State v. Peats

475 P.2d 238, 106 Ariz. 254, 1970 Ariz. LEXIS 405
CourtArizona Supreme Court
DecidedOctober 8, 1970
Docket2030
StatusPublished
Cited by13 cases

This text of 475 P.2d 238 (State v. Peats) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Arizona Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
State v. Peats, 475 P.2d 238, 106 Ariz. 254, 1970 Ariz. LEXIS 405 (Ark. 1970).

Opinions

STRUCKMEYER, Vice Chief Justice.

On March 2, 1963, appellant, Stephen Earl Peats, was convicted after a jury trial in Yuma County, Arizona, of first degree murder. The jury recommended imprisonment in the State Prison for life. No timely appeal was taken from the conviction and sentence, but, on the 16th of May, 1969, Peats filed a motion in this court under Supreme Court Rule 16(a), 17 A.R.S., to take a delayed appeal, setting forth that he did not appeal within the mandatory 60 days because he had not been advised by his then lawyer that he had a right to appeal. The Attorney General filed a response to Peats’ motion, recommending that Peats be given an out of time appeal, and the Superior Court of Yuma County, having found that Peats was indigent, appointed an attorney to act on his behalf and ordered that a record be furnished at the County’s expense.

The record discloses that on the morning of September 29, 1962, Peats and a friend were traveling from Los Angeles, California to the State of Louisiana. At a roadside rest area east of Yuma they saw a small black automobile pulled off the road with the driver, alone in the seat, asleep. Peats and his companion then endeavored to rob the driver, but a fight ensued in which the driver was shot to death. Peats and his companion hid the victim’s body and took his billfold, watch, and other items of value. There is evidence that Peats had been taking drugs for several days prior to this incident and had only a vague recollection of what occurred.

The court instructed the jury that the State had to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the homicide was either premeditated or committed in the perpetration of a robbery; and that, to consider the claim of robbery, the State had to prove that at the time the crime was committed the defendant had a specific felonious intent to steal. Immediately following, the court gave this instruction requested by the State:

“You are instructed that voluntary intoxication does not excuse the commission of crime. You are further instructed that intoxication is being under the influence of an intoxicating liquor or drug. A person who voluntarily becomes intoxicated with or without a preconceived design to commit a crime and while intoxicated, though it is to such a degree as to render him fully oblivious to his acts or conduct, does any act which if done by a person capable of distinguishing between right and wrong, is responsible for his act.”

Peats now urges that the instruction was so erroneous as to require a reversal of his conviction.

In considering his argument, it should be first stated that no objection was made at the trial to the giving of the instruction. Ordinarily, errors in instructions to which no objections are made will be considered as waived. This principle was recently stated in State v. Norgard, 103 Ariz. 381, 383, 442 P.2d 544, 546 in this language:

“We have held many times that this Court will only consider such questions [256]*256as were raised at trial with respect to errors or omissions in the giving of instructions unless such claimed error is so fundamental that it is manifest the defendant did not receive a fair trial. [Citations].”

It is urged that the instruction permitted the jury to find a specific intent to rob even though defendant was “intoxicated to such a degree as to render him fully oblivious to his acts or conduct.” Peats ascribes to the word “oblivious” the meaning of lacking conscious knowledge or awareness, thereby suggesting that the jury could believe that even if defendant was so intoxicated from liquor or drugs that he was consciously unaware of what he was doing at the time of the offense, and hence lacking a specific intent, he could still legally commit the crime of robbery.

However, the word “oblivious” has another well understood meaning. Webster’s Third International Dictionary also defines oblivious as "lacking remembrance, memory, or mindful attention: characterized by forgetfulness.” We think it was in this latter sense that the court intended and the jury must have understood the word “oblivious.” Particularly we think this was true in the light of the setting of this criminal case. First, because the defendant’s case presented testimony that he could remember only some of the details of the homicide, and, second, because the court unequivocally required that the State prove that Peats had a specific felonious intent to steal at the time of the homicide. In the sense that the instruction means that a lack of remembering is not a defense to a crime it was not erroneous. Without an appropriate objection, the claimed error is not so fundamental that it is manifest the defendant did not receive a fair trial.

Moreover, the defendant in his proposed instruction number seven requested that the court charge the jury in the language of the statute, A.R.S. § 13-132, on the legal effect of intoxication as a defense to a criminal charge. For reasons which are not disclosed, the defendant later modified his proposed instruction, eliminating any reference to the statute. By § 13-132, where a crime requires the formulation of a specific intent, the intoxication of the accused may be shown as a defense. See State v. Roqueni, 94 Ariz. 72, 381 P.2d 757. Apparently the defense was satisfied for the court to instruct the jury simply that it was necessary for the State to prove the defendant had a specific felonious intent to steal at the time the crime was committed. We think that the defendant’s modification of his own proposed instruction by deleting the reading of A.R.S. § 13-132 is a waiver of any claim of error now.

The defendant further complains of the refusal of the trial court to give his requested instructions numbers 6 and 6(a). Defendant’s requested instruction number 6 is a haec verba quotation from Rule 28S of the Rules of Criminal Procedure, 17 A.R.S. Rule 288 of the Rules of Criminal Procedure provides that if the defendant in a criminal case is acquitted on the grounds of insanity, the court shall direct that a petition be filed for the examination of the defendant as a mentally ill person. The defendant’s instruction number 6(a) is to the effect that Rule 288 provides the means of keeping a defendant under restraint pending a sanity hearing by directing his confinement in the State Hospital.

We think the two proposed instructions tended to inform the jury concerning matters which were not properly their concern. It is the jury’s duty to find the facts. In finding the facts, the jury should be guided by the evidence in the case and should not consider extraneous matters which might tend to influence their verdict independent of the facts surrounding the commission of the offense.

Defendant claims error because the trial court did not hold a separate hearing outside the presence of the jury to determine the voluntariness of his statements made to certain police officers, urging that this was in violation of the holding of Jackson v. [257]*257Denno, 378 U.S. 368, 84 S.Ct. 1774, 12 L.Ed.2d 908.

We think Peats’ position is without merit, being of the opinion that the holding in Jackson v. Denno has no application to the decision here.

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

Related

State v. Moody
94 P.3d 1119 (Arizona Supreme Court, 2004)
State v. Saiers
992 P.2d 612 (Court of Appeals of Arizona, 1999)
State v. Cornell
878 P.2d 1352 (Arizona Supreme Court, 1994)
State v. McLoughlin
652 P.2d 531 (Arizona Supreme Court, 1982)
State v. McShine
642 P.2d 482 (Court of Appeals of Arizona, 1982)
State v. Skaggs
586 P.2d 1279 (Arizona Supreme Court, 1978)
State v. Doss
568 P.2d 1054 (Arizona Supreme Court, 1977)
State v. Jensen
531 P.2d 531 (Arizona Supreme Court, 1975)
State v. Cobb
521 P.2d 1124 (Arizona Supreme Court, 1974)
State v. Taylor
512 P.2d 590 (Arizona Supreme Court, 1973)
State v. Peats
475 P.2d 238 (Arizona Supreme Court, 1970)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
475 P.2d 238, 106 Ariz. 254, 1970 Ariz. LEXIS 405, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-peats-ariz-1970.