Case Name: Bessie Marie CLAYTON, v. STATE of Mississippi
Court: Mississippi Supreme Court
Jurisdiction: Mississippi
Decision Date: 1995-03-09
Citations: 652 So. 2d 720
Docket Number: No. 91-KA-00459-SCT
Parties: Bessie Marie CLAYTON, v. STATE of Mississippi.
Judges: Before PRATHER, P.J., and PITTMAN and McRAE, JJ.
Reporter: Southern Reporter, Second Series
Volume: 652
Pages: 720–732

Head Matter:
Bessie Marie CLAYTON, v. STATE of Mississippi.
No. 91-KA-00459-SCT.
Supreme Court of Mississippi.
March 9, 1995.
David 0. Bell, Oxford, for appellant.
Michael C. Moore, Atty. Gen., Deirdre McCrory, Sp. Asst. Atty. Gen., Jackson, for appellee.
Before PRATHER, P.J., and PITTMAN and McRAE, JJ.

Opinion:
PITTMAN, Justice,
for the Court:
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
On March 31, 1989, pursuant to § 97-3-19(l)(b) of Mississippi Code Annotated, Bessie Marie Clayton was indicted for the Depraved Heart Murder of her daughter Angi-netta Clayton. A trial on the merits was had on April 9th and 10th, 1990. Subsequent to the State resting its case, the defense moved for a directed verdict, which was overruled by the trial court. The defense then proceeded with its case and put on Linda Clayton and Carolyn Clayton, two of the defendant's sisters. At the close of all the evidence, the defense renewed the motion for a directed verdict, which was in turn overruled by the trial court. After being instructed on murder and manslaughter, the jury found the Defendant guilty of murder. The court on April 12, 1990, entered a Judgment of Conviction and Sentence of life imprisonment. In addition, the court ordered that "the sentence of life imprisonment imposed herein-above shall be consecutive to the sentence previously imposed by this Court in Lafayette County Circuit Court cause number 12,921."
Subsequently and on April 19,1990, Defendant filed a Motion for J.N.O.V. or in the alternative for a New-Trial. Thereafter on April 30,1990, the lower court overruled said Motion.
Clayton appeals to this Court and assigns the following as reversible error:
J. THE TRIAL COURT ERRED IN OVERRULING APPELLANT'S MOTION FOR DIRECTED VERDICT BOTH AT THE END OF THE STATE'S CASE AND AT THE END OF THE CASE BECAUSE THE STATE'S EVIDENCE WAS INSUFFICIENT TO PROVE BEYOND A REASONABLE DOUBT AND TO THE EXCLUSION OF EVERY HYPOTHESIS CONSISTENT WITH HER INNOCENCE THAT THE DEFENDANT HAD COMMITTED AN ACT EMINENTLY DANGEROUS TO OTHERS AND EVINCING A DEPRAVED HEART, REGARDLESS OF HUMAN LIFE
II. THE ADMISSION OF CERTAIN PHOTOGRAPHS OF THE BODY HAD NO PROBATIVE VALUE AND WAS PREJUDICIAL
STATEMENT OF THE FACTS
Bessie Marie Clayton, a resident of Oxford, Mississippi, had five children. Bessie and her children lived in a trailer off of Highway 30 with her mother and two sisters, Carolyn and Linda. She at times also resided with a man in a home off of South Lamar street. The following summarizes the additional facts developed at trial.
F.A Buddy Roy
Buddy Roy, Lafayette County Medical Examiner, arrived at the Clayton trailer around 6:00 P.M. on January 17, 1989. He saw a child wrapped in a blanket on the couch and was informed that the child had been dead for a period of time. When Roy arrived, Bessie Marie Clayton and Carolyn Clayton were present in the trailer. Roy proceeded to take photographs of the scene. The child was then transported to the hospital and an autopsy was performed the next day, January 18, 1989, by Dr. Brooks Allison. Roy was present when the autopsy was performed but took the photographs of the body prior to the autopsy being performed. Roy described the child's skin as "leathery like" and the photographs depicted "severe dehydration . and also depicts a dilated anal canal." While at the hospital, Roy also examined the child's medical records.
