Opinion ID: 1156488
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Admission of Prior Unadjudicated Criminal Conduct

Text: In the penalty phase of the trial, the jury received evidence of Pruett's prior convictions for attempted robbery and embezzlement. The jury also viewed the videotape of the interview conducted on the afternoon of February 14, 1985, during which Pruett confessed not only to the murder of Wilma Harvey but also to the 1975 killing of Debra McInnis. In addition, the jury heard, over Pruett's objection, the testimony of Larry McInnis, Debra's husband. McInnis testified that on the evening of May 25, 1975, he went to meet his wife after work at the Kentucky Fried Chicken store where she was employed. Finding the front door locked, he went to the side door and heard some distressing noises. He opened the door, entered the store, and found his wife laying in the floor in a pool of blood. She had multiple stab wounds about her throat, along with slash marks on her throat, and a large lump on the side of her head. She was alive, but she died the next day. Pruett acknowledges that this Court has consistently allowed evidence of a defendant's . . . prior unadjudicated criminal conduct . . . to come in at the sentencing stage in a capital case in order to prove his future dangerousness as a continuing threat to society. Pruett contends, however, that by allowing Larry McInnis to testify, the trial court permitted the Commonwealth to introduce evidence of the vileness of the 1975 murder of Debra McInnis, evidence which was irrelevant to the question whether Pruett represented a continuing threat to society. Furthermore, Pruett maintains, the Commonwealth was permitted to play for the jury an extremely lengthy and detailed videotaped confession out of [his] very mouth as to the circumstances of his killing of Debra McInnis in 1975. The testimony of Larry McInnis served merely to inflame the jury, Pruett opines, and, hence, the trial court should have limited the evidence of his prior unadjudicated criminal conduct to his videotaped confession. Under Code || 19.2-264.2 and -264.4(C), the death penalty may be imposed only if the Commonwealth proves the future dangerousness of the accused or the vileness of the offense for which he is on trial. [7] Future dangerousness may be established by showing that there is a probability based upon evidence of the prior history of the defendant or of the circumstances surrounding the commission of the offense of which he is accused that he would commit criminal acts of violence that would constitute a continuing serious threat to society. Code | 19.2-264.4(C) (emphasis added). In Smith v. Commonwealth, we defined criminal acts of violence as serious crimes against the person committed by intentional acts of unprovoked violence. 219 Va. at 478, 248 S.E.2d at 149. The testimony of Larry McInnis concerning the condition in which he found his wife tended to fit her murder precisely within the Smith definition. The same testimony no doubt also tended to establish the vileness of the McInnis murder, and, if offered solely for that purpose, the testimony may have been irrelevant and thus inadmissible. But evidence of a prior act of violence is certainly probative of the probability that the accused would commit other criminal acts of violence. When offered for that purpose, as the testimony of McInnis was offered here, the evidence should be considered relevant and admissible. Furthermore, we do not think the trial court was bound to limit the evidence of prior unadjudicated conduct to what was revealed by the videotape. In the first place, Pruett's confession as it related to the McInnis murder was not as detailed as Pruett now maintains. On many matters about which he was questioned, Pruett answered either that he did not know or could not remember. On one vital point concerning the number of times he stabbed Mrs. McInnis, Pruett first said he stabbed her numerous times but later reversed himself and said a few times. And even when the interview neared its end, Pruett's interrogators were still trying to get him to provide details they apparently thought necessary to confirm that it was he who actually murdered Mrs. McInnis. Aside from that, Larry McInnis was the first person to observe the victim and the crime scene after the fatal attack. Regardless of the relationship he shared with the victim, he was a competent witness with first-hand knowledge of essential facts. His testimony was not offered merely to inflame the jury, but to supplement and corroborate Pruett's confession. We have approved the admission of similar evidence of prior unadjudicated criminal conduct in the penalty phase in a number of death penalty cases, including our recent decisions in Poyner v. Commonwealth, 229 Va. at 418, 329 S.E.2d at 827-28, Watkins v. Commonwealth, 229 Va. at 488, 331 S.E.2d at 436, and Frye v. Commonwealth, 231 Va. 370, 393, 345 S.E.2d 267, 283 (1986). While the factual situations involved here and in our earlier decisions may vary somewhat from case to case, the basis for the legal principle remains the same: evidence of prior criminal acts of violence, whether adjudicated or not, is relevant to a determination of future dangerousness. Accordingly, we adhere to our earlier rulings and hold that the trial court did not err in admitting the testimony of Larry McInnis.