Opinion ID: 1349911
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Defendant's Impairment

Text: Under § 13-703(G)(1), impairment may constitute a mitigating factor if, at the time of the offense, defendant's capacity to appreciate the wrongfulness of his conduct or to conform his conduct to the requirements of law was significantly impaired.... (emphasis added); see also Fierro, 166 Ariz. at 553-54, 804 P.2d at 86-87. In this case, however, we agree with the trial judge that defendant's impairment on the night of the murder did not rise to the level of significant impairment. Defendant testified that he smoked marijuana and may have consumed as many as 18 to 21 beers on the day of the murder. He additionally testified that he drank some tequila and that he, George, and another friend shared a half-gallon of scotch. Yet, defendant's prodigious alcohol consumption is largely uncorroborated. Gallegos testified that he gave defendant 2 or 3 beers when they were at the garage and then an additional 2 or 3 beers when they returned home later that evening. The last 2 or 3 beers he gave defendant came from a case that he had purchased on his way home from work. Gallegos checked this case before he went to bed and noticed that the beers were all basically there. He also checked the case the following day and did not notice anything unusual from his check the previous evening. A search of the house revealed only 4 empty beer containers and 2 empty beer cartons. Defendant nevertheless maintained that he threw his empty containers into a large cardboard box, which was located in the carport and was filled with empty aluminum cans. A scotch bottle also was found almost empty, but defendant and George may have consumed this liquor earlier in the week. Notwithstanding the lack of physical evidence to corroborate defendant's testimony, other evidence in the record indicates that defendant was not significantly impaired on the night of the murder. Despite his claim that he had consumed a substantial amount of alcohol, defendant's own testimony revealed that he was able to work on his vehicle at least sporadically from 4:30 until 10:30 p.m. He then played video games with George and Gallegos. Gallegos, who also was drinking, testified that defendant was doing much better than he was at the video games. He also testified that he did not notice anything unusual about defendant's behavior or speech, and that it seemed like just another normal evening. Mrs. W, who was not drinking, testified that she did not observe defendant drinking any beer that evening. She also testified that defendant did not appear to be drunk. When she was asked why she earlier had told an investigator that defendant appeared drunk, she responded: At the time he just  he looked giddy, happy. It was  I don't know how to term it. Just happy. Giddy. He was not stammering. He was not incoherent. He was totally concentrating and doing well on the [video] game. Defendant's testimony and his confession to Officer Saldate revealed his state of mind immediately following the murder. Defendant told Officer Saldate that after he carried the victim's body out of the house, he locked the door behind him. Officer Saldate asked him why he did this, and Saldate described defendant's response as follows: [I]f [Gallegos] would have got up, ... he would have probably immediately gone to the bedroom where they sleep and questioned them about the fact why the door is unlocked, when he specifically told them to lock it before they went to sleep. Defendant also testified that before he and George carried the body outside, he told George to take off his shoes so that he would not make any noise walking down the street. Defendant's statements and his attempt to conceal the murder show that he appreciated the wrongfulness of his conduct and that he acted with significant foresight. John P. DiBacco, Ph.D., who conducted the diagnostic evaluation of defendant pursuant to rule 26.5, Arizona Rules of Criminal Procedure, found that: [A]lthough he may have been significantly intoxicated when he committed the crime his intent was clear to molest the child and then cover-up his resulting crimes.... [A]lthough [defendant] may have been intoxicated at the time of the crime, ... he did .. . appreciate the wrongfulness of his act. (Emphasis added.) Despite evidence in the record indicating that defendant was impaired to some degree on the night of the murder, this impairment alone is insufficient to constitute a mitigating factor under § 13-703(G)(1). See State v. Woratzeck, 134 Ariz. 452, 458, 657 P.2d 865, 871 (1982). We agree with the trial judge that defendant's intoxication did not significantly impair his ability to conform his conduct to the requirements of the law or his ability to appreciate the wrongfulness of his conduct. The trial judge therefore was correct in finding this statutory mitigating factor inapplicable.
