Libby v. State

859 P.2d 1050, 109 Nev. 905, 1993 Nev. LEXIS 137
Nevada Supreme Court·Decided September 9, 1993·No. 21271·Published·Cited by 41 cases

Opinions

[908] OPINION

By the Court,

Rose, C. J.:

Facts

In August of 1988, Charles Beatty (Beatty) moved to Winne-mucca, Nevada. He secured employment at the Pinson Mine and moved into a house at 14 South Street. Beatty’s 24-year-old nephew, James Robertson (Robertson), came with Beatty to stay for a couple of weeks. Robertson had several physical disabilities as a result of contracting Hodgkin’s disease (cancer of the lymph glands) when he was 13 years old, including partial paralysis, a deformed shoulder, and impaired speech that rendered him unable to scream. He also wore a leg brace for an injury caused by a motorcycle accident.

On September 14, 1988, Beatty was not seen at work and did not answer his telephone at home. On September 22, 1988, his and Robertson’s bodies were found in the desert. Beatty’s fully-clothed body had been stuffed into a trash bin, with his feet exposed. He had been shot in the back of the head at the base of his skull in an upward direction. Robertson’s body, clothed only in a pair of white jockey shorts, was wrapped in blankets and lay in a ravine. He had been shot in the top of his head in a downward direction, and his throat had been cut. Because Robertson’s body had begun to decompose, the examining physician could not determine the exact path of the bullet, how long Robertson remained alive or conscious after he was shot, or whether the throat wound was inflicted post-mortem.

A law enforcement team investigated Beatty’s residence. At trial, a blood specialist testified that the blood found on a headboard in the back bedroom was “consistent with that of [Robertson],” to the exclusion of Libby and Beatty. In the same bedroom, Agent Robert Milby found .22 caliber cartridge casings on the floor under a mattress. Blood of a type consistent with that of Beatty was discovered in front of the television in the living room.

On September 24, 1988, Renee Montgomery (Montgomery) approached the investigators on South Street and asked if the house was ready to rent. She explained to a police officer that she had spoken to a man named Roger Libby (Libby) in the early morning of September 14, 1988. Montgomery had known Libby since June of 1988; he was a customer of the casino where she worked as a bartender. Libby shared her room at the Winners Hotel in Winnemucca when there were no rooms available in town. After Labor Day weekend, Libby told Montgomery he was [909] going to stay with Charles Beatty. On September 14, 1988, he told her that he was returning to Moberly, Missouri, that Beatty was returning to Wyoming, and that they wanted to rent the house to her. Late that night, he showed her the house, except the room in which Robertson slept, which he told her was a mess. Montgomery then went back to the casino and did not see Libby again.

On September 24, 1988, Missouri police located Beatty’s Chevrolet Blazer in Higbee, Missouri, and arrested Libby as he approached the vehicle. Troopers Don Ancell and Kevin Hyatt searched the front portion of the Blazer for weapons. They found Beatty’s checkbook and wallet in the pocket of the passenger side door. Inside the checkbook were blank cards in Beatty’s name. Missouri police officers later found a wallet in Libby’s possession, which contained Beatty’s Nevada driver’s license, Beatty’s bank cards, Beatty’s First Interstate Bank automatic teller machine card, and Libby’s own identification card. The four digit PIN number which accesses the account was on a piece of paper in the wallet. The next day, Ancell went to the residence of Libby’s friend in Higbee and found several stereo components and other items which belonged to Beatty. At Libby’s place of employment in Missouri, police recovered several tools inscribed with the name Charles Beatty.

On September 26, 1988, Agent Milby and other Nevada law enforcement officers traveled to Missouri to continue the investigation. They searched the Blazer and discovered a .22 caliber rifle and a box of .22 caliber ammunition. At trial, a criminal specialist testified that the bullet fragments found in the victims’ bodies “were small and consistent with a .22 caliber bullet or something very, very close to it.” Blood of a type consistent with that of Beatty was on the Blazer’s carpet.

Several weeks later, police discovered that someone had made three withdrawals from the automatic teller using Beatty’s Winne-mucca bank account. One withdrawal occurred in Winnemucca on September 14, 1988, and the next two were in Las Vegas on September 15, 1988. The same white male individual was shown on video tape using the machines. The jury viewed all of the tapes and thus had the opportunity to identify the user of the machines.

The State filed a felony complaint against Roger Libby, charging him with two counts of murder with the use of a deadly weapon, three counts of robbery with the use of a deadly weapon, and five counts of grand larceny. The State also filed notice of its intention to seek the death penalty. On February 6 and 7, 1990, the trial court heard several motions to suppress evidence, including a motion to suppress Libby’s statements to Agent Milby and late Winnemucca Police Chief Reed Hayes. The court granted the motion in part, suppressing the statements to Hayes because [910] Libby had requested an attorney during the interview. The State appealed the decision, and this court dismissed the State’s appeal (State v. Libby, Supreme Court Docket No. 20774, Order Dismissing Appeal entered March 27, 1990). The trial commenced on April 5, 1990, and on April 17, 1990, Libby was convicted of two counts of first degree murder with the use of a deadly weapon and five counts of grand larceny. He was sentenced to death on both murder counts.1 This appeal followed.

Libby alleges that numerous errors occurred during each phase of the trial. Of greatest significance are the following: (1) the admission of photographs of the victims’ bodies; (2) the granting of the prosecutor’s motion in limine to prohibit questioning regarding the victims’ drug use; (3) the district court’s decision to rule on Libby’s motion to disqualify the judge for bias, rather than appoint another judge to rule on the motion; (4) the denial of Libby’s motions to change venue; (5) the refusal to allow supplemental voir dire regarding the jurors’ knowledge of pretrial publicity; (6) the introduction into evidence of the pants Beatty wore the day he was killed; (7) the admission of evidence of victim characteristics, such as scholastic achievement; and (8) the fact that the jury instruction regarding depravity of mind has since been declared unconstitutionally vague. We conclude that none of these alleged errors warrants reversal.

Admission of Photographs Into Evidence

Libby argues that the district court abused its discretion in admitting into evidence color photographs of the victims’ bodies. The State used the photographs to demonstrate the manner in which the bodies were deposited at the desert sites, the location of the gunshot wounds, the proximity of the barrel to the victims’ heads, and the slit in Robertson’s throat.

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Libby v. State, 859 P.2d 1050, 109 Nev. 905, 1993 Nev. LEXIS 137 (Neb. 1993).

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