Williamson v. State

2013 Ark. 347, 429 S.W.3d 250, 2013 WL 5375431, 2013 Ark. LEXIS 418
CourtSupreme Court of Arkansas
DecidedSeptember 26, 2013
DocketCR-12-1130
StatusPublished
Cited by9 cases

This text of 2013 Ark. 347 (Williamson v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Arkansas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Williamson v. State, 2013 Ark. 347, 429 S.W.3d 250, 2013 WL 5375431, 2013 Ark. LEXIS 418 (Ark. 2013).

Opinion

CLIFF HOOFMAN, Justice.

| T Appellant Charles Williamson appeals from his conviction for first-degree murder, for which he received a life sentence. He was also convicted of using a firearm during the commission of the felony and received a sentence enhancement of fifteen years’ imprisonment. On appeal, Williamson argues (1) that there was insufficient evidence to support his conviction and (2) that the circuit court erred in denying his motion to suppress his confession. Our jurisdiction is pursuant to Ark. Sup.Ct. R. 1-2(a)(2) (2013). We affirm.

Williamson was charged with first-degree murder in connection with the death of his girlfriend, Jessica Noles, on April 23, 2010, in Hot Springs, Arkansas. According to Williamson, who confessed to police and also testified at the jury trial, he and Noles were in an argument, and Noles threatened to leave Williamson and take the couple’s two-week-old son with her. Williamson went and retrieved his .38 Special revolver, which he had purchased the previous month. Noles was sitting in the kitchen, holding their son, and 12Williamson testified that he pointed the gun at Noles’s forehead, cocked the hammer back, and pulled the trigger, killing her. He testified that he “blacked out,” that he was not in his right mind at the time, and that he could not control his actions. Williamson stated that he caught the baby as Noles slumped over in the chair. He then threw the gun in the trash can and called his grandmother, who called 911.

Detective Michael Lyndon with the Hot Springs Police Department testified that he arrived on the scene at 2:45 p.m. When he entered the apartment, Lyndon stated that he saw Noles’s body slumped over in the chair with an obvious gunshot wound to the head, from which blood was dripping into either a bucket or a trash can. Williamson was holding the baby and talking on the phone, and Lyndon heard Williamson say to the person on the phone that “he didn’t mean to hurt her.” Williamson’s grandmother and his aunt were also present in the apartment. Lyndon asked about the location of the weapon, and Williamson advised police that it was in the trash can. The gun was retrieved and contained four live cartridges. One spent .38-caliber shell casing was also recovered.

Williamson was arrested and taken to the police station for questioning, and Sergeant Jason Brasfield conducted the interview. Brasfield testified that he first advised Williamson of his Miranda rights. According to Brasfield, Williamson told him that he had completed the twelfth grade through a special-education program and that he was not currently under the influence of any alcohol or drugs. Bras-field testified that he then showed Williamson the rights form and read each right to him, while allowing Williamson to. read along. Brasfield asked Williamson if he understood each right, which he indicated that he did by placing his ^initials beside each one. Brasfield also read aloud the waiver-and-consent section of the form, and both Williamson and Brasfield signed it. Brasfield testified that Williamson did not have any questions about his rights and that he did not appear to have any trouble understanding the form. After Williamson had waived his rights, he gave a statement to Brasfield in which he admitted shooting Noles during their argument. He claimed that he suffered from obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and that this triggered his bipolar condition, causing him to become angry and to shoot Noles after she threatened to leave him. Williamson indicated that he and Noles had been arguing all week because Noles’s mother had been telling her that he was “no good” and that she should leave him. After Williamson finished his statement, Brasfield went and typed it up, then brought it to him to review and sign. Brasfield testified that he read the statement to Williamson and allowed him to read along. Williamson did not indicate that there were any changes or corrections that needed to be made to the statement. Brasfield brought another officer along to witness the statement being read to Williamson, and both officers, as well as Williamson, signed the statement.

Prior to trial, Williamson filed a motion to suppress his statement to police, arguing that he was not properly advised of his Miranda rights and that he lacked the mental capacity to consent to a waiver of his rights. After a hearing, the circuit court denied the motion, finding that Williamson had been adequately apprised of his Miranda rights, that he had waived those rights, and that he had voluntarily given his statement to police.

In addition to Williamson’s confession, the State presented evidence that Noles was killed by a single bullet fired from Williamson’s .38 Special at a distance of less than one inch. |4The firearm and tool-mark examiner testified that the gun was a double-action/single-action revolver, which could be fired either by first cocking the hammer back and then pulling the trigger, which requires relatively little trigger pressure, or by not cocking the hammer but by exerting significantly more pressure on the trigger.

At the conclusion of the evidence, the jury was given instructions on the charged offense of first-degree murder, the lesser-included offense of second-degree murder, and the firearm enhancement. The jury convicted Williamson of first-degree murder, as well as the firearm enhancement, and sentenced him to life in prison, plus fifteen years. Williamson filed a timely notice of appeal from the judgment and commitment order entered on July 19, 2012.

In his first point on appeal, Williamson argues that there was insufficient evidence to support his first-degree murder conviction. In determining whether there is substantial evidence to support the verdict, this court reviews the evidence in the light most favorable to the State and considers only the evidence that supports the verdict. Wyles v. State, 368 Ark. 646, 249 S.W.3d 782 (2007). Substantial evidence is that evidence which is of sufficient force and character to compel a conclusion one way or the other beyond suspicion or conjecture. Id. The fact that evidence is circumstantial does not render it insubstantial; however, when circumstantial evidence is relied upon, it must exclude every other reasonable hypothesis but the guilt of the accused. Id. The question of whether circumstantial evidence excludes other reasonable hypotheses is for the jury to decide. Id. When reviewing a sufficiency challenge, this court reviews all of the supporting evidence introduced at trial, even if it was admitted erroneously. Dodson v. State, 341 Ark. 41, 14 S.W.3d 489 (2000).

15Williamson contends that the State failed to offer substantial evidence of his intent to commit first-degree murder because it did not prove that it was his conscious object to cause the death of Jessica Noles. The statute pursuant to which Williamson was convicted, Ark.Code Ann. § 5-10-102(a)(2) (Repl.2006), required the State to show that Williamson, with the purpose of causing the death of another person, caused the death of another person. A person acts purposely with respect to his or her conduct when he or she acts with the conscious object to engage in conduct of that nature or to cause the result thereof. Ark. Code Ann. § 5-2-202(1) (Repl.2006).

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Bluebook (online)
2013 Ark. 347, 429 S.W.3d 250, 2013 WL 5375431, 2013 Ark. LEXIS 418, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/williamson-v-state-ark-2013.