Opinion ID: 1308443
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 15

Heading: Sufficiency of Evidence of Aggravating Circumstances.

Text: Under Virginia's death penalty statute, a sentence of death may not be imposed unless there is proof of either (1) dangerousness, viz., that there is a probability the defendant would commit criminal acts of violence which would constitute a continuing threat to society, or (2) vileness, viz., that the defendant's conduct in committing the offense was outrageously or wantonly vile, horrible, or inhuman in that it involved torture, depravity of mind, or an aggravated battery to the victim. Code §§ 19.2-264.2, -264.4(C). Because Bunch had no prior criminal record, the trial court refused to permit the jury to consider the aggravating circumstance of dangerousness, but submitted the case to the jury on the vileness standard, and the jury based its verdict upon that standard. Bunch contends the court erred in permitting the jury to consider the death penalty at all. Citing Godfrey v. Georgia, 446 U.S. 420, 100 S.Ct. 1759, 64 L.Ed.2d 398 (1980), Bunch contends that the three statutory terms of torture, depravity of mind, and aggravated battery must be considered together in determining vileness, with the result that depravity of mind does not exist in the situation where there is no torture and where there is no aggravated battery to the victim. Bunch concedes this interpretation is not constitutionally mandated by Godfrey, but he suggests it is a direction in which [this] Court might wish to go. We reject Bunch's suggestion. We believe a mere inspection of the statutory language in question demonstrates clearly that the term vileness includes three separate and distinct factors, with the proof of any one factor being sufficient to support a finding of vileness and hence a sentence of death. Code §§ 19.2-264.2 and -264.4(C) define vileness as conduct that involves torture, depravity of mind, or aggravated battery to the victim; the use of the disjunctive word or, rather than the conjunctive and, signifies the availability of alternative choices. Hence, depravity of mind can exist independently of the presence of torture or aggravated battery and may alone support a finding of vileness as a basis for a sentence of death. [1] We have interpreted depravity of mind, as used in its statutory context, to mean a degree of moral turpitude and psychical debasement surpassing that inherent in the definition of ordinary legal malice and premeditation. Smith, 219 Va. at 478, 248 S.E.2d at 149. We believe that Bunch's conduct as depicted in the record clearly revealed a depraved mind within this definition. Bunch planned days ahead to murder and rob Thomas, a woman with whom he had been involved in an intimate relationship. She was not the only object of his murderous musings, however; he wanted to kill somebody, and he thought about killing some prostitutes. In any event, when he awoke on January 31, he decided he would kill and rob Thomas that day. He went to her home about noon, had intercourse with her, and left with the promise to return later. He returned at 6:00 p.m. and invited her to go to dinner. While she dressed, he drank some wine. When Thomas announced she was ready to go, Bunch started playing hide and ... seek with her. He hid in the bathroom, and when she found him, she said, okay... let's go. As they walked down the hallway, he shot her. He felt real good when he shot her, to the point where he actually had a sexual orgasm. During the next hour or so, with Thomas dying on the floor, Bunch amused himself drinking Thomas's wine, listening to music, and ransacking her house. He had a euphoric feeling about the whole thing. After some two hours, Bunch tied a knot in a scarf Thomas was wearing, dragged her to a door, and draped the scarf over the doorknob. He hung her up ... to make sure she didn't talk and there were no witnesses around. After Bunch exerted [himself] by pulling [Thomas] across the floor, he had a blood flow to his sexual parts and experienced a feeling of a full erection. Before leaving the house with Thomas's jewelry and other items, Bunch wiped his fingerprints off everything and took the phone off the hook. Bunch told Investigator Cahill that he had gotten a thrill from killing Thomas, that he wanted to kill some more, and that he would have killed some hookers... if he had stayed in the area. Earlier, Bunch had told his friend Rider that he would like to maybe become a hit man or a mercenary, and he told another friend he wanted to be in the Mafia. Investigator Cahill gave a final word of testimony relating to the depravity-of-mind issue. He was asked while on the witness stand whether Bunch displayed any remorse or sorrow for killing Thomas. Cahill replied, No, sir. Bunch argues, however, that his sentence of death is impermissible under Godfrey. In our opinion, the circumstances surrounding Thomas's death clearly distinguish this case from Godfrey. There, in a prosecution for capital murder under a statute defining vileness in terms identical with our statutory language, the defendant was sentenced to death for killing his wife and mother-in-law. Believing that the mother-in-law had prevented a reconciliation with his wife, he went to the mother-in-law's trailer and fired a shot through a window, killing his wife instantly; he entered the trailer and shot his mother-in-law, killing her instantly. He then called the sheriff's office, reported the crimes, and asked to be arrested. He later told an officer he had committed a hideous crime. 