Opinion ID: 2008865
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: pacheco

Text: We shall address the following claims raised on appeal by defendant Pacheco. First, he contends that the affidavits upon which warrants for the search of his apartment and his car were issued were executed improperly and did not furnish sufficient probable cause. Second, he claims that his warrantless arrest was illegal, thereby rendering a subsequent taped confession while he was in police custody also illegal. Third, he asserts that his taped confession was not voluntarily given by virtue of promises made to him by detectives while he was under arrest.
Pacheco challenges both the form and the sufficiency of affidavits prepared in support of applications for search warrants to search his automobile and his apartment. Corporal Donald W. Miller of the State Police, in support of his application for each warrant, submitted a four-page document. The information upon which Miller was basing probable cause was included in a typewritten statement entitled Affidavit. For want of space, the statement carried over to page 2, labeled 2, which was signed by Corporal Miller. These two pages were affixed in each application to a two-page standard affidavit form commonly used by police departments and accepted by the courts. In the space provided in the form for entry of the grounds for issuance of a warrants, a typewritten statement was inserted which directed the magistrate to see attached affidavit of Corporal Donald W. Miller made a part of and attached to. Pacheco complains that the affidavits were not legally sufficient in accordance with Rule 41(c) of the Superior Court Rules of Criminal Procedure because the jurat did not appear on the same page as the affiant's statement. However, the same officer who signed the affidavit also signed and swore to the applications for search warrants which in each instance incorporated the affidavit by reference. We discuss this issue only to make it clear that this court will not indulge in hypertechnicality on matters so serious as those which are before us today. See United States v. Ventresca, 380 U.S. 102, 109, 85 S.Ct. 741, 746, 13 L.Ed.2d 684, 689 (1965). There is not even the slightest doubt in our minds that page 2 of the affidavit was a continuation of page 1 and that pages 1 and 2 were incorporated in the standard affidavit form by clear and unequivocal reference and by physical attachment. Pacheco additionally attacks the substance of the affidavits, contending that on their face they did not make out probable cause sufficient for issuance of the search warrants. The affidavits submitted contained information about the Mills homicide from two separate informants. The first informant was Mills's female companion with whom he had been residing for a brief time. She reported to the police that on the night of the homicide, Mills returned home for a short while and told her he was going out with Joe. As Mills left their apartment, she looked out and saw him get into a car that she described. The second informant was a co-worker of Gibbons, Pacheco's female companion, who stated that Gibbons reported to work on Monday, April 13, 1981 with tooth marks on her face. Upon questioning Gibbons about the marks, the informant learned that they had been inflicted by Pacheco. Gibbons also told the co-worker that Joe killed the guy in Tiverton, that he said he was going to kill Mills, and that he later returned home covered with blood. The affidavits indicated that the car Mills's companion described was determined through a police investigation to be owned by Pacheco. The affidavits also recited the discovery of the dead body of Mills. The defendant now asserts that the affidavits did not provide the issuing justice with sufficient information from which the judicial officer could independently conclude that the informants were credible and that their information was reliable. We disagree. This court recently considered the issue of an informant's credibility and reliability in State v. Ricci, R.I., 472 A.2d 291 (1984). That case was our first opportunity to address this issue in the light of the United States Supreme Court's decision in Illinois v. Gates, 462 U.S. 213, 103 S.Ct. 2317, 76 L.Ed.2d 527 (1983). In Gates the Court adopted a totality of the circumstances test for a finding of probable cause. That test is characterized by flexibility: The task of the issuing magistrate is simply to make a practical, commonsense decision whether, given all the circumstances set forth in the affidavit before him, including the `veracity' and `basis of knowledge' of persons supplying hearsay information, there is a fair probability that contraband or evidence of a crime will be found in a particular place. And the duty of a reviewing court is simply to ensure that the magistrate had a `substantial basis for    conclud[ing]' that probable cause existed. Jones v. United States, supra, 362 U.S. [257] at 271, 80 S.Ct. [725] at 736 [4 L.Ed.2d 697 (1960)]. We are convinced that this flexible, easily applied standard will better achieve the accommodation of public and private interests that the Fourth Amendment requires than does the approach that has developed from Aguilar and Spinelli.  