Opinion ID: 2020963
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: As to the Defendant Watkins

Text: In their challenges to the sufficiency of the evidence, each defendant has placed great reliance upon the inconsistencies and contradictions between the testimony of Debra Cunningham and her out of court statements and further inconsistencies and contradictions in her three out of court statements. Watkins relies solely upon the argument that the evidence derived from her is not substantial evidence of probative value supporting the material fact of his presence at the scene. Obviously her in court testimony will not support a finding of such fact; and there was no other in court testimony or circumstantial evidence that placed him at the scene. Consequently, if the verdict is to stand, as to him, it must be upon the strength of hearsay statements attributed to her. Three such hearsay statements were admitted, two over objections and one without. As previously related, Fred Turner testified that when he heard the shots he jumped up and looked out the window and that Debra was behind him. Debra, although denying having any memory of what she saw, acknowledged that she looked out the window immediately after hearing the shots. Turner testified that Debra yelled out, Darnell and Levi. (Watkins and Williams). This testimony came in without objection from Watkins and over the hearsay objection of the defendant Williams. The evidence was clearly admissible under the excited utterance exception to the hearsay rule. See Teague v. State, (1978) 269 Ind. 103, 111, 379 N.E.2d 418, 422; Ferrier v. State, (1977) 266 Ind. 117, 124-25, 361 N.E.2d 150, 154-55; Walker v. State, (1976) 265 Ind. 8, 10, 349 N.E.2d 161, 163-64, cert. denied, (1976) 429 U.S. 943, 97 S.Ct. 363, 50 L.Ed.2d 313. Later in the evening of October 8th, the date of the homicide, Debra gave her first statement to the police; but, standing alone, it was not inculpatory of Watkins. On October 14th, Debra gave a second statement to the police. On this occasion she implicated all four defendants, including Watkins, whom she said was at the scene and holding a shotgun. She also said that she saw him and Warner run to the alley. In her previous statement she had said that she had seen Warner and another boy and that they ran to the alley. She also said that she was then identifying all four assailants because Fred Turner had asked her to do so. Both of the aforesaid statements were admitted as substantive evidence. On January 9, 1978, Debra was deposed. Her deposition was also offered to contradict her in court testimony that she had remembered nothing she saw when she looked out the window. Only that portion of the deposition that so operated was admitted, and it reflected that when deposed, she stated that she saw both Warner and Watkins firing guns. Watkins does not argue that any of the aforementioned statements were improperly admitted or that they were not entitled to be considered as substantive evidence upon the guilt issue. Rather, he argues that the evidence derived from Debra is not of such quality  substantial and probative  as to support the finding that Watkins was among the assassins, because of the conflicts in her various versions of the incident. He posits that no reasonable man could select any one of her stories and rely upon it to the exclusion of any other and cites the cases of Gaddis v. State, (1969) 253 Ind. 73, 251 N.E.2d 658, Lottie v. State, (1974) 262 Ind. 124, 311 N.E.2d 800 and Baker v. State, (1956) 236 Ind. 55, 138 N.E.2d 641, but we do not find them to be compelling. Gaddis is similar to the case before us in that the only witness to identify him was so vacillant in his statements as to render his testimony highly suspect. He had identified the appellant, in the presence of policemen, at the scene of the crime approximately one hour following its commission. At trial, he said that he looked like the man and that he had been too shook up and rattled that night to say for sure. 253 Ind. at 77, 251 N.E.2d at 660. He also testified that the police had threatened that he would be sent to the penitentiary if he did not testify against Gaddis and that Gaddis had also threatened him. However, in holding that the evidence was insufficient, we noted the absence of any circumstantial evidence supporting Gaddis' guilt and the fact that uncertainty pervaded all evidence derived from the witness. Those are not the circumstances that confronted the jury in the case before us. Although Debra's statements were inconsistent and contradictory, an inference could be fairly drawn from all the circumstances that she had seen the event and had recall concerning it, whereas in Gaddis such an inference could not be fairly drawn. Accepting such inference, the question for the jury was, when was Debra lying and when was she telling the truth or half truths. First, it must be acknowledged that Debra Cunningham knew the defendants. She so testified at the trial and we infer from this that she knew them by sight and by name at the time of the murder. Second, immediately following the shooting, she looked out the window and, with a clear view of the scene, exclaimed, Darnell and Levi (Watkins and Williams). This is particularly significant, because it came before there was time for reflective thought and fabrication. Such responses have been termed excited utterances and characterized as the event speaking through the witness' involuntary responses. They are regarded as having a high degree of reliability and, for this reason, are admissible and probative, notwithstanding their hearsay characteristics. Third, Debra's October 8th statement does not conflict with or contradict her October 14th statement. Although we might expect that she would have told all that she knew of the incident on the occasion of the 8th, on its face, the statement does not proclaim it. She said that she saw Warner fire a pistol and that she saw him and another boy in blue jeans, whom she did not identify, run towards the alley. She was not asked, and she did not say, whether these two were the only ones that she saw or whether or not she knew the boy whom she had seen run away with Warner. Hence, the October 14th statement can be viewed as completing the story begun on the 8th. In Lottie v. State, (1974) 262 Ind. 124, 311 N.E.2d 800, we reversed the judgment of the trial court (Arterburn, C.J., and Givan, J. dissenting) because the identifying testimony was speculative and conjectural. The sole identifying witness, herself, would not be more assertive than to say, while observing the accused at trial, that he appeared to be three or four inches taller than the person who had robbed her, and that his mouth looked a little different,    in my opinion    it is the same man;    he does appear to be the same individual. and    the eyes and nose looks to me like the same