446 U.S. at 426, 100 S.Ct. at 1763. Holding that the validity of the defendant's death sentence turned on whether, in light of the facts and circumstances, the Georgia Supreme Court had applied a constitutional construction of the depravity-of-mind factor, the United States Supreme Court stated that the answer must be no. Id. at 432, 100 S.Ct. at 1767. The Court pointed out that the defendant's victims were killed instantly, that they were family members who were causing him extreme emotional trauma, and that he acknowledged his responsibility for his acts and the heinous nature of his crimes. In stark contrast, the facts of this case display extreme baseness. Bunch, with no provocation whatsoever from his victim, planned her murder with cold-hearted calculation and larcenous intent. He carried out his murderous plan in true hit man style of complete detachment, yet with a bizarre sexual reaction on his part. As she lay dying, he removed her jewelry and enjoyed himself by partaking of her wine, listening to music, and rifling through her personal belongings. Then, in a final gesture of contempt for his victim and to make certain she would never bear witness against him, he garroted her, dragged her across the floor, and hung her from a doorknob, the exertion causing his sexual arousal. From these facts, the jury clearly could find that an utter depravity of mind accompanied the murder in this case. Bunch also contends that proof of an aggravated battery requires evidence of serious physical abuse of the victim before death. There is no compelling evidence in this case, Bunch maintains, to support the proposition that the victim ... suffered an aggravated battery prior to her death. We considered an identical contention in Whitley. There, we said: The statutory construction Whitley urges, one announced by the Georgia Supreme Court in Blake v. State, 239 Ga. 292, 236 S.E.2d 637 (1977), and noted in passing in Godfrey, was not the ratione decidendi in Godfrey. Godfrey's victim died almost instantaneously from a single gunshot, and the defendant's sentence was based upon no more than a finding that the offense was `outrageously or wantonly vile, horrible and inhuman.' Godfrey, 446 U.S. at 428 [100 S.Ct. at 1764]. Such an amorphous finding, unrelated to any constituent element of the statutory definition, was constitutionally insufficient to support the death penalty. The Supreme Court was not required to decide, and did not decide, whether an aggravated battery must precede the victim's death in order to satisfy the vileness standard. Nor need we decide that question here, for the evidence fully supports the conclusion that [the victim's] death was the result of aggravated battery upon her person.... We have construed the term aggravated battery as used in Code § 19.2-264.2 to mean a battery which, qualitatively and quantitatively, is more culpable than the minimum necessary to accomplish an act of murder. 223 Va. at 78-79, 286 S.E.2d at 169-70 (footnote omitted) (citation omitted). We believe that Whitley's rationale is applicable here and, hence, we need not decide in this case whether proof of an aggravated battery requires evidence of serious physical abuse of the victim before death. From the evidence previously recited, the jury could have found that Bunch shot Thomas and then, while she was still alive, garroted her and hung her on the doorknob until she succumbed. This, clearly, was an aggravated battery to Thomas's person, viz., one which, qualitatively and quantitatively, [was] more culpable than the minimum necessary to accomplish an act of murder. Id. at 79, 286 S.E.2d at 170. Bunch asserts, however, that his version of the shooting, which he says was not contradicted by any other evidence, was that he shot the victim once in the head, as she walked away from him, that she did not see [Bunch] preparing to shoot her, and that she immediately lost and never regained consciousness. Hence, Bunch maintains, the shooting, even when coupled with the subsequent hanging, did not amount to an aggravated battery. The medical examiner testified, however, that the bullet struck Thomas, not in the back of the head, but on the left side above her ear and that the bullet's path was towards the back, downward, and to the deceased's right. As the Attorney General suggests on brief, the doctor's testimony permitted the inference that Bunch was standing above and facing [Thomas] at her side with the gun pointing down and that she knew Bunch was preparing to shoot her. Furthermore, the medical examiner testified that Thomas could have lived for an hour to two hours after she was shot. The doctor also stated that Thomas's lungs exhibited congestion and that with constriction around the neck, one would get congestion of the lungs. After stating these observations, the medical examiner opined that this was a combined cause of death due to a gunshot wound to the head and... with a secondary complication, asphyxiation by hanging. From this and other evidence previously recited, the jury could infer that Thomas was still alive when Bunch hung her up and thus could conclude that she was the victim of an aggravated battery to her person.