Id. at ___, 103 S.Ct. at 2332, 76 L.Ed.2d at 548. We noted in State v. Ricci that we interpret Gates as a retraction of the rigid application of the two-pronged test that the Court announced in Aguilar v. Texas, 378 U.S. 108, 84 S.Ct. 1509, 12 L.Ed.2d 723 (1964), and further delineated in Spinelli v. United States, 393 U.S. 410, 89 S.Ct. 584, 21 L.Ed.2d 637 (1969): [O]nly the rigid application of the `two-pronged test' has been abandoned, not the test itself. State v. Ricci, 472 A.2d at 296. We further stated: [T]his court has adhered to the original meaning of Aguilar and Spinelli and that our treatment of the issue conforms with what we believe the Court intended in Gates. When the Supreme Court reaffirmed the traditional totality-of-the-circumstances approach, it was responding to the rigidity that some states have given the `two-pronged test.' Ours is not such a state. Rather, we believe the principles that have controlled our determinations remain valid in light of Gates and need not change in any way. Id. 472 A.2d at 296. The affidavits in the instant case contain no express assertion of the informants' track record. But this omission we think does not preclude a finding that they are believable. First-time informants can be found to be believable, and practical commonsense considerations can properly form a determination that probable cause exists. 472 A.2d at 297. The record shows that neither of the informants was anonymous. In addition, each one appears to us to have had sufficient and reliable knowledge of the facts that they reported: Mills's companion's statement was based on first-hand observation; Gibbons's co-worker's statement was based on information given to her by Gibbons whom the co-worker knew well and with whom defendant was living. Moreover, the credibility of each informant was buttressed by the products of an independent police investigation that corroborated the informants' accounts. On this record, we find the informants to have been credible and their information to have been reliable, and we further conclude that taken as a whole, the affidavits substantially established probable cause for the issuance of the search warrants. See State v. Ricci, 472 A.2d at 298. We therefore shall not disturb the finding of the trial justice.
Pacheco sought to exclude his confession on the premise that it was derived from an illegal, warrantless arrest. He claimed that under Wong Sun v. United States, 371 U.S. 471, 83 S.Ct. 407, 9 L.Ed.2d 441 (1963), the confession was fruit of the poisonous tree. Id. at 485, 83 S.Ct. at 416, 9 L.Ed.2d at 453-54. After a preliminary hearing, the trial justice ruled that defendant's arrest was lawfully executed and therefore that the subsequent confession made by him during his period of detention was competent evidence. The defendant challenges this ruling. We sustain the trial justice. The general rule is that absent entry into a dwelling for the purpose of arresting a criminal suspect, there is no constitutional requirement that police officers first obtain an arrest warrant, provided, however, that the arresting officers have probable cause to believe that the suspect has committed a felony. United States v. Watson, 423 U.S. 411, 417, 96 S.Ct. 820, 824, 46 L.Ed.2d 598, 605 (1976); In re John C., R.I., 425 A.2d 536, 538, cert. denied, 453 U.S. 922, 101 S.Ct. 3159, 69 L.Ed.2d 1005 (1981); see G.L. 1956 (1981 Reenactment) § 12-7-3 and § 12-7-4. Probable cause to arrest depends on whether at the time of arrest the facts and circumstances within the arresting officer's knowledge and of which he had reasonable, trustworthy information were sufficient to cause a prudent officer to believe that the suspect had committed or was committing a crime. In re John N., R.I., 463 A.2d 174, 178 (1983); State v. Welch, R.I., 441 A.2d 539, 541 (1982); In re John C., 425 A.2d at 538. We stated in In re Armand, R.I., 454 A.2d 1216 (1983): [A] general principle applicable here is that the mosaic of facts and circumstances must be viewed cumulatively `as through the eyes of a reasonable and cautious police officer on the scene, guided by his or her experience and training.' [Citation omitted.] Moreover, in our review we must examine the completed mosaic in terms of what the police knew, what they