individual. Id. at 128, 311 N.E.2d at 802. The only circumstantial evidence supportive of the identification was that the person who had robbed the witness had had a toothpick in his mouth and that the accused had been seen with a toothpick in his mouth twenty minutes earlier at a place from which he could have traveled during the elapsed time. We said in Lottie that the evidence tends to support a conclusion of guilt, but it does not rise to the minimum standards set forth in Baker v. State ,  236 Ind. 55, 138 N.E.2d 641 and other cases there cited. Id. at 129, 311 N.E.2d at 803. Watkins has also relied upon Baker v. State, supra , in support of his argument that the evidence was not substantial evidence of probative value from which a reasonable man could conclude, beyond a reasonable doubt, that he was one of the perpetrators of the crime charged. The following quoted passages from Baker bear repeating In considering the standard by which we review the evidence where it is challenged as being insufficient to sustain a verdict or finding, this court has often said there must be substantial evidence of probative value before we can decide an accused has been proved guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. `This last rule places the evidence before the court on appeal, not for the purpose of weighing it, or for the purpose of determining the facts when there is actual conflict, but for the purpose of deciding, as a question of law, whether or not there is substantive evidence in support of the required material facts essential to a conviction. It is not enough to sustain a conviction that the evidence, when given full faith and credit, may warrant a suspicion or amount to a scintilla.' `... We use the word substantial as meaning more than seeming or imaginary' The rule of law defining proof beyond a reasonable doubt has been well settled for many years and requires each juror to be so convinced by the evidence that as a prudent man he would feel safe to act upon such conviction in matters of the highest concern and importance to his own dearest and most important interests, under circumstances where there was no compulsion or coercion upon him to act at all. The standard of a prudent man is that of a reasonable man. If different persons might reasonably arrive at different conclusions from that reached by the trial jury, the verdict will not be set aside for that reason. On the other hand if no reasonable man could find the evidence has proved an accused guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, a verdict would not be sustained by sufficient evidence. In the leading case of State v. Gregory (1936), 339 Mo. 133, 143, 96 S.W.2d 47, the court analyzed the rule on review to be as follows: `Now since the test of substantial evidence is whether a jury reasonably could find the issue thereon, the result must depend in some measure upon the degree of persuasion required. In a criminal case liberty and sometimes life are involved, and there cannot be a conviction except upon a finding of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. Necessarily, therefore, it becomes the duty of an appellate court as a matter of law to decide whether the evidence was sufficient to induce a belief of the defendant's guilt beyond a reasonable doubt in the minds of jurors of average reason and intelligence. And in resolving that question the court undoubtedly can pass on the credibility of the testimony to the extent of determining whether it was substantial in the sense above explained.' (Citations omitted). Id. at 60, 61, 62, 138 N.E.2d at 644, 644-45, 645. We hold to the standards above expressed, but they do not command a reversal of the judgment against Watkins. In Baker, the erratic witness identified the accused at the trial and had done so at the police station shortly after his arrest. In the meantime, however, she had told the accused and his wife, in the presence of her own husband, that she could not possibly identify her assailant, and the accused's wife and another established an alibi for him. The Baker court observed that such evidence stood unimpeached and uncontradicted. While there are similarities between Baker and the case before us, there are also important distinctions. Watkins stood upon his motion for a directed verdict at the close of the State's case and offered no defense evidence. Thus he relied upon his assessment of the State's evidence as being insufficient, as a matter of law. The Baker witness had been incriminating of him while in the presence of the authorities but not in their absence, suggesting that she may have been susceptible to what she perceived was expected of her; and there had been no excited utterance or other evidence supportive of her identification. In this regard, we acknowledge, as pointed out by Watkins, that the value of the excited utterance identification by Debra rests upon her own credibility and upon that of Fred Turner whose credibility was also suspect, in view of some inconsistencies in his testimony and conflicts between it and a prior out of court statement. However, such inconsistencies and conflicts were not so abject as to render his testimony inherently unbelievable. His credibility, therefore, was a matter for the jury to determine. We observe that Watkins has been vigorous, and rightly so, in his attack upon the value of identification evidence that is dependent upon Debra's credibility, because of the inconsistencies in her out of court statements and conflicts between such statements and her testimony at the trial. An additional consideration worthy to be weighed in the balance is that the portion of Debra's deposition that went into evidence revealed that she identified Watkins as one of the assailants. This statement had been made under oath and was subject to cross examination at the time it was made and was in evidence without objection from Watkins or Warner and without any request for a limiting instruction having been made. ( See California v. Green, (1970) 399 U.S. 149, 90 S.Ct. 1930, 26 L.Ed.2d 489.) Statements of October 8th and 14th, insofar as these two defendants are concerned, are corroborative of the statement from the deposition. As previously observed Debra's statements of October 8th and 14th are not necessarily conflicting. Her depositional testimony cannot be entirely reconciled with her October 14th statement, but in each she identified Warner and Watkins. The circumstantial evidence is entirely consistent with Debra's October 14th statement and her deposition and warranted the jury in crediting those statements and discrediting her in court testimony. These features clearly distinguish Watkin's case from Gaddis, supra, Lottie, supra, and Baker, supra ; and we hold that the evidence of identification of Watkins was substantial and probative and therefore, as a matter of law, sufficient to sustain the verdict.