. She left her cousin's house with her three children in the car and drove to a pawnshop where she purchased a .25 caliber automatic pistol. What prompted her decision to take her own life is not entirely clear; however, it appears she grew up in an atmosphere of domestic violence and verbal abuse; and, believing that her cousin was no longer willing to allow her to continue living in her home, was worried she could not provide food and shelter for herself and her three children.

After purchasing the pistol, Lentz drove, somewhat aimlessly, to her mother's home where she intended to leave her children. Her mother was not home, so she took her children to lunch for a treat of fast-food. She then went to visit a woman to whom she planned to give what little money she had, but found the woman did not need the money as much as she had believed. Then, she returned to her mother's house and was waiting for her mother to return when she saw Hudspeth drive by the house. Upon seeing Hudspeth, Lentz decided she wanted to talk with him one last time so that she would leave good memories of herself.

She drove to Hudspeth's house, where she and Hudspeth entered into a conversation, during which Hudspeth told her that he had smoked marijuana earlier that day. Further, Hudspeth asked her to come inside the house. When she declined, he became jealous and angry and went back inside the house. Shortly thereafter, Hudspeth's cousin came out of the house and talked briefly with Lentz before going to his father's house, which was next-door to Hudspeth's. Lentz did not want Hudspeth to remember their last moment together as one of strife, so she walked to his front door, where she was met by Hudspeth, and again they talked.

Deciding she no longer wished to kill herself, Lentz asked Hudspeth for her waterbed which she had left in his bedroom. They went inside the house to the bedroom, whereupon Hudspeth refused to return the bed to her. Lentz told him "you know what Judge Kopf said about you using my stuff." At the mention of Judge Kopf, Hudspeth's facial expression changed, and "his eyes turned black." From previous batterings, Lentz knew it was "[t]ime to get out, time to leave... . Get away." She tried to "ease out" of the house, but Hudspeth saw her and said, "[i]f I have to go to jail this time, if I have to go this time, it will be for a reason." Hudspeth grabbed her, pulled her back, and she fell. Lentz testified as follows:

[T]he next thing I remember is his back was to me. There was ringing. He was gone. And I thought, oh, my God, he's gone to get my girls. And then I thought, my girls, as I got to the door he had a pistol, himself, that he had used on me before. I did not see him with my girls. I thought he might be on the other side, maybe he got his pistol out of his car quick enough to shoot them because I had scared him. I felt I had scared him because he was not in the room.

Further, when asked on direct examination whether she remembered shooting Hudspeth, Lentz stated:

I remember thinking of the pistol when he knocked me down, to scare him so I could get away and then I heard the ringing and he wasn't there, so figured I had scared him or that he was either going to lock the door to really, so no one could get in. Because that's usually what he did. He usually went and locked all the doors where the girls could not get in when I was screaming.

Although she was afraid Hudspeth would be waiting for her outside the house, *246 she went outside where she saw him lying on the ground. She thought he was "playing," although she could hear someone breathing with difficulty, as if they had bronchitis.

Hudspeth's cousin testified that when Lentz arrived at Hudspeth's house, he left and walked next door to his father's house. Shortly thereafter, he heard a gunshot and ran outside where he saw Lentz running away with a gun and Hudspeth lying on the ground near the steps leading into his parents' house, which was approximately one hundred (100) feet from Hudspeth's house. The cousin's father also testified that he heard a shot and came outside where he saw Lentz running away and Hudspeth lying on the ground. The cousin's mother also testified that she saw a female running away, and Hudspeth on the ground.

An autopsy revealed that Hudspeth had been shot twice at close range with a .25 caliber pistol. Only one of the two wounds was fatal; the fatal bullet entered his back and passed through his heart, and another bullet entered his face, near his left cheek. According to expert medical testimony, it would not have been unusual for a person to have received a fatal wound, as was present here, and to travel a distance of one hundred (100) feet before collapsing.

Lentz testified that she drove from Hudspeth's house to her mother's house, where she left her children. Lentz's mother testified that Lentz told her that she had shot Hudspeth once and he had fallen down, and then she shot him again; however, Lentz stated she did not remember telling this to her mother.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

Luis Alberto Figueroa v. State of Mississippi
Court of Appeals of Mississippi, 2021
William B. Wells v. State of Mississippi
Mississippi Supreme Court, 2017
Colburn v. State
990 So. 2d 206 (Court of Appeals of Mississippi, 2008)
Burnside v. State
882 So. 2d 212 (Mississippi Supreme Court, 2004)
Martin v. State
872 So. 2d 713 (Court of Appeals of Mississippi, 2004)
James C. Burnside v. State of Mississippi
Mississippi Supreme Court, 2003
Kolberg v. State
829 So. 2d 29 (Mississippi Supreme Court, 2002)
Logan v. State
773 So. 2d 338 (Mississippi Supreme Court, 2000)
Eskridge v. State
765 So. 2d 508 (Mississippi Supreme Court, 2000)
Jenkins v. CST Timber Co.
761 So. 2d 177 (Mississippi Supreme Court, 2000)
Bryan Kolberg v. State of Mississippi
Mississippi Supreme Court, 2000
Richmond v. State
751 So. 2d 1038 (Mississippi Supreme Court, 1999)
Roderick Eskridge v. State of Mississippi
Mississippi Supreme Court, 1999
Simmons v. State
722 So. 2d 666 (Mississippi Supreme Court, 1998)
Franco Coleman v. State of Mississippi
Mississippi Supreme Court, 1998
Robert Richmond v. State of Mississippi
Mississippi Supreme Court, 1997
Holland v. State
705 So. 2d 307 (Mississippi Supreme Court, 1997)
Antonio Simmons v. State of Mississippi
Mississippi Supreme Court, 1996
Marvin Logan v. State of Mississippi
Mississippi Supreme Court, 1996

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
604 So. 2d 243, 1992 WL 124781, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/lentz-v-state-miss-1992.