heard, and what they observed as trained officers. Id. 454 A.2d at 1218. Our function on review is to make an independent examination of the record to determine whether factors existed that established probable cause for an arrest. Unless we perceive them to be clearly erroneous, we do not disturb the findings of the trial justice. Id. 454 A.2d at 1218. The record discloses that Pacheco was stopped and arrested a short distance from his residence as Gibbons and he were driving in defendant's automobile. The record also discloses that the affidavits that supported the search warrants also provided the arresting officers with knowledge of the following facts: a homicide had been committed, statements by two informants were made linking Pacheco with the homicide, a description was made of the automobile in which Mills was last seen alive, and the fact that the described automobile was owned by Pacheco was verified by police. We have held that information upon which probable cause to arrest is premised may be the collective knowledge of the police department and is not restricted to what the arresting officer knows independently. State v. Belcourt, R.I., 425 A.2d 1224, 1226-27 (1981). Additionally, the arresting officers in the instant case themselves observed defendant and his female companion place items in the trunk of defendant's car apparently in preparation for flight. All this, we believe, presented a mosaic of facts and circumstances sufficient to justify a reasonable belief on the part of a prudent police officer that a homicide had been committed and that the person whom they sought to arrest committed the crime. In respect to the sufficiency of information required to form probable cause, we have stated that establishing probable cause to make an arrest does not require the same degree of proof as is required to prove guilt. In re Armand, 454 A.2d at 1218; State v. Belcourt, 425 A.2d at 1226. We find that the information known to the officers in the instant case was both trustworthy and reliable as the sources of that information were intimately acquainted with the persons involved in this case, one with the victim, the other with Pacheco. See State v. Ricci, 472 A.2d at 297; State v. Belcourt, 425 A.2d at 1227; State v. Soroka, 112 R.I. 392, 397, 311 A.2d 45, 47 (1973). Because we find no error in the trial justice's ruling, we therefore sustain his findings that (1) the warrantless arrest was valid and (2) defendant's subsequent confession made during the period of detention was not the fruit of an illegal arrest. See Wong Sun v. United States, 371 U.S. at 487, 83 S.Ct. at 417, 9 L.Ed.2d at 455. We now consider whether defendant's confession was inadmissible for other reasons.
Pacheco argues that his taped confession made to police officers was inadmissible because it was induced by promises and therefore was involuntary. Prior to trial he filed a motion to suppress the confession on this ground. In compliance with Jackson v. Denno, 378 U.S. 368, 376-77, 84 S.Ct. 1774, 1780-81, 12 L.Ed.2d 908, 915-16 (1964), the trial justice conducted an independent hearing outside the presence of the jury to determine the voluntariness of Pacheco's confession. He concluded that the confession was voluntary and permitted the prosecution to enter in into evidence. We find no error in the ruling of the trial justice. Testimony of police officers at the suppression hearing revealed that they provided Pacheco with Miranda admonitions at the site of his arrest where no interrogation ensued and again upon arrival at the police station. Officers had asked Pacheco if he wanted assistance of an attorney, and Pacheco explicitly stated that he did not. Pacheco answered questions but did not admit his guilt that evening. Officers further testified that the next morning Pacheco asked to speak with the bearded detective (Peter Dias of the Tiverton police department), who went to Pacheco's cell and inquired of Pacheco if he had asked to speak with him. Pacheco responded in the affirmative whereupon the detective immediately began to read Pacheco the Miranda warnings. Pacheco interrupted the detective, stating that he knew his rights and that he wanted to talk about the murder. Subsequently, the detective and Pacheco moved to another room, whereupon the detective again advised Pacheco of his rights under Miranda. Pacheco clearly indicated that he understood them and that he wanted to discuss the murder. Before giving his statement, Pacheco inquired about his companion, Gibbons. The officers informed him that she was being held and charged with harboring. At this juncture, Pacheco requested that Gibbons not be prosecuted and that he be placed in an out-of-state prison if convicted for the murder. Officers testified that after