State v. Johnson

699 P.2d 221, 40 Wash. App. 371
Court of Appeals of Washington·Decided April 23, 1985·No. 6070-5-III; 6080-2-III·Published·Cited by 24 cases

Opinion

Thompson, J.

Bill Ray Johnson and Russell Lenard McLaws appeal their convictions of first degree murder. We affirm.

In the early morning hours of March 15, 1983, two armed men wearing ski masks, gloves, and heavy coats entered the home of Edward Prather and Julie Klassen. The men awakened the sleeping couple, and demanded drugs and money. Mr. Prather gave the gunmen $20 and marijuana packaged in Mickey Mouse sandwich bags; he was then taken by one of the gunmen into the kitchen where he was bound with wire. Ms. Klassen remained in the bedroom with the other gunman where she was raped. While the rape was being committed, Mr. Prather became partially free and an altercation broke out in the kitchen during which Mr. Prather apparently struck the gunman with a chair. The rapist ran to the kitchen and Ms. Klassen heard him say "get him", followed by a series of rapid gunshots. When Ms. Klassen later entered the kitchen, she saw Mr. Prather on the floor in a pool of blood; he died of gunshot wounds before the police arrived. The police recovered pry bars from the front porch of the house.

During the course of the investigation, Cindy Whitford, Mr. McLaws' girl friend, contacted the police, informing them of Mr. McLaws' participation in the crime. The police obtained statements from other witnesses, including accomplice Jeffery Paradiso, implicating both Mr. Johnson and Mr. McLaws in the murder. On May 1, 1983, an automobile driven by Mr. McLaws was stopped by the police for defective vehicle equipment. Mr. McLaws consented to a search of the vehicle in which the police recovered two ski masks and ammunition similar to that which killed Mr. Prather.

Mr. Johnson and Mr. McLaws were charged with the *374 killing of Edward Prather during the commission of first degree robbery on June 22, 1983. During the pretrial hearing, Mr. Johnson and Mr. McLaws sought to suppress the recorded witness statements contending they violated RCW 9.73, the privacy act. At trial, Mr. McLaws objected to the admission of the ski masks, ammunition, and pry bars as irrelevant and unduly prejudicial. A jury convicted Mr. Johnson and Mr. McLaws of first degree murder. Their motion for a new trial was denied and a sentence of life imprisonment was imposed.

Principal among the numerous issues raised by Mr. Johnson and Mr. McLaws is their contention the trial court erred in refusing to suppress certain witness statements. We disagree. Mr. Johnson and Mr. McLaws claim the police violated the privacy act, RCW 9.73, when recording witness statements, by failing to announce at the commencement of the tape that "such . . . conversation is about to be recorded ..." RCW 9.73.030(3). 1 Thus, they sought to prevent the admission into evidence of either the tapes or any of the information contained in the tapes.

RCW 9.73.030(l)(a), (b) provide:

Intercepting or recording private communication— Consent required—Exceptions. (1) Except as otherwise provided in this chapter, it shall be unlawful for any individual, partnership, corporation, association, or the state of Washington, its agencies, and political subdivisions to intercept, or record any:
(a) Private communication transmitted by telephone, telegraph, radio, or other device between two or more individuals between points within or without the state by any device electronic or otherwise designed to record and/or transmit said communication regardless how such device is powered or actuated, without first obtaining the consent of all the participants in the communication;
*375 (b) Private conversation, by any device electronic or otherwise designed to record or transmit such conversation regardless how the device is powered or actuated without first obtaining the consent of all the persons engaged in the conversation.

Any information obtained in violation of this statute is inadmissible. RCW 9.73.050. "Under our state privacy act, a defendant has standing to object to use of evidence obtained in violation of the statute, even though the defendant was not a participant in the unlawfully intercepted or recorded conversation." State v. Williams, 94 Wn.2d 531, 534, 617 P.2d 1012, 24 A.L.R.4th 1191 (1980). Thus, Mr. Johnson and Mr. McLaws have standing to object to evidence obtained in violation of RCW 9.73.

Mr. Johnson and Mr. McLaws, relying on State v. Williams, supra, claim a violation of RCW 9.73 prohibits in-court testimony from witnesses who participated in the recorded conversations, and the admission of any other information gained as a result of those recordings. Consequently, the State would be precluded from presenting any evidence of the crime where all evidence relates to prior witness statements made to the police. We decline to follow this interpretation of Williams, particularly since that court excluded police participant testimony about recorded conversations when the recording itself was suppressed. Here, the challenged testimony is not about recorded statements but consists of the witnesses' independent recollections of facts obtained through personal knowledge prior to the recordings. We hold such testimony is not subject to suppression under the privacy act. In addition, we find the recording sessions complied with RCW 9.73.

All parties stipulated at the pretrial hearing that at the beginning of each contested tape the following information was recorded: "names of the parties, who the statement [was] taken by, the date, the time [including time started and time stopped], and where it [was] being taken . . ."In addition, in denying the defense motion to suppress these recordings, the court noted that in each instance, except for *376 the taped telephone call from Ms. Whitford, 2 the tape recorder was on the table between the detective and witness during the conversations, and " [i]n each case the detective asked at the end of the conversation if the witness would sign a typewritten transcript of the recording, and the witness indicated their [sic] assent." As a result of these measures, the trial court found the recording sessions conformed with RCW 9.73.

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State v. Johnson, 699 P.2d 221, 40 Wash. App. 371 (Wash. Ct. App. 1985).

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