At the scene of the death, Roy inquired of Bessie Marie about any medications that the child was taking and was shown a bottle of Dilantin with the date of prescription being January 6, 1989. Roy further testified that:
The bottle . was prescribed for a total of 240 cc of Dilantin. It was approximately 12 cc's of medication removed from the bottle, and on the prescription I noticed that the medication was to be given a dosage of 4 cc's three times per day. The child's death occurred on January 17,1989. The total usage from the bottle should have been approximately 120 cc's of Dilan-tin under normal usage_ It was approximately 12 cc's only used from the bottle.
Roy testified that the certificate of birth for Anginetta LaWan Clayton showed that she was born on May 12, 1986. The certificate of death showed that she died on January 17, 1989, as a result of "renal thrombosis with infarcts, both kidneys due to consequences of severe dehydration, severe malnutrition, inanition and starvation."
After being informed by Clayton that she was the child's mother and the "child had been sickly on several occasions", Roy called Sheriff Buddy East.
F.D. "Buddy" East
Lafayette County Sheriff Buddy East arrived at the hospital and proceeded to view the deceased. East knew that Clayton had other children and that the Welfare Department "had been working with Ms. Clayton about her children.... " He called the Welfare Department who sent representatives to the hospital that night. After receiving a verbal court order to remove the rest of the children from the trailer, East and the representatives went to the trailer. East testified that the trailer was "dirty, nasty, filthy; and we took the children at that time into custody and turned them over to the Welfare Department." East stated that he didn't see any food in the home and that "it wasn't fit for a dog to live in." While at the trailer, East also recovered the bottle of Dilantin. The Sheriff called Bessie Marie Clayton in and informed her that he was going to charge her "if this baby died from malnutrition or died from not being properly eared for." During this exchange, Clayton informed East that she "didn't stay out there all the time: that she lived on North Lamar...." East testified that Bessie Clayton (defendant's grandmother) was present in the trailer when the authorities arrived to collect the children.
Dr. Joe Harris
Harris, a practicing pediatrician in Oxford, Mississippi, saw and treated Anginetta Clayton on several occasions. Harris first treated Anginetta in October of 1986. He testified that the child had numerous medical problems including: microcephaly (where the head is very small because the brain does not grow) and spastic quadraplesis (where both arms and legs were very stiff). At the time he first treated Anginetta, she was 6 months old and weighed 16 pounds "which is fairly normal for that age." Anginetta was hospitalized in November of 1986 for bronchiolitis and was later sent to Le Bonheur Hospital in Memphis, Tennessee, for further neurological evaluation. On January 30, 1987, Anginetta was seen by Dr. Walcott for a seizure disorder in the Oxford, Mississippi emergency room. She was given Phenobarbital for the disorder and weighed about 15.4 pounds. During a follow-up visit with Dr. Harris the next day, Hams diagnosed Anginetta with an ear infection in both ears. Anginetta was hospitalized from May 14th through May 16th, August 22nd through August 25th, and again in September of 1988, for status epilep-ticus/repeated seizures. At the time of the September 1988 hospitalization, Anginetta weighed 16.5 pounds. Harris prescribed Dilantin for the seizures and stated that nausea and vomiting were common side effects.
Harris testified as to the birth defects including the microcephaly, stiffness and seizures and stated:
She didn't develop normally like a normal child would be expected to develop and grow and thrive.... The nerves to all her body her arms and legs were affected . they were what we call spastic, very stiff.... She had developed seizures; and this again, is probably from her congenital problem. So she was on medication for her seizures.
She couldn't really do a whole lot of anything. Her mother had to take care of her all the time. She required, 'pretty much constant care. Feedings were difficult too. The child couldn't take normal feedings and couldn't be fed like a child her age should be fed or feed herself. She had to be fed and cared for continuously, . She never developed past a three or four month's age level as far as she had developed and as far as she was ever going to develop.
Harris stated that the child's condition and ailments warranted placing the child in a medical facility for constant care but that there was not a facility that would take a child of that age.
Harris also testified that he informed Clayton that if Anginetta was not given her medication and taken proper care of, she could die. Finally, Harris labeled the condition and decline of the child from September of 1988 until January of 1989 as noticeable and "a chronic process."
Ultimately, Harris testified that notwithstanding all of her illnesses and conditions, Anginetta should have demonstrated an "upward trend in her growth pattern." He further stated that:
The precipitous drop we see in her weight shortly before death and the autopsy report, showing renal vein thrombosis, and severe inanition or severe malnutrition doesn't reflect her disease process. Her disease doesn't cause that. With proper care she still would have grown somewhat, but she didn't. She lost weight.