first consulting with an assistant attorney general, they related to Pacheco that charges against Gibbons would be dismissed, as in fact they subsequently were, and that they would make recommendations that Pacheco serve a prison term at an out-of-state facility. Thereafter, Pacheco gave a statement admitting his participation in the killing of Mills. In Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966), the Supreme Court held that before statements made by an accused at the time of custodial interrogation are admitted in evidence, the prosecution must show that the accused, prior to interrogation, was given what have come to be known as Miranda rights and that the accused effected a voluntary, knowing, and intelligent waiver of those rights. Id. at 444, 86 S.Ct. at 1612, 16 L.Ed.2d at 706-07. The Court has also held that any use in a criminal trial of a defendant's involuntary confession is a denial of due process. Mincey v. Arizona, 437 U.S. 385, 398, 98 S.Ct. 2408, 2416, 57 L.Ed.2d 290, 303 (1978). [3] The burden is on the prosecution to prove by at least a preponderance of the evidence that a defendant's confession was voluntary. Lego v. Twomey, 404 U.S. 477, 489, 92 S.Ct. 619, 627, 30 L.Ed.2d 618, 627 (1972). In Rhode Island, however, the state must prove voluntariness by clear and convincing evidence. State v. Rodgers, R.I., 447 A.2d 730, 731 (1982); State v. Fuentes, R.I., 433 A.2d 184, 189 (1981). We find that the requirements of Miranda v. Arizona, supra , were satisfied in this case and that Pacheco made a valid waiver of his constitutional rights. Waiver occurs when an accused intentionally abandons or relinquishes a known right. Johnson v. Zerbst, 304 U.S. 458, 464, 58 S.Ct. 1019, 1023, 82 L.Ed. 1461, 1466 (1938); State v. Killay, R.I., 430 A.2d 418, 422 (1981). The record establishes that Pacheco's waiver of his right to remain silent and his right to counsel was knowing, intelligent, and voluntary. Although compliance with the prophylactic requirements of Miranda is essential, taken alone it does not eliminate other challenges that may be raised to voluntariness under the totality-of-circumstances test. In this case a challenge has been raised to voluntariness based upon the alleged promises made to Pacheco by the interrogating officers. The first case in which a confession was rejected as involuntary is the case of Rex v. Warickshall, 1 Leach Cr. C 263 (1783). In that case Jane Warickshall had made a full confession of her guilt but challenged the confession on the ground that it had been made by promises of favour. The Court of King's Bench expressed the rule on admissibility of confessions as follows: Confessions are received in evidence, or rejected as inadmissible, under a consideration whether they are or are not intitled [sic] to credit. A free and voluntary confession is deserving of the highest credit, because it is presumed to flow from the strongest sense of guilt, and therefore it is admitted as proof of the crime to which it refers; but a confession forced from the mind by the flattery of hope, or by the torture of fear, comes in so questionable a shape when it is to be considered as the evidence of guilt, that no credit ought to be given to it; and therefore it is rejected. Id. at 263-64. It should be noted that this English rule stemmed from the concept that such confessions were basically unreliable and unworthy of credit. This doctrine concerning admissibility of confessions was separate in origin and separated in time by about a century from the recognition of the privilege against self-incrimination which arose as a result of the abuses of the Court of Star Chamber as in Lilburn's Trial, 3 How.St.Tr. 1315 (1637-1645) and was asserted in the Twelve Bishop's Trial, 4 How.St.Tr. 63 (1641). See 3 Wigmore Evidence, § 818 (McNaughton rev. 1961); 8 Wigmore Evidence, § 2250 (McNaughton rev. 1961). These two concepts were often confused and intertwined, and the maxim Nemo tenetur seipsum accusare [4] (No one should be held to accuse himself) which underlay the assertion of the privilege against self-incrimination has often been quoted in such confession cases as Bram v. United States, 168 U.S. 532, 544, 18 S.Ct. 183, 187, 42 L.Ed. 568, 574 (1897). In Bram the rule in respect to confessions was set forth in categorical terms, borrowed from an English text: `But a confession, in order to be admissible, must be free and voluntary: that is, must not be extracted by any sort of threats or violence, nor obtained by any direct or implied promises, however slight, nor by the exertion of any improper influence   .' Id. at 542-43, 18 S.Ct. at 187, 42 L.Ed. at 573 (quoting 3 Russ. Crimes 478 (6th ed. 1896)). However, in Bram the issue of admissibility of a confession obtained by a Halifax