Opinion ID: 2588202
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 10

Heading: The evidence supporting premeditation and deliberation, burglary, kidnapping, and torture

Text: Hernandez claims that there was insufficient evidence of premeditation and deliberation, burglary, kidnapping, and torture. In reviewing the sufficiency of the evidence, this court must determine whether the jury, acting reasonably, could have been convinced by the competent evidence of the defendant's guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. [42] This court will not disturb a jury verdict where there is substantial evidence to support it, and circumstantial evidence alone may support a conviction. [43] Hernandez contends that there was insufficient evidence of premeditation and deliberation. He says that there is no suggestion in the record that he brought a weapon to Donna's home, engaged in any planning of the offenses, or packed clothing in his car or otherwise prepared to leave town with his daughter. He notes that he parked his car in Donna's driveway without attempting to hide it and stresses that he was experiencing emotional turmoil and was heavily intoxicated. We conclude, on the contrary, that there was strong evidence of premeditation and deliberation. The record shows that Hernandez repeatedly threatened to kill Donna. He left such threats on her answering machine. He made a veiled threat to kill her when he told Landeros you're going to die, dogs. Later that evening, he made the threat explicit over the phone to Donna's mother. And about two weeks before the murder, he told a friend that he wanted to kill Donna. Further, the jury could reasonably have found that Hernandez acted premeditatedly and deliberately in murdering his ex-wife on October 6, the anniversary of their failed marriage. Hernandez's possession of over $1,000 in cash immediately after the murder could also reasonably be considered evidence that he planned the crime and his flight afterwards. The evidence that Hernandez intended the murder also supports the jury's finding of burglary. If Hernandez entered Donna's house with the intent to murder her or to kidnap Ana, he committed burglary. [44] Hernandez emphasizes that he and Donna had been seen together on various occasions not long before her murder and that there was no sign that he forcibly entered her home. However, forcible entry is not an element of burglary; so even if Donna consented to his entry, he still committed a burglary as long as he entered with a felonious intent. [45] Hernandez contends that there was also insufficient evidence of second-degree kidnapping. As discussed above, he argues that he had legal custody of his daughter. He further argues that the divorce decree permitted him to take Ana out of state. These arguments are of no avail. To reiterate, NRS 200.310(2) provides in relevant part that [a] person who willfully and without authority of law seizes ... another person... for the purpose of conveying the person out of the state without authority of law, ... is guilty of kidnapping in the second degree. Hernandez violated a protective order, a custody decree, and criminal statutes when he murdered Donna and took Ana. Therefore, he seized Ana without authority of law. And the evidence that his purpose was to convey her out of state to Mexico is overwhelming: he had threatened more than once to do so, he was driving with her in that direction when stopped by the police, and she told the police that was where her father was taking her. Hernandez contends that there was insufficient evidence of murder by torture and of torture as an aggravating circumstance. Torture involves a calculated intent to inflict pain for revenge, extortion, persuasion or for any sadistic purpose and intent to inflict pain beyond the killing itself. [46] In Domingues v. State , this court concluded that there was insufficient evidence of torture where the evidence did not indicate that the appellant's intent was anything other than to kill the victim and there was no evidence that the specific intent behind the attempted electrocution or the stabbing was to inflict pain for pain's sake or for punishment or sadistic pleasure. [47] Hernandez argues that the record here shows simply that he stabbed Donna to death and did not intend to torture her. We disagree. Coupled with the multiple injuries he inflicted on her before her death, Hernandez's act of thrusting the knife into Donna's vagina reflects an intent to inflict pain beyond the killing itself for a sadistic purpose. Hernandez counters that this act occurred after Donna's death and therefore cannot be torture; he cites Byford v. State. [48] Although the evidence was not conclusive that Donna was dead when the act occurred, we presume that she was because in the guilt phase the jurors found Hernandez guilty of sexual penetration of a dead body. Nevertheless, even if the knife was thrust into Donna's vagina after her death, it is relevant evidence of his state of mind before her death as he beat her, stabbed her repeatedly, and strangled her. We conclude that this evidence was sufficient to prove torture as an aggravator under NRS 200.033(8) and murder by torture under NRS 200.030(1)(a). There was also sufficient evidence of the torture or mutilation aggravator on the basis of the mutilation evident in the record. [49]