State v. Adamson

680 P.2d 1259, 140 Ariz. 198, 1984 Ariz. App. LEXIS 383
CourtCourt of Appeals of Arizona
DecidedMarch 19, 1984
Docket2 CA-CR 2709
StatusPublished
Cited by5 cases

This text of 680 P.2d 1259 (State v. Adamson) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Arizona primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
State v. Adamson, 680 P.2d 1259, 140 Ariz. 198, 1984 Ariz. App. LEXIS 383 (Ark. Ct. App. 1984).

Opinion

OPINION

HATHAWAY, Judge.

Appellant was tried and convicted of nine felony counts, including five counts of forgery. The longest sentence imposed was for 29 to 30 years, with several shorter sentences to run concurrently with this one. These sentences were ordered to run consecutively to a death sentence imposed on appellant in another case.

The case arose out of a connected series of events which culminated in the beating of Leslie Boros on February 24, 1975. Bo-ros was a talent agent in Phoenix and *199 became romantically involved with one of his clients, Jennifer Tanner. Apparently Mrs. Tanner’s husband found out about the affair and planned, with appellant and James Robison, to assault Boros. The series of events began in February 1975, when Boros received a phone call from someone saying that they had a singer and desired Boros’ services as a talent agent. A meeting was arranged at a Phoenix hotel which the' caller failed to attend. The purpose of the meeting was for Boros to hear the singer’s audition tape. The caller, later identified as appellant, called Boros again on February 24,1975, and arranged a meeting at the Scottsdale Sheraton for that evening.

Appellant arrived at the Sheraton without luggage or a reservation. He blamed his lack of baggage on airline malfeasance and his lack of a reservation on a third party. The testimony reveals that he made these problems widely known when he checked into the hotel. The evidence also establishes that appellant signed the room registration card and other hotel bills using the name of John Hart. He named as his employer Western Surety Company of Dallas, Texas, a company with which appellant was no longer affiliated. When selecting rooms, appellant insisted on a room at the rear of the hotel complex and was given room number 120. Appellant spent the next several hours waiting at the hotel for Boros to arrive. He had several drinks at the bar, tipping the bartender in excess of the bar tab and generally calling attention to himself.

Sometime before 8:30 that evening, Bo-ros met appellant and the two men went to the bar. They ordered drinks, talked briefly and then appellant suggested that they go to his room to hear the audition tape. When they arrived at room 120, appellant opened the door and said that he had forgotten something and that he would return shortly. Within seconds after appellant exited, the room door was flung open by Stanley Tanner, who began beating Boros with a club. After a few minutes, Tanner stopped his attack. Robison entered the room soon thereafter and began tying Bo-ros’ leg to the bed. Tanner ordered Boros to undress, which Boros did, and then Robi-son tied Boros’ other leg to the bed. Tanner knocked a smoking pipe out of Boros’ mouth and put it in Boros’ rectum. At some point during this series of events, Boros lunged at Tanner in an attempt to get the gun which Tanner carried in one hand. Boros wrestled Tanner to the bed, but Tanner threatened to shoot Boros in the stomach if Boros didn’t release him. After Boros let go, Tanner began accusing Boros of having an affair with his wife. Each time Boros offered an explanation or denied the affair, Tanner hit him with the club. Just before Tanner left, he took some sheep shears from a briefcase and shaved Boros’ head and mustache. He also threatened to castrate Boros with a device used for castrating sheep, but decided against it. Tanner left the room a short time later.

Boros untied himself, attempted to remove the blood from his clothes, dressed and went home. At about 4 a.m. on February 25, Boros was called by Ann Thornton, a friend and client with whom Boros had an appointment later that morning. When Bo-ros explained his experience of the past several hours, Ms. Thornton drove to Bo-ros’ house and they both went to the hospital. A doctor at the hospital put casts on both arms and eventually operated on Bo-ros’ right hand. Several days later Boros reported the incident to Richard Porter, Phoenix Assistant Police Chief and a deacon of the Mormon church. Boros asked that Porter not reveal this information because of threats made by Tanner and for other personal reasons. Nothing else was done about this for IW years, until Boros recognized appellant’s picture in the newspaper in connection with a possible murder committed in room 120 at the Scottsdale Sheraton. At this time, Boros agreed to be a prosecution witness. Appellant was later charged for his role in the attack on Boros and with five counts of forgery.

The first issue raised on appeal is whether the prosecution committed reversible error by commenting in its closing argument on the fact that appellant refused to testify on his own behalf. The underlined portion of the following excerpt from the prosecu *200 tor’s closing statement is the basis for appellant’s argument:

“The same thing applies in a case, in a criminal case, where you are dealing with circumstantial evidence. This case is a good example. John Adamson used a phony name, a phony address, a ruse of coming to the motel in a taxicab from the airport, lost luggage. All that rigmarole [sic] he went through. And then signing in. Of course he didn’t have any identification because it was all in his luggage, so he signed in with the name John Heart [sic]. And he did that for a reason.
Now, he hasn’t told us that. Nobody has told us he did it for a reason. But we know. We can figure out why he did it. You don’t have to be told I did this for a reason to conclude that it was done for an illegal reason, because you look at the whole situation. You look at the lawn, you look at the sidewalks, you look at the trees; and you see why it was done. It was done so that John Adamson would not be held responsible for the bill. It was done so that John Adamson would not be responsible for what happened to Boros in the room. John Adamson was not to be connected with that at all. Who were they talking about, if Mr. Bo-ros should go to the police? Who was he going to talk about? He was going to talk about John Heart [sic] from Dallas, Texas. That’s who he was going to talk about. He didn’t know Adamson.” (Emphasis added)

It is constitutionally impermissible for a prosecutor to comment on a defendant’s failure to testify in his own behalf. State v. Mata, 125 Ariz. 233, 609 P.2d 48, cert. den. 449 U.S. 938, 101 S.Ct. 338, 66 L.Ed.2d 161 (1980). This right is protected by statute in Arizona. A.R.S. § 13-117. However, to transgress the constitutional protection, the comment “must be adverse; that is, it must support an unfavorable inference against the defendant and, therefore, operate as a penalty imposed for exercising a constitutional privilege.” State v. Mata, 125 Ariz. at 238, 609 P.2d at 53. We do not find that the prosecutor’s comment was adverse in this case. Rather, it was made in the context of a discussion about circumstantial evidence and the evidence presented to the jury supporting the state’s case. We find no reversible error.

The second issue is whether the trial court erred when it denied appellant’s motion to vacate judgment.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
680 P.2d 1259, 140 Ariz. 198, 1984 Ariz. App. LEXIS 383, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-adamson-arizctapp-1984.