detective from a mariner who was suspected of killing the ship's captain was based upon a totality of coercive influences. At that time it was not required that any admonitions such as those mandated by Miranda be given. Also Rogers v. Richmond, 365 U.S. 534, 81 S.Ct. 735, 5 L.Ed.2d 760 (1961), had not been decided. In that case the Warickshall rationale of unworthiness of credit was set to rest, and Justice Frankfurter pointed out that an involuntary confession is inadmissible, not because it is unlikely to be true, but because the methods used offend an underlying principle of our criminal law. That principle in effect is that authorities may not by coercion prove the charge out of the accused's own mouth. Id. at 540-41, 81 S.Ct. at 739, 5 L.Ed.2d at 766. This principle tied the rejection of an involuntary confession rather closely to the principle underlying the privilege against self-incrimination  that no person should be required to accuse himself. This trend toward combining the rule of exclusion of coerced confessions with the privilege against self-incrimination was completed and fully rationalized in Miranda v. Arizona, supra . For the first time the Court clearly required cautionary admonitions concerning the right to counsel and to remain silent to be given in the police station because it was recognized that at that point the privilege against self-incrimination was endangered and that unless steps were taken to protect the privilege, it would count for naught in the ultimate trial of the case. Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. at 444-45, 86 S.Ct. at 1612, 16 L.Ed.2d at 706-07. The prophylactic requirements of Miranda probably rendered the somewhat literal application of the rule enunciated in Bram no longer necessary. In fact, a number of courts, both state and federal, have found this to be true. In United States v. Ferrara, 377 F.2d 16 (2d Cir.1967), the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit considered the voluntariness of a confession that was given to a federal agent who stated to the suspect that if he cooperated with the United States [Attorney] I felt sure that he would get out on reduced bail. Id. at 17. This statement was sought to be used by the defendant as a promise that would vitiate the confession under the Bram doctrine. In response to this argument, the court observed: The Bram opinion cites with approval the statement in an English textbook that a confession is not voluntary if `obtained by any direct or implied promises, however slight.' That language has never been applied with the wooden literalness urged upon us by appellant. The Supreme Court has consistently made clear that the test of voluntariness is whether an examination of all the circumstances discloses that the conduct of `law enforcement officials was such as to overbear [the defendants] will to resist and bring about confessions not freely self-determined   .' Rogers v. Richmond, 365 U.S. 534, 544, 81 S.Ct. 735, 741, 5 L.Ed.2d 760, [768] (1961). 377 F.2d at 17. The Court of Appeals went on to emphasize both that prior to this interview an assistant United States attorney had admonished the defendant concerning his rights to counsel and to remain silent and that he was not subjected to any protracted interrogation or threatened in any way. The court held that the agent's comment was not the kind of inducement or promise that would, by itself, make the confession involuntary. Id. at 18. In reliance upon this doctrine, the Federal District Court for New Jersey in United States v. Arcediano, 371 F. Supp. 457 (D.N.J. 1974), found that a defendant who conditioned his offer to give information about a bank robbery upon getting FBI assurance that he would be placed in federal custody, and who was given the assurance that the agent would do his best to bring this about (a promise that was fulfilled), was not wrongfully induced to confess. The judge emphasized that it was the defendant who offered the information, conditioning it upon the assurance that the agents would endeavor to get him placed in federal custody. The court held that such a promise, standing alone, was insufficient to render the confession involuntary. Id. at 469. Similar reasoning has been applied by Courts of Appeal in United States v. Frazier, 434 F.2d 994, 995-96 (5th Cir.1970) (the fact of cooperation would be made known to the United States attorney and that some consideration might be given therefor), and in United States v. Reynolds, 532 F.2d 1150, 1156 (7th Cir.1976) (agent said there was a possibility that United States attorney and judge would be more lenient in respect to bail and penalty if suspect cooperated). In the latter case the court, applying a totality-of-circumstances test, found that the