Case Title: Solomon v. State

Citation: 

Docket Number: CR95-54-8

State: arkansas

Court: Arkansas Supreme Court

Date: 1996-01-22T00:00:00Z

Document:
Bob SOLOMON v. STATE of Arkansas

CR 95-548                                          ___ S.W.2d ___

                    Supreme Court of Arkansas
               Opinion delivered January 22, 1996


1.   Evidence -- witness sequestration -- victim's daughters should
     have been sequestered by the trial court. -- The trial court
     stated that the victim's daughters were exempted from the
     witness-sequestration rule by Ark. R. Evid. 616, which
     provides that the victim of the crime, as well as the parent,
     guardian or custodian of a minor victim, has the right to be
     present during the trial notwithstanding Rule 615; the trial
     court ruled in error since none of the victim's daughters was
     the victim of the murder and no minor victim was involved.  

2.   Appeal & error -- prejudice will not be presumed -- no
     reversal absent a showing of prejudice. -- Prejudice is not
     presumed and the appellate court does not reverse absent a
     showing of prejudice. 

3.   Evidence -- sequestration rule -- purpose of. -- The purpose
     of Ark. R. Evid. 615 is to expose inconsistencies in the
     testimonies of different witnesses and "to prevent the
     possibility of one witness's shaping his or her testimony to
     match that given by other witnesses at trial."  

4.   Evidence -- victim's daughters improperly allowed to remain in
     court during trial -- prejudice demonstrated, conviction
     reversed and remanded. -- Where the supreme court found that
     appellant had demonstrated prejudice where the victim's
     daughters were allowed to remain in the courtroom throughout
     the trial and the case was decided by the jury upon the
     conflicting testimonies presented as regards the issue of
     appellant's intent when he shot the victim, the witness-
     exclusion rule should have been applied to prevent the
     possibility of any of the victim's daughters from shaping her
     testimony to that of a preceding witness; accordingly, the
     judgment of conviction was reversed and the case was remanded
     for a new trial. 

5.   Evidence -- evidence alleged insufficient -- substantial
     evidence discussed. -- In determining whether there is
     substantial evidence, the evidence is reviewed in the light
     most favorable to the appellee, and it is permissible to
     consider only that evidence which supports the guilty verdict;
     substantial evidence is that which is forceful enough to
     compel reasonable minds to reach a conclusion one way or
     another. 

6.   Evidence - jury resolves conflicting versions of the facts --
     substantial evidence found to support the verdict. --
     Resolution of the conflicting versions of the facts as
     presented by the witnesses rested with the jury; here it was
     clear that the jury did not believe appellant's version; there
     was substantial evidence to support the conviction for first-
     degree murder.

7.   Evidence -- proffered evidence inadmissible -- direct
     examination did not open the door. -- Arkansas R. Evid. 405
     generally limits proof of character to reputation or opinion
     testimony; however, pursuant to Rule 405(a), a character
     witness may testify on cross-examination as to relevant
     specific instances of conduct; here, appellant's argument that
     proffered evidence of the victim's character, by testimony of
     specific instances of her prior violent conduct toward him,
     was erroneously excluded, was meritless where the abstract
     revealed no evidence from the sheriff, on direct examination,
     regarding the victim's character; hence, the proffered
     evidence was not admissible under Rule 405(a) as it was beyond
     the scope of cross-examination.

8.   Evidence -- victim's violent character not an essential
     element of the murder charge or of appellant's defense of
     accident -- appellant's attempt to use proffered testimony
     circumstantially properly disallowed. -- Arkansas Rule of
     Evidence 405(b) permits proof of character by specific
     instances of conduct in cases in which character or a trait of
     character is an essential element of a charge, claim or
     defense, such a character trait must be "an operative fact
     which under substantive law determines the rights and
     liabilities of the parties"; appellant did not satisfy this
     standard because the victim's violent character was not an
     essential element of the murder charge or of his defense of
     accident; appellant sought to use the proffered testimony
     circumstantially rather than as a direct substantive issue,
     and, therefore, it was not admissible under Rule 405(b). 

