State v. Revader

735 So. 2d 875, 98 La.App. 5 Cir. 1268, 1999 La. App. LEXIS 1571, 1999 WL 314729
CourtLouisiana Court of Appeal
DecidedMay 19, 1999
DocketNo. 98-KA-1268
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 735 So. 2d 875 (State v. Revader) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Louisiana Court of Appeal primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
State v. Revader, 735 So. 2d 875, 98 La.App. 5 Cir. 1268, 1999 La. App. LEXIS 1571, 1999 WL 314729 (La. Ct. App. 1999).

Opinion

I,CANNELLA, Judge.

Defendant, Joseph J. Revader, appeals from his conviction of second degree murder and his sentence to life imprisonment at hard labor without beneát of parole, probation or suspension of sentence. For the reasons which follow, we affirm and remand.

On February 17, 1998, the Jefferson Parish Sheriffs Office received a telephone call from a woman in Florida, requesting that an officer check on her mother, Blanche White. The woman stated that she had not been hble to contact her mother for a couple of days and that her brother, Joseph Revader, who lived with their mother, had been making excuses about why their mother could not come to the phone. In response to the telephone call, Officer Joseph Ventola was dispatched to apartment # 301 at 2200 Severn Avenue, Metairie, where Blanche White resided. The officer knocked on the door. The defendant responded and allowed Officer Ventola inside. The officer inquired as to the whereabouts of |3Blanche White and was told by defendant that she was in Boutte, Louisiana, visiting relatives. Defendant seemed calm and Officer Ventola noted that there were two other boys in the apartment watching television. The officer and defendant went to the kitchen to telephone defendant’s sister, who had made the police contact. The defendant explained to his sister that their mother was in Boutte. Officer Ventola testified that he spoke with the woman and, although she stated that she had telephoned all of her mother’s relatives and friends in Boutte and could not locate her mother, she seemed satisfied with her brother’s explanation. Officer Ventola stated that, as a result of the conversation, he got the impression that there might have been a problem between Blanche White and her daughter and that she might have been in the apartment simply refusing to speak with her daughter. Therefore, he asked the defendant if he could look around the apartment. The defendant agreed and permitted the officer to go into the bedroom. The officer stated that he took a few steps into the bedroom, did not see anyone, did not see anything suspicious and then left the apartment.

After Officer Ventola left the apartment, the defendant became very nervous and confessed to his two friends, Chris Lopez and Julio Pena, that he had killed his mother. He showed the boys two knives and some bloody clothing that was in a bag in the hall closet. Defendant then brought the boys into the bedroom, moved some weight equipment and lifted up a throw rug, exposing bloody carpet. Defendant [877]*877then lifted the mattress and the boys saw a part of a human body. Thereafter, defendant asked the hoys to chive him across the river. The boys drove the defendant across the river by some railroad tracks, as defendant requested. The boys returned to Metairie, to Chris Lopez’s apartment, which was near defendant’s, and telephoned the Jefferson Parish Sheriffs Office 14to report the homicide.

Officer Jody Fruchtnicht responded to the call and interviewed the two boys. They told him that the defendant had told them that he had killed his mother and that they had seen the bloody clothing, knives and the body, hidden under the bed in the bedroom. Because they were afraid of being implicated, the boys told the officer that they had left the defendant at the apartment, instead of telling him that they had driven him across the river.

Officer Fruchtnicht then went to defendant’s apartment and knocked on the door. When no one answered, he tried the knob. The door was unlocked, so he went inside of the apartment. He looked around the apartment for defendant. When the officer entered the bedroom, he immediately noticed that the room was covered with blankets and sheets. He pulled back part of a sheet and noticed a red substance on the floor which he believed to be blood. The officer then lifted the mattress on the bed and observed a large, rolled up rug. Unrolling part of the rug, the officer smelled a rancid odor and observed a part of the victim’s body. Officer Fruchtnicht then secured the area and the apartment and notified his headquarters of what he had found.

The investigation was then turned over to the detective bureau. Officer Don English was next on the scene. After speaking with Officer Fruchtnicht, Officer English entered the apartment with crime scene technicians. The bedroom was photographed as found and at various stages of the investigation as thé body was discovered and unwrapped. The officer also searched the hall closet and found a Macy’s bag containing a white bloodstained bathrobe, two knives, an empty bottle of a cleaning agent and a bottle of white liquid paper. A bloodstained pair of men’s jockey shorts was found in the closet along with a pair |Bof white socks with what appeared to be liquid paper on them. After speaking to the two boys, Officer English obtained an arrest warrant for the defendant.

Two days later, on February 19, 1997, Officer Lauren Chaisson, employed by the Lafourche Parish Sheriffs Office, stopped the defendant as he was walking down P. Thibodeaux Lane in Thibodeaux, Louisiana. Officer Chaisson had been sent there in response to a suspicious person call and the defendant met the description given of the suspect. Defendant told the officer that he had no identification. The officer then conducted a pat down search and discovered a wallet and a large amount of cash. The wallet contained a credit card issued to Blanche White. Defendant told the officer that the credit card had been loaned to him. The officer checked with her dispatcher for any outstanding warrants. Next, Officer Mark Matranga arrived on the scene and Officer Chaisson told him what had transpired. The dispatcher informed the officers that nothing showed up on the defendant. The officers asked the defendant if his mother or a relative could come and pick him up. Defendant told Officer Matranga that his mother was dead. The officers decided further inquiry should be made concerning defendant. They handcuffed defendant to make further inquiry.

Officer Dennis Thornton of the Jefferson Parish Sheriffs Office received information that defendant had been picked up in Lafourche Parish. He and Officer English went to Lafourche Parish to arrest the defendant and bring him back to Jefferson Parish. Defendant waived his rights, after being informed of them and made two separate statements to the officers. In his first statement, he denied killing his mother, stating that he had nothing to do with [878]*878it and only learned of his mother’s death from seeing it reported on television. In his second statement, defendant admitted that he killed his mother by stabbing her and | ^hitting her with a dumbbell.

On April 3, 1997, the Jefferson Parish Grand Jury indicted the defendant on one count of second degree murder, in violation of La. R.S. 14:30.1. The defendant was 17 at the time the crime was committed. On April 4, 1997, at arraignment, the defendant pled not guilty.

On May 2, 1997, the defendant requested appointment of a sanity commission to determine whether he was competent to stand trial. On June 12, 1997, a sanity hearing was held and, at its conclusion, the trial judge found that the defendant was competent to stand trial.

On August 29, 1997, the defendant withdrew his former plea of not guilty and entered a plea of not guilty and not guilty by reason of insanity. A jury trial was held from May 11 through 14, 1998. The jury found the defendant guilty as charged. Written polling of the jury reflected that 10 of the 12 jurors concurred in the result.

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Related

State v. Bright
860 So. 2d 196 (Louisiana Court of Appeal, 2003)

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Bluebook (online)
735 So. 2d 875, 98 La.App. 5 Cir. 1268, 1999 La. App. LEXIS 1571, 1999 WL 314729, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-revader-lactapp-1999.