Dr. Brooks Allison
Dr. Allison, a pathologist for Oxford-Lafayette Hospital, performed the autopsy on Anginetta Clayton on January 18, 1989, and determined the cause of death. Allison stated that blood clots had formed in the child's veins which drain the kidneys as a result of severe malnutrition and dehydration. Allison discussed and described the total lack of moisture in the skin, the presence of dry fecal material in the child and the process causing the renal thrombosis with acute infarcts. Allison said the fecal material was "entirely consistent with severe dehydration of the body." He further stated that the material "could have been there a very long time" and that the baby could have been given food and was not at that time able to digest it. In his report, Allison also used the term "marasmic", which describes "babies that had severe protein and calorie deprivation or malnutrition ." Dr. Allison determined that the child had lost approximately "36 percent body weight in about four months, over a third of this baby's body weight in four months." He further opined that:
[T]he loss of weight didn't have anything to do with the problems with seizure disorder, fever, and retardation_ [T]he immediate cause of death was thrombosis of the renal vein, which were the result of dehydration and malnutrition.
Linda Clayton and Carolyn Clayton
Linda and Carolyn, sisters of the defendant, both testified on behalf of Bessie Marie Clayton. Both stated that Bessie Marie did not work and that they all received aid from the government in the form of food stamps and Medicaid.
Linda stated that she, her sister, them kids, and her grandmother, Bessie W. Clayton, lived out in the trailer on Highway 30. While Linda stated that Bessie Marie lived with her children in a home on Lamar, she also stated that Bessie Marie lived in C.B. Webb and "sometimes" lived there in the trailer; Bessie Marie was there on January 17, 1989, with Anginetta when Linda left for work. Linda testified that Bessie Marie was with Anginetta when she was hospitalized, she never saw her sister mistreat Anginetta and that her grandmother and Carolyn provided care to Anginetta. Linda also testified that she did not let two Welfare Department workers into the trailer when they came to check the home.
Carolyn also testified that Bessie Marie lived in her own place but did spend time at the trailer as well. Carolyn in her testimony recalled that the day the baby died, Bessie was in court and Anginetta and Bessie W. Clayton were at the trailer. Carolyn stated .that after they noticed that something was wrong with the baby, she went to the courthouse to get Bessie. When they returned to the trailer, Anginetta was dead. Carolyn also testified that she never witnessed Bessie mistreat Anginetta, that Bessie took the baby to the hospital several times and that the baby required different care because she was retarded.
DISCUSSION OF THE LAW WHETHER THE EVIDENCE IS SUFFICIENT TO SUPPORT THE VERDICT OF GUILTY?
Standard of Review
This assignment of error turns on the familiar standard concerning sufficiency of evidence. This Court in considering a motion for directed verdict has stated that:
When on appeal one convicted of a criminal offense challenges the legal sufficiency of the evidence, our authority to interfere with the jury's verdict is quite limited. We proceed by considering all of the evidence — not just that supporting the case for the prosecution — in the light most consistent with the verdict. We give the prosecution the benefit of all favorable inferences that may reasonably be drawn from the evidence. If the facts and inferences so considered point in favor of the accused with sufficient force that reasonable men could not have found beyond a reasonable doubt that he was guilty, reversal and discharge are required. On the other hand, if there is in the record substantial evidence of such quality and weight that, having in mind the beyond a reasonable doubt burden of proof standard, reasonable and fair minded jurors in the exercise of impartial judgment might have reached different conclusions, the verdict of guilty is beyond our authority to disturb.
Pate v. State, 557 So.2d 1183, 1184 (Miss.1990), citing McFee v. State, 511 So.2d 130, 133-34 (Miss.1987); Wells v. State, 521 So.2d 1274, 1277-78 (Miss.1987). As the testimony summarized above illustrates, the evidence was very close for the jury's consideration.
In the case sub judice, Appellant was indicted pursuant to § 97-3-19 of Mississippi Code Annotated which reads:
§ 97-S-19. Homicide; -murder defined; capital murder
The killing of a human being without the authority of law by any means or in any manner shall be murder in the following cases:
(b) When done in the commission of an act eminently dangerous to others and evincing a depraved heart, regardless of human life, although without any premeditated design to effect the death of any particular individual;
Miss.Code Ann. § 97 — 3—19(l)(b) (Supp.1992).
