Opinion ID: 1201769
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: FACTS AND PROCEEDINGSA. Guilt Phase

Text: On March 21, 1986, Los Angeles County sheriff's deputies found the body of Amelia P. in the master bedroom of her home in the desert community of Littlerock, in the County of Los Angeles. The body was face down on the floor, with the hands tied together behind the victim's back, the ankles tied together, and the hands tied to the ankles. These bindings were made with neckties belonging to the victim's husband, Ubaldo P. A piece of cloth was found in the victim's mouth, secured by a necktie tied around the victim's head and upper neck. The body was clothed only in a robe. On the floor near the body were the victim's underwear, socks, and running shoes, as well as a bloodstained hammer and the broken tip of a fireplace poker. The cause of death was multiple blows to the back and sides of the head, fracturing the skull and lacerating the brain. Semen was present on the victim's right inner thigh and genital area, but there were no indications of traumatic sexual assault. Based on the temperature of the liver when the body was found, death was estimated to have occurred between 8:10 a.m. and 12:30 p.m. that day. The victim's blood tested negative for alcohol and an array of illegal drugs, including cocaine. Kevin P., the youngest of the victim's sons, was five years old on the day of his mother's death, and seven years old when he testified at trial. According to that testimony, a Black man Kevin had never seen before entered the house with a knife in his hand. The man had no facial hair and no tattoos on his arms. It was before lunch, and Kevin was under a table in the living room watching television. The man, who was wearing a sleeveless blue top and dark blue cut-off pants, put the knife to the victim's neck and demanded money. As Kevin described it, the knife was black with a little round silver ball around it, and it was a survival knife. At the man's direction, Kevin retrieved the keys to the family van from the kitchen and gave them to the man. The man tried to start the van but was unable to do so. The man then took the victim to the master bedroom, where the man tied up the victim. From the closet in the master bedroom, the man removed two guns belonging to Kevin's father. Kevin went into his own bedroom and stayed there for a long time. Some days later, Kevin attended a lineup but did not identify anyone. Ubaldo P. testified that he had left the house that morning between midnight and 1 a.m. to go to work 77 miles away in the City of Commerce. When he returned at 5 p.m., the sheriff's deputies were already there. Missing from the house were an M-1 carbine, a 30.06 rifle, and an army duffel bag. The victim's jewelry case, usually kept in the bedroom, was in the family van. The hammer found on the bedroom floor was normally kept in a toolbox in the garage. The fireplace poker was in its usual place, but there were bloodstains on the shaft and the tip had been broken off. The victim was very neat and normally did not leave her clothing on the floor. He had no reason to suspect that she was abusing drugs or alcohol. Investigating officers found the keys to the van outside the victim's house, about 30 feet from the rear garage door. Nearby, the officers found a single set of shoe prints leading away from the house. It had rained the previous day, making a crusty surface. The officers followed the tracks for about a third of a mile, at intervals observing marks consistent with an object such as a rifle dragging on the ground. The tracks led to a camper, from which the victim's house was easily visible. [1] The officers ordered the occupants to leave the camper. Defendant and his brother Gregory emerged from the camper and were taken into custody. Inside the camper, the officers found a pair of MacGregor athletic shoes that could have made the shoe prints. The officers found an identical pair of athletic shoes behind the front seat of an automobile belonging to defendant's mother, Maxine Cudjo. Unlike the shoes found in the camper, the shoes found in the automobile were very wet. In addition to the shoes, the officers found a black survival knife and a pair of cut-off blue jeans in the Cudjo camper. When shown these articles at trial, Kevin testified that the knife was different from the knife wielded by the man who had assaulted his mother, and that the cut-off pants the assailant had worn were similar to, but shorter than, the ones found in the Cudjo camper. No firearms were found in the camper or in Maxine Cudjo's automobile. Maxine Cudjo testified that on the day of the murder she was living in the camper. Defendant and Gregory had slept in the camper the previous night, as they occasionally did. She spent most of that morning in the house next door, doing housework for the man who owned the land under the camper. Returning to the camper at 11 a.m., she found defendant and Gregory, both wearing their MacGregor athletic shoes. The three of them went in Maxine's car to the post office and then to the residence of Julia Watson, one of Maxine Cudjo's daughters. Maxine returned to the camper; a little while later, at about 1:30 p.m., she departed again in her car to visit friends, leaving defendant and Gregory in the camper. On her next return to the camper, at approximately 4 p.m., sheriff's deputies had taken her sons into custody. Julia Watson testified that her mother had visited her house that day with defendant and Gregory at approximately 1 or 2 p.m. Defendant was wearing cut-off jeans and work boots; Gregory wore shorts and tennis shoes. Gregory Cudjo did not testify at trial, but the prosecution introduced evidence of the testimony he had given at defendant's preliminary hearing and statements he had made to investigating officers during a tape-recorded interview the morning of the day after the murder of Amelia P. In these prior statements, Gregory maintained that he had remained in the camper throughout the morning of the murder until his mother returned at approximately 11 a.m. During this time, he alternately slept and listened to a professional baseball game on the radio. He said defendant was gone from the camper for about two hours, leaving at about the time the baseball game started and returning at the same time as Maxine. During the taped interview, Gregory said that later that afternoon defendant had washed off his MacGregor athletic shoes when they were at Julia Watson's house. Analysis of semen found on the victim's external genital area and right inner thigh revealed that it could have come from defendant but could not have come from Gregory Cudjo or from Ubaldo P. [2]