9.   Criminal law -- purpose of Miranda warnings -- resolution of
     whether suspect was "in custody." -- The Miranda warnings were
     intended to inhibit abuse of the federal constitutional Fifth
     Amendment right against self-incrimination of a person by
     reason of custodial interrogation by law enforcement officers;
     "in custody" means a person who is deprived of his freedom of
     action by formal arrest or restraint on freedom of movement of
     the degree associated with a formal arrest; in resolving the
     question of whether a suspect was in custody at a particular
     time, the only relevant inquiry is how a reasonable man in the
     suspect's shoes would have understood his situation. 

10.  Criminal law -- review of voluntariness of confession -- trial
     judge's ruling not clearly against the preponderance of the
     evidence. -- On appeal, the court makes an independent
     determination of the voluntariness of a confession and does
     not reverse the trial court, absent a finding of clear error,
     recognizing that conflicts in the testimony are for the trial
     court to resolve; here, the record showed that appellant made
     the challenged pre-arrest statement in the hospital's waiting
     room after the sheriff had twice advised appellant that he was
     not there to take any statements and just wanted to locate and
     secure the weapon, and that, after the challenged statement
     was made, the sheriff left appellant unattended in the waiting
     room to locate the weapon, then returned to appellant in the
     waiting room approximately ten minutes later and verbally
     advised appellant of his Miranda rights; on these facts the
     trial judge's ruling was not clearly against the preponderance
     of the evidence.   

11.  Motions -- motion for mistrial properly denied -- trial court
     did not abuse its discretion. -- Where the trial judge was in
     a superior position to evaluate the prejudicial effect of the
     witness's display upon the jury and to evaluate the
     credibility of the witnesses regarding the lunchtime incident,
     and the record, as abstracted, failed to show that appellant
     obtained any cautionary instruction to the jury, the appellate
     court found no abuse of discretion was committed by the trial
     court in denying appellant's third motion for mistrial;
     emotional outbursts by the relatives of murder victims are not
     unusual and are difficult to control; the trial court
     exercises a wide latitude of discretion in the control of the
     trial and resorts to the drastic remedy of a mistrial as a
     last resort.


     Appeal from Pope Circuit Court, Fifth Judicial District; John
S. Patterson, Judge; reversed and remanded.
     Stuart Vess, for appellant.
     Winston Bryant, Att'y Gen., by:  J. Brent Standridge, Asst.
Att'y Gen., for appellee.

     Donald L. Corbin, Justice.
Associate Justice Donald L.
Corbin, 1-22-96
*ARKREP7*




BOB SOLOMON,
                    APPELLANT,

V.

STATE OF ARKANSAS,
                    APPELLEE,



CR 95-548



APPEAL FROM THE POPE COUNTY
CIRCUIT COURT, FIFTH JUDICIAL
DISTRICT, NO. CR 93-241,
HON. JOHN S. PATTERSON, JUDGE,





REVERSED AND REMANDED.




     Appellant, Bob Solomon, appeals the judgment of the Pope
County Circuit Court convicting him of the first-degree murder of
his spouse, Janice Solomon, and sentencing him to imprisonment for
forty years.  Jurisdiction is properly in this court pursuant to
Ark. Sup. Ct. R. 1-2(a)(2).  Appellant admitted that he shot the
victim, but argued that the shooting was accidental.  Appellant
raises five arguments for reversal, among them that it was error
for the trial court to refuse to exclude three of the state's
witnesses from the courtroom pursuant to the witness-sequestration
rule, Ark. R. Evid. 615.  We agree and reverse for a new trial.  We
find appellant's other arguments are meritless, but discuss them
for the benefit of the trial court upon retrial.
                   Witness-sequestration rule
     At the commencement of the trial, the trial court ruled that
state's witnesses, Jennifer Patty, Peggy Barker, and Teresa Patty,
the victim's daughters, could remain in the courtroom despite
appellant's invocation of the witness-sequestration rule.  Rule
615.  The trial court stated that the victim's daughters were
exempted from the witness-sequestration rule by Ark. R. Evid. 616,
which provides that the victim of the crime, as well as the parent,
guardian or custodian of a minor victim, has the right to be
present during the trial notwithstanding Rule 615.  As the state
concedes, the trial court ruled in error since none of the victim's
daughters was the victim of the murder and no minor victim was
involved.  See Williams v. State, 320 Ark. 67,