State v. Mitchell

622 S.W.2d 791, 1981 Mo. App. LEXIS 3513
Missouri Court of Appeals·Decided September 29, 1981·No. 40036·Published·Cited by 24 cases

Opinion

DOWD, Judge.

Nevail Mitchell, herein appellant, was convicted by a jury of first degree murder and sentenced to life imprisonment. He appeals. The evidence adduced at trial is as follows.

The decedent Juanita Gregory had been separated from her husband for ten years, during which time she had several male friends. The decedent and the appellant had lived together for a number of years but were not doing so at the time of the murder. Appellant’s relationship with decedent was marked with arguments and fights where appellant beat or struck her. On February 27, 1977, during an argument at decedent’s house, appellant was heard by a neighbor to say “If I can’t have her, no one else can.” On March 3, 1977, a fellow employee saw the decedent and the appellant arguing in the lobby of her place of employment at about 6:30 a. m. Appellant was angry and was shouting at decedent. That evening the decedent went shopping with her two sons and a male friend, Richard Kimbrough. While the decedent was in the shopping center, appellant drove up and asked her two children where their mother was and whether she was with Richard Kimbrough. When told she was with Kimbrough the appellant looked “mad” and drove away. That following morning, March 4, 1977, Kimbrough telephoned the decedent and heard appellant’s voice in the background saying “You ain’t got no problems, bitch”, after which the phone went dead. Appellant and the decedent were then seen leaving her house at 8:45 or 9:00 a. m. and walking towards appellant’s blue Cutlass Supreme. At approximately 2:00 p. m., two high school students, Duane Smith and Sue Ann Morris were seated in Smith’s pickup truck near to and within sight of a barn by Weldon Springs Road in St. Charles County, when they saw a blue Cutlass Supreme exit the driveway to the barn some thirty yards behind them and turn in their direction. Both Smith and Morris testified the car was moving unusually fast and weaving all over the road and that Smith saw the occupant’s face and Morris saw the back of his head. Both subsequently identified the car as being that of the appellant. Smith also noted that the appellant looked surprised as he passed them. The body of the decedent was found the next day on March 5. The body was nude from the waist to the knees and bore shotgun wounds to the head, right forearm and abdomen. It was determined she had been killed at approximately 2:00 p. m. on March 4, and that shotgun wounds to the head were the cause of death. Items of evidence seized were shotgun pellets found in the decedent’s brain and abdomen, and shot cup embedded in the brain, shotgun wadding found near the body and a plaster cast was taken of a tire track near the body. The prints of the tires on appellant’s car were found to match the plaster cast of the tire tracks found at the murder scene.

On March 5, the day the decedent’s body was discovered, appellant, who was in Louisiana, called a friend in St. Louis and after being told of the decedent’s death stated he had no idea how she was killed and that he “hadn’t seen her since God knows when.” He also stated that he had been at the St. Louis license bureau at 9:00 a. m. and at a shopping center from 1:00 to 1:30 p. m. on the day of the murder. Appellant later testified he had been at the license bureau at the time of the murder. Appellant was arrested upon his return to St. Louis. On the basis of a written consent to search executed by appellant, his car was seized and his house was searched. Found during this search were ten unexpended twenty-gauge shotgun shells Federal brand size 8 *794 shot and Western brand size 6 shot, and a twenty gauge shotgun.

Appellant was advised of his Miranda rights. He denied committing the crime and stated that the last time he had seen the decedent was Wednesday, March 2, and that he didn’t know where St. Charles was.

Prior to appellant’s arrest, Duane Smith identified appellant from nine photographs of black males, as the man he had seen driving the car. Following appellant’s arrest, both Smith and Morris positively identified him in a lineup. The shotgun pellets recovered from the decedent’s brain were size 7½ or 8 and the shot cup indicated a Federal brand twenty-gauge shell. The pellets in decedent’s abdomen were size six, and Western brand twenty gauge shotgun wadding was found near the body. Evidence adduced at trial also showed that the projectiles which caused the victim’s death matched the shotgun shells seized from the appellant.

After the proceedings there was a delay caused by the court reporter’s failure to prepare a transcript. A contempt order by this court against the court reporter followed. State v. McAnany, No. 41960, September 19, 1979. After the preparation of the transcript a hearing was held on the adequacy of the appeal record. At this time the State stipulated as to objections of the defense during the trial and to legal arguments and objections presented by the defense during the motion for new trial that were not included in the transcript. The State did not stipulate to actual testimony of witnesses.

Appellant raises several points of error, the first being that the court erred in overruling his motion for acquittal at the close of all the evidence because the State failed to adduce sufficient evidence to convict him. There is no direct evidence of the appellant’s guilt presented by the State. It is well established, however, that a conviction based solely on circumstantial evidence is as legitimate as one founded on direct evidence. State v. Shelton, 589 S.W.2d 658 (Mo.App.1979). The circumstantial evidence need not be conclusive of guilt or demonstrate the impossibility of innocence but must be consistent with the theory of guilt and inconsistent with reasonable theories of innocence. State v. Lumsden, 589 S.W.2d 226, 227 (Mo.banc 1979); State v. Tumbough, 497 S.W.2d 856, 858 (Mo.App.1973).

The State’s evidence showed that the appellant had had arguments and physical altercations with the decedent in the past, and that appellant had expressed jealousy and anger toward the victim in the past and on the night before the murder. Appellant was heard shouting at the decedent while she was on the phone and shortly thereafter the line went dead. In addition, appellant was the last person seen with the victim. He was also identified by two witnesses as the man they saw leaving the property where the decedent’s body was found at approximately the time the victim was killed. A shotgun and ammunition found in appellant’s possession matched the gauge, brand of shells and type of shot used to kill the victim, and the tires on appellant’s car matched tire prints found at the murder scene. The appellant stated he had not seen the decedent since two days prior to the murder yet there was evidence placing him with her during that time. Finally, in a telephone conversation with a friend the day the body was found, the appellant made statements inconsistent with his alibi.

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State v. Mitchell, 622 S.W.2d 791, 1981 Mo. App. LEXIS 3513 (Mo. Ct. App. 1981).

622 S.W.2d 791 (State v. Mitchell) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.

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