This case must be reversed. The defendant here is convicted of murder under § 97-3-19 for failure to properly feed and care for her child. In effect, she is found to have neglected Anginetta Clayton to such an extent as to have caused her death. Yet the record is replete with hospital visits, doctors' office visits and a spasmodic, yet continuous, effort by the defendant to find help for the child and to deal with her numerous health problems. We must be reluctant to hold the defendant to a standard of health care for Anginetta that rises above her ability. The defendant managed her normal children in such a way that they survived and matured normally. She could not cope with the health of Anginetta and the health community, though involved and informed, did not cope with the situation as it existed. Surely, at the very best, we should remand this case so that another jury may pass upon the charge and the evidence. Dr. Joe Harris, a private practitioner, in the field of pediatrics testified that:
[W]e don't know what caused her problem at birth, but from birth she did have— if you want to call them birth defects, that's fine; but she had some problems. She had had microcephaly, which is a small head; and the reason she had a small head is because she had a small brain. That sounds facitious (sic), but that's what hap pens. If your brain doesn't grow, your head doesn't grow.
Anginetta's brain did not grow. We don't know why. We can assume it was a poor blood supply to the brain, but we'll never know. She was sent to LeBonheur. They examined her; and again, as I said, she may have had congenital infection. She may have had malformation to a blood vessel to the brain that prevented the brain from growing, therefore a small head.
She didn't develop normally like a normal child would be expected to develop and grow and thrive. She just didn't do that. Again, that was part of her, if you will, birth defects.
The nerves to all her body, her arms'and legs were affected, and she had a problem with development growth of her limbs. They were what we call spastic, very stiff. When you see Anginetta try to move her arms, she couldn't move them; but, again, you felt a lot of resistance because of her congenital problems.
She had developed seizures; and this, again, is probably from her congenital problem. So she was on medication for her seizures.
She required special care if you want to call it that, because she didn't grow and develop like you would expect a normal child to do. She couldn't sit up. She couldn't really do a whole lot of anything. Her mother had to taek [sic] care of her all the time. She required pretty much constant care.
Feedings were difficult too. The child couldn't take normal feedings and couldn't be fed like a child her age should be fed or feed herself. She had to be fed and cared for constantly, if you will.
She never developed past a three or four months' age level as far as she had developed and as far as she was ever going to develop....
First of all, you probably couldn't get enough nutrients in her to let her grow as a normal child would without special type of feeding, tube feedings and that type thing; but you would expect her to show a continued growth pattern. There would be peaks and valleys, yes; but your usual trend would have been upward.
This testimony suggests the difficulty in caring for the child. We must be careful not to require of the mother a standard of care that even the professional medical community found difficult. Dr. Harris speaks of examination by Le Bonheur (a children's hospital in Memphis, Tennessee) but he did not institutionalize the child. Dr. Harris testifies to growth and upward growth trends but this growth is obtained by "special type of feeding, tube feeding and that type thing." To make this a failure under § 97-3-19 there must be evidence of the defendant's knowledge and ability to give this type of care. Dr. Harris testified further that this pitiful victim of neglect, by both her mother and our society, should have been placed in some medical facility. In part he stated:
That was part of our reason for referral to a neurologist to see if her condition warranted that. I think Anginetta could have benefitted from that [hospitalization], yes....
She was seen by the mental complex center here, and they said it was no place for a child that age in that facility. As far as I know, there is no other place.
Anginetta had no place to go though she had the desperate need. The mother, who surely failed her in large part, could not give the requisite care in this unusual situation. We should not place the total blame on an ignorant and unknowing mother. The record reveals that the defendant/mother took Angi-netta on more than a dozen occasions to health facilities seeking help but help was not to be found. Advice and medicine seemed to be available but attention to Anginetta's special needs was not available. We should not hold the defendant to a standard of care that she could not give and a standard of care that even professionals only talked about but could not give permanently and a standard of care that was not available to the defendant even through charitable or government agencies.