government had proven by a preponderance of the evidence that the defendant's will was not overborne and that his confession was the product of a rational intellect. Id. at 1159-60. In Taylor v. Commonwealth, 461 S.W.2d 920 (Ky. 1970), the court was confronted with a challenge to confessions that were made as part of a deal pursuant to which certain charges in Indiana were dismissed as against both defendants. The court emphasized that the circumstances of the promise in that case were entirely compatible with the exercise by the appellants of a free volition in the giving of the confessions, and therefore the confessions were admissible. Id. at 922. The court emphasized that the initial proposal for the deal came from one of the defendants, who feared harm at the hands of a former acquaintance if he was sentenced to the Indiana penitentiary. Id. The Supreme Court of Wisconsin in Pontow v. State, 58 Wis.2d 135, 205 N.W.2d 775 (1973), a case involving a promise to reduce to a single charge eighteen burglaries to which the defendant ultimately confessed, stated that a promise of leniency does not in itself evince involuntariness, it is a factor which may be considered in making that determination. Id. at 143, 205 N.W.2d at 779. The court went on to hold that this promise, in the circumstances did not render the confession involuntary. Id. The principle was reenunciated and followed in State v. Cydzik, 60 Wis.2d 683, 692-93, 211 N.W.2d 421, 427 (1973), which again utilized a totality-of-circumstances analysis. To the same effect are state and federal decisions in United States v. Glasgow, 451 F.2d 557, 558 (9th Cir.1971); United States v. Sibley, 535 F. Supp. 208, 210-12 (E.D.Pa. 1982); State v. Anderson, 298 N.W.2d 63, 65 (Minn. 1980); State v. Edwards, 49 Ohio St.2d 31, 40-41, 358 N.Ed.2d 1051, 1058 (1976); State v. Starling, 188 N.J. Super. 127, 133, 456 A.2d 125, 129 (1983). The Supreme Court of Rhode Island in State v. Nagle, 25 R.I. 105, 109-10, 54 A. 1063, 1065 (1903), strongly influenced by the reasoning and authority of Bram v. United States, supra , enunciated the same categorical rule, derived from an English text, that a confession extracted by any promise direct or implied, however slight, would not be admissible. This rule was repeated with uncritical approval in State v. Boswell, 73 R.I. 358, 362, 56 A.2d 196, 198 (1947), although in that case the confession was determined to be voluntary. Most recently in State v. Amado, supra , we upheld a ruling by the trial justice that a confession was involuntary when the defendant during an in-custodial interrogation was persuaded to take a polygraph test after being threatened with a capital charge and offered protective custody if he gave a statement. We sustained the holding of the trial justice that the defendant did not waive his constitutional rights in a manner that squared the Miranda v. Arizona ,  and that the confession was not given completely voluntarily, but rather as the result of promises of reward   . 424 A.2d at 1060. Our ultimate conclusion was that the trial justice's findings that the defendant had been subjected to subtle pressures and improper influences, and that these pressures and influences vitiated the voluntariness of the confession were not clearly wrong. Id. 424 A.2d at 1063. Turning to the facts of the case at bar and applying a totality-of-circumstances test rather than the literal rule of Bram v. United States, supra , and State v. Nagle, supra , our conclusion is that the trial justice did not err in finding the confession voluntary. We are of the opinion that the voluntariness and freedom of will of the defendant was not overborne or diminished by the affirmative reaction of the police to his desire to be placed in an out-of-state prison if convicted or his request that his companion, Gibbons, not be prosecuted for harboring. Such a response under the reasoning of Warickshall 's case would not deprive the confession of its credibility. Nor does it offend against the values protected by the privilege against self-incrimination as later enunciated by the Supreme Court in Miranda. The repeated admonitions of the right to remain silent and the right to counsel, as well as Pacheco's responses to such admonitions and his assertions concerning his understanding thereof to the police, were more than enough to dispel any inferences of the kind of subtle, coercive pressures that the trial court and this court observed in State v. Amado, supra . For the reasons stated, we find that the trial justice was not clearly wrong in ruling that Pacheco's confession was voluntary. Our independent examination of the record leads us to conclude that the confession made by Pacheco was voluntary and therefore was properly admitted into evidence.