Proof of defendant's impairment was not limited to evidence that he was intoxicated on the night of the murder. Defendant also presented evidence that he had a history of alcohol and drug abuse, as well as a documented learning disability. As discussed above, we agree with the trial judge's determination that defendant was not significantly impaired on the night of the murder, and therefore, his impairment does not constitute a mitigating factor under § 13-703(G)(1). A trial court's inquiry, however, must not end there. State v. McMurtrey, 136 Ariz. 93, 102, 664 P.2d 637, 646 (1983). Although defendant's impairment on the night of the murder did not rise to the level of a statutory mitigating circumstance, the trial judge should have considered whether such impairment, when viewed in light of defendant's alleged history of alcohol and drug abuse, constituted a non-statutory mitigating circumstance. See Fierro, 166 Ariz. at 553-54, 804 P.2d at 86-87. Yet, nothing in the special verdict indicates that the trial judge made this determination. We therefore must examine the record to determine whether defendant's impairment constitutes a non-statutory mitigating circumstance. Initially, we note that defendant considers himself an alcoholic. He testified at trial that he has been consuming large amounts of alcohol predominately on weekends since he was 12-13 years old. In addition, he testified that the week of the murder, he consumed alcohol on a daily basis. Yet, defendant's claim of serious alcohol dependency is largely uncorroborated. In 1988, a juvenile court placed defendant on probation for felony theft. As a result, defendant's probation officer required that defendant come to his office once a week as part of his regular probation checks. At defendant's aggravation/mitigation hearing, the probation officer testified that through his weekly contacts with defendant, he did not detect any serious problem with alcohol use. However, when Dr. DiBacco conducted his psychological evaluation of defendant just before the sentencing hearing, he noted: It is further important to indicate that [defendant] did obtain a significant elevation on the McAndrew scale, which indicates prominent drug and/or alcohol ideation, if not abuse and dependency. Furthermore, defendant has a documented history of drug use. In 1984, a juvenile court placed him on probation for possession of marijuana. While on probation in 1989 for felony theft, defendant tested positive for marijuana and methamphetamine. The presentence report, however, revealed that he had stopped using crystal methamphetamine about a year before the commission of the present crime. The record therefore indicates that marijuana was the only drug defendant had been using just prior to the night of the murder. Finally, defendant is learning disabled and has attended special education classes since approximately the fourth grade. This factor, however, does not appear to have contributed significantly to his level of impairment. Indeed, after diagnostic evaluation, Dr. DiBacco determined that defendant is not mentally deficient and noted that test results indicated that he has at least average fluid intelligence. Overall, after considering the evidence that defendant was impaired to some degree on the night of the murder, as well as his history of drug and alcohol abuse, we find that defendant's impairment constitutes a non-statutory mitigating circumstance in this case. The trial judge, however, failed to consider defendant's impairment in mitigation when determining whether to sentence him to death. The dissent maintains that the trial judge undoubtedly considered all of the impairment evidence before imposing defendant's sentence. On the contrary, we think the special verdict indicates that once the trial judge determined that defendant's impairment did not meet the (G)(1) standard, he concluded that impairment was not a mitigating circumstance in this case. After discussing the evidence that defendant had presented regarding his impairment, the trial judge stated: On balance the evidence suggests that the voluntary consumption of alcohol by the defendant immediately prior to the murder impaired his ability to conform his conduct to the requirements of law. On the other hand, there was no appreciable impairment to his capacity to appreciate the wrongfulness of his conduct. The test is disjunctive. Neither impairment rises to the level of significantly impaired. Therefore this mitigating circumstance does not exist. This finding appeared in a section of the special verdict labelled MITIGATION  STATUTORY. Yet, nowhere in the section labelled MITIGATION  NONSTATUTORY did the trial judge mention defendant's impairment. In fact, the judge listed the non-statutory mitigating circumstances that he thought defendant had proved by a preponderance of the evidence, and impairment was not included on this list. It is this fact, along with the trial judge's statement that he considered and weighed each of the mitigating circumstances offered by defendant and proved to exist by a preponderance of the evidence,  that leads us to the conclusion that the trial judge disregarded defendant's impairment when determining whether to sentence him to death. Because we cannot ascertain whether the trial judge would have sentenced defendant to death had he considered defendant's impairment as a non-statutory mitigating circumstance, we remand this case for resentencing. See McMurtrey, 136 Ariz. at 101-02, 664 P.2d at 645-46 (remanding for resentencing after trial judge failed to consider potentially mitigating evidence that did not meet standard specified in § 13-703(G)(1)).