We therefore follow the decision set forth in Mister v. State, 190 So.2d 869 (Miss.1966), wherein this Court, in reversing and remanding a case for a second jury trial, stated:
The State's case was sufficient to survive defendant's request for a peremptory instruction, but under all the circumstances, the verdict is against the great weight of the evidence. The motion for a new trial should have been sustained. Since the evidence of defendant's guilt is of such nature as to create a serious doubt in our minds, we think that another jury should be permitted to pass upon the question. Cole v. State, 217 Miss. 779, 65 So.2d 262 (1953); Dickerson v. State, 54 So.2d 925 (Miss.1951); Jefferson v. State, 52 So.2d 925 (Miss.1951); Conway v. State, 177 Miss. 461, 171 So. 16 (1936).
Lyle v. State, 193 Miss. 102, 8 So.2d 459 (1942), is an illustrative arson ease on the sufficiency of the evidence. The conviction in the trial court was based upon the uncorroborated testimony of an accomplice, and the Court held that where such testimony is improbable, unreasonable, and self-contradictory, it should not be upheld.
Mister v. State, 190 So.2d at 871.
This Court in Hux v. State, reaffirmed the law set forth in Mister v. State: "In our opinion, the state's case was sufficient to survive defendant's request for a peremptory instruction, but as stated in Quarles v. State, 199 So.2d 58 (Miss.1967), and Mister v. State, 190 So.2d at 869, the defendant's guilt is in such a state of serious doubt that this Court believes that another jury should pass upon the matter." Hux, 234 So.2d 50, 51 (Miss.1970).
Finally, as this case necessitates reversal, we decline to address the issue of photographs. However, we do choose to address certain jury instructions given at the trial of the case sub judice, as such a discussion could perhaps prevent the same error from reoecurring.
The trial court properly gave instructions allowing the jury to find Clayton guilty of manslaughter rather than murder. It also refused a lesser included instruction of ne-gleet. The problem arises in the definitional instruction. There the court told the jury that the difference between "depraved heart" murder and "culpable negligence" manslaughter was that the former requires that the defendant's acts be "willful". The court then instructed the jury that "culpable negligence" was such reckless behavior as to be the "equivalent to willfulness." That the jury was confused is evidenced by the fact that it requested further instructions on those terms. The court declined to give further instructions.
While it is true that "culpable negligence" has been deemed sufficient to supply the element of willfulness thought necessary to a criminal act, Evans v. State, 562 So.2d 91 (Miss.1990); Smith v. State, 197 Miss. 802, 20 So.2d 701 (1945), defining the term as such is hopelessly confusing in the context of this case.
To the extent that we hold on to the notion that depraved heart murder and culpable negligence manslaughter can co-exist given the broad interpretation of depraved heart murder adopted by this Court, See Mallett v. State, 606 So.2d 1092 (Miss.1992); Windham v. State, 602 So.2d 798 (Miss.1992), instructions such as that given in the instant ease defining culpable negligence are to be avoided. In Hums v. State, 616 So.2d 313, 320 (Miss.1993), we considered jury instructions for both depraved heart murder and culpable negligence manslaughter. We stated that the more appropriate definition of culpable negligence is "negligence of a degree so gross as to be tantamount to a wanton disregard of, or utter indifference to, the safety of human life." Hums, 616 So.2d 313, 320 (Miss.1993). Where the objective is to distinguish culpable negligence manslaughter from depraved heart murder the definition of culpable negligence should be limited to the definition given by this Court in Hums
REVERSED AND REMANDED.
DAN M. LEE and PRATHER, P.JJ., and McRAE, J., concur.
BANKS, J., concurs in part.
HAWKINS, C.J., concurs in part and dissents in part with separate written opinion joined by SULLIVAN and BANKS, JJ.
SMITH, J., dissents with separate written opinion joined by JAMES L. ROBERTS, Jr., J.
. The defense objected to the court's refusal of their gross neglect instruction and the court's granting the State a lesser-included offense/manslaughter instruction.
. The sentence previously imposed was for a period of twelve (12) years and resulted from defendant's conviction for possession of a controlled substance with intent to distribute.
. Harris testified that none of the treating physicians were able to precisely determine Anginet-ta's condition.
. Linda had two children, Carolyn had three children, and Bessie had five children.
. In Hums, we erroneously attributed this language to the statute. The definition is derived from case law. See Sullivan v. State, 213 Miss. 14, 56 So.2d 93 (1952); Smith v. State, 197 Miss. 802, 20 So.2d 701 (1945).