The defendant raises the issue of the adequacy of the affidavit of Deputy Chief Asa Davol, Jr., for the issuance of a search warrant to take samples of blood and hair from Pacheco. This issue does not require extended analysis since the materials obtained pursuant to this search warrant were suppressed by the trial justice and were not introduced against Pacheco. Therefore, the question of the adequacy of the affidavit is moot.
Pacheco challenges the examination by the prosecution of his use of drugs. In support of this challenge Pacheco cites the general rule enunciated in State v. Jalette, 119 R.I. 614, 382 A.2d 526 (1978), that evidence of other criminal activity may not be introduced in a criminal trial unless the evidence is relevant for some purpose other than the purpose of showing that defendant is a person of bad character and criminal propensities. Id. at 624, 382 A.2d at 531-32. Pacheco further argues that this general rule in this particular case is not subject to any of the exceptions set forth in State v. Colangelo, 55 R.I. 170, 179 A. 147 (1935). The principles of law enunciated are correct, but the application to this case leaves much to be desired. In this case Pacheco had raised the defense of diminished capacity. In support of this defense he had presented a psychiatrist who detailed his history of drug use from the time he was thirteen years of age. When Pacheco took the stand, his attorney questioned him extensively concerning the subject of his drug use. On cross-examination the prosecutor was permitted by the trial justice to explore this same subject matter, which had become relevant to the question of defendant's ability to form the specific intent necessary to commit the crimes of first- or second-degree murder. Allowing such cross-examination was not an abuse of discretion on the part of the trial justice under the circumstances of this case. See State v. D'Alo, R.I., 435 A.2d 317, 320 (1981); State v. Camerlin, 117 R.I. 61, 66-67, 362 A.2d 759, 762 (1976). Pacheco also contends that the trial justice committed reversible error in allowing the prosecutor to elicit evidence concerning defendant's assault upon and kidnapping of the witness Gibbons. Initially the relationship between Gibbons and Pacheco was brought out by defense counsel in his cross-examination of Gibbons. During the course of this cross-examination Gibbons testified concerning defendant's having beaten her and threatened to kill her if she testified against him. On redirect examination the prosecutor went into this subject matter in order to rehabilitate Gibbons's credibility. In the course of this rehabilitation reference was made to Gibbons's having lived with Pacheco unwillingly after he kidnapped her from New Hampshire because she feared that he would kill her if she did not conform to his wishes. Since defense counsel opened this line of inquiry, we cannot say it was an abuse of the trial justice's discretion for the court to allow further exploration on redirect examination of the witness Gibbons. See State v. Mastracchio, 112 R.I. 487, 495, 312 A.2d 190, 195 (1973). Further, defense counsel again opened this same area of inquiry in his direct examination of defendant. Consequently, allowing the prosecution to cross-examine Pacheco on this same subject could scarcely be considered an abuse of discretion. See State v. Camerlin, State v. Mastracchio, both supra; State v. Bruni, 79 R.I. 311, 316-17, 88 A.2d 162, 165 (1952).
Pacheco also challenges the instructions of the trial justice in respect to diminished capacity and asserts that in effect he shifted the burden of proof on this element of the case to defendant in violation of the principles enunciated in State v. Muir, R.I., 432 A.2d 1173, 1176 (1981). In support of this argument, Pacheco seeks to dissect portions of the trial Justice's instructions in order to suggest that the burden of establishing this fact was placed upon Pacheco. A reading of the entire instruction makes it clear beyond any doubt that the trial justice did not place the burden of proof of this issue upon Pacheco. The court specifically stated: However, the Defendant does not have to prove diminished capacity. The burden of proving lack of diminished capacity is on the state. Nothing could be made more clear by this instruction than the principle that the state had the burden of proving each and every element of the crime of murder, including the lack of diminished capacity to form the necessary specific intent. Consequently, this assertion is without merit.