Defendant testified in his own behalf. He admitted that he knew Amelia P., that he had been in her house on the morning of her death, and that he had had sexual relations with her, but he denied that he had killed her. He said he had seen Amelia P. on three occasions before the day of her death. Defendant explained that he and a woman named Iris Thomas had worked together selling cocaine, and that he had derived most of his income from this illicit trade. On two occasions, he had seen Amelia P. purchase cocaine. One of these transactions had occurred in the parking lot of an apartment complex in Quartz Hill. The other transaction had occurred on March 4 or 5, 1986, at a house belonging to Thomas's mother. According to defendant, Amelia P. had announced at the door that she had come to see Miss Thomas about some coke. Defendant had invited Amelia inside. Amelia had asked Thomas's mother to front her an eight track of cocaine. (Defendant testified that an eight track is one-eighth of an ounce.) After some discussion of arrangements for payment, Thomas's mother had given cocaine to Amelia. On a later date, defendant had seen Amelia P. at a market and they had waved to each other but had not conversed. On the morning of March 21, defendant was driving his mother's car to a friend's house when he noticed Amelia P. standing in the front yard of her residence. She was wearing a housecoat or robe. It was about 9 a.m. When he blew the horn, she came to the car and asked how he had been and if he knew anybody who had any cocaine. Defendant said he had some. She asked if she could have it on credit as a favor. He said that it would depend on whether she would do him a favor. They agreed to talk about it further. Defendant drove to the camper, retrieved some cocaine, and returned to the victim's residence. Amelia P. invited him into the house. He sold her some cocaine on credit for $50. (Sheriff's officers did not find rock cocaine at the victim's residence, but they did find an empty baggie in the garage. Just two and one-half inches square, the baggie was smaller than the ones normally sold in supermarkets; it was a convenient size for $50 worth of rock cocaine. The officers did not take possession of the baggie.) Defendant smoked some cocaine, then asked Amelia P. when she could pay him. After further conversation, Amelia agreed to have sex with defendant in lieu of cash payment. They engaged in sexual intercourse on the living room couch; defendant left five minutes later. Defendant did not see anyone else in the house. He went back to the camper and told Gregory he had had sex with Amelia P. in exchange for cocaine. Defendant then went jogging. He did not wear the MacGregor shoes, which had cleats, but athletic shoes with smooth soles. When he returned to the camper, Gregory was there and their mother arrived about five minutes later. Defendant changed to work boots. Gregory and defendant went with their mother to the post office, and then to Julia Watson's house. Defendant sat in the front passenger seat of his mother's automobile during this excursion. At that time, defendant had tattoos on both biceps, on his right shoulder, and on his lower left arm. Defendant denied owning the cut-offs found in the camper and denied knowing to whom they belonged, although he admitted he had seen them in the camper. Defendant admitted owning the survival knife found in the camper. Gregory is two years younger than defendant and had no facial hair on the day of the murder. (Apparently, a photograph in evidence, taken on the day of the murder after defendant's arrest, showed that defendant had a goatee and/or a mustache.) To establish Gregory's knowledge of the details of the murder, the defense introduced the complete tape recordings of Gregory's two interviews with investigating officers. During these interviews, Gregory said that when defendant saw the officers following his tracks to the camper, he admitted to Gregory that it appeared the officers were following his (i.e., defendant's) tracks. According to Gregory, defendant gave this description of what he had done: Defendant had hidden and the woman had walked up with a basket of clothes. The woman was wearing a housecoat, which came open. Defendant rushed up, grabbed her, put a knife to her throat, and said he wanted only money. The woman had no money and no jewelry, but defendant took a couple of shotguns, one of which looked like a rifle. The woman started to make a lot of noise, so defendant put a sock in her mouth. There was a little boy, and there was a boa constrictor in an aquarium. (Kevin kept a pet snake in his bedroom.) The little boy had shown defendant where to find the keys to a van. Defendant had started the van but was unable to drive it out of the garage because the garage door was padlocked on the outside. Defendant had hogtied the woman with some neckties that were in the closet next to a ... jacket with all kinds of medals on it โ something like a Ranger jacket or something. (Ubaldo P. testified he had been an Airborne Ranger in the United States Army, and his green full-dress uniform had been hanging in the closet.) Defendant became real nervous because the woman had said her husband would come home at noon and it was then 11:25 a.m. He had tied her up to give himself enough time to get away. He did not rape the woman. According to Gregory, defendant said nothing about hitting the woman. By stipulation, the defense established, first, that Kevin had told investigating officers on the day of the murder that he had been watching a certain television program when the intruder entered his house; second, that this program had been broadcast that day from 10:30 to 11:00 a.m.; and, third, that the professional baseball game that was broadcast that morning began at 10:30 a.m. An expert in drug dependency testified that it is frequently impossible to determine from an individual's appearance and behavior whether that individual has been using cocaine. He also testified that it is not uncommon for the spouse of a cocaine addict to profess ignorance of the addict's use of cocaine. This may indicate genuine ignorance or the psychological state of denial. A defense investigator testified that he had driven the route that defendant said in his testimony that he had jogged on the morning of the murder and that the distance was three miles.
On rebuttal, Deputy Sheriff Robert Flores testified that on March 21, 1986, the time from the landing of the sheriff's helicopter at the victim's residence to the officers' arrival at the Cudjo camper was at least one hour and thirty minutes.