Court Opinion

ID: 9633779
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 11:59:32.892584+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:08:41.938589
License: Public Domain

URBIGKIT, Chief Justice,
dissenting.
This record paints a picture of evil — persons and events — and if not for the harm to be continued by precedent for future cases, I would leave unopened the volumes of testimony and simply dissent. Unfortunately, the guilt of appellant Arlen Joe Price in the brutal murder of his homosexually, incestuously child raping uncle, Lewis “Sonny” Price, Jr., cannot be sorted out from the processes of his trial or the decision now written by the majority of this court. Evil frequently lives on after its carrier has departed existence. That evil infected Brent E. Miller (Chief) who participated in the homicide, or more likely committed it himself, and then apparently chose to end it all by walking into the shotgun blast of the park ranger at Lake Mead in southern Nevada.
I. INTRODUCTION TO THIS TRAGEDY
Students of current law, in considering precedent to be the cornerstone, recognize and discuss in detail today that precedent from an individual case cannot be extracted from the particular facts from which the decision was made. Comparably, this case should not be perpetrated upon future litigation without recognition of all encompassing tragedy, detail and horror from which this appellant’s conviction and life sentence resulted. Students of Greek tragedies and devotees of horror movies could find no more unbelievable the misuse of humanity than what comes to front stage here to showcase the death of Sonny Price and Chief, the penitentiary confinement of appellant’s brother Timmy, and now the life sentence of appellant for murder. Timmy, in years gone by, had been repeatedly raped by his uncle, Sonny Price, without criminal prosecution and the same perversion was committed upon appellant. Within these facts and other family conflicts, this case did not just happen one cold winter night in a trailer house near Jackson, Wyoming. It took a lifetime of horrible acts to get here. The issues created in the admitted homicide prosecution followed from action by appellant against his uncle from an attitude which had been advertised in a number of public statements and became well known by the ultimate victim.
The distasteful and disgusting history of the sexual abuse committed by appellant’s uncle and the consuming hatred held for him by appellant colors and pervades this record. No one with knowledge of this family doubted that the hatred existed and, overtly, the uncle knew and feared when *918and how the price might be collected by appellant’s stated intent to kill him. This record tells an unbelievably nasty, brutal and perverted tale of cardinal sins and the ultimately effected capital punishment for those offenses committed upon two small boys by homosexual rape and bestiality.
Dead now is the uncle’s participating boyfriend, which occurred in earlier time, the uncle who was killed and Chief who walked into the gun in Nevada with the apparent intent to die. Surviving only in terms hardly less tragic is appellant with his life sentence and his younger brother who, at trial date, was serving an extended term in the Wyoming State Penitentiary for rape. I fear that the evil which consumed the relationship of these parties in early life, followed by homicide and ultimate trial, will now emanate from Wyoming case law to spread its pervasive pollution in future cases.
This record would sustain criminal case determination that Chief and appellant went to the rural trailer house where Sonny Price resided with criminal intent — appellant to kill and Chief to obtain money or property by robbery. The record lacks in substance, however, that appellant intended to or did individually commit either larceny or robbery and, furthermore, leaves in doubt who wielded the knife by which the victim was stabbed a number of times.
II. ISSUES PRESENTED BY THIS APPEAL
Without question, appellant was involved in the “transaction” from which the death intentionally resulted to a degree that the resulting life sentence is not necessarily a shock to any judicial conscience.
It is, however, what occurred at trial, which by majority opinion may cause future damage to Wyoming law, that causes my present significant concern. Those seeds now planted for future noxious growth include in adjudicatory terms:
1. Prosecution was pursued on both a felony murder and premeditated murder basis, but the verdict form neither permitted nor required the jury to determine which of either was proved since the decisive crime of convicted guilt could not be identified by the jury on the submitted verdict form.
2. Submission of the case on a first degree felony murder charge based on robbery was improper after the trial court determined there was insufficient evidence to submit robbery as a separate criminal charge.
3. Requiring appellant to testify and admit to the offense in violation of his right against self-incrimination as a court ordered predicate to establish a foundation to allow the psychologist to testify “as a matter of foundation” cannot possibly be considered in this case to be harmless error under Chapman v. State of California, 386 U.S. 18, 87 S.Ct. 824, 17 L.Ed.2d 705, reh’g denied 386 U.S. 987, 87 S.Ct. 1283, 18 L.Ed.2d 241 (1967). This majority ignores the Chapman test for harmless constitutional error which requires proof by the prosecution to show “beyond a reasonable doubt that the error complained of did not contribute to the verdict obtained.” Chapman, 386 U.S. at 24, 87 S.Ct. at 828.
III. DISJUNCTIVE CRIMES CHARGED AND UNDIFFERENTIATED VERDICT FORM SUBMITTED
This case authenticates how harmless error by direction or implication as an absolution of error in initial opinion will then, by created precedent, promote carelessness or intentional disregard in future cases. The subject of a proper verdict form for alternative charges of premeditated or intentional (malice) murder and felony murder has a chaotic history. This subject first received direct consideration in Wyoming by this court in Cloman v. State, 574 P.2d 410 (Wyo.1978).1
*919In Cloman, 574 P.2d at 412, this court assessed the verdict form to recite the crimes in the disjunctive, “[d]id the jury find evidence of premeditated murder or felony-murder in the commission of a robbery, or both?” The court then recognized “[t]he ‘proper rule to be applied is that which requires a verdict to be set aside in cases where the verdict is supportable on one ground, but not on another, and it is impossible to tell which ground the jury selected.’ ” Id. at 412 (quoting Yates v. United States, 354 U.S. 298, 312, 77 S.Ct. 1064, 1073, 1 L.Ed.2d 1356 (1957)).
To answer the disjunctive dilemma and comply with the proper rule, the court then exercised its fact finding persuasion to conclude:
In summary, as supplemented by Instruction 12, the disjunctive verdict rendered in this case, to-wit that defendants were guilty of killing * * * purposefully and with premeditated malice or in the commission of, or in an attempt to commit, a robbery, causes no ambiguity or uncertainty when the facts, circumstances and legitimate inference substantially support all of the essential elements of both offenses. The district court was not in error in overruling defendants’ motions. The remaining assignments of error are found to lack merit sufficient to find reversible error.
Cloman, 574 P.2d at 422 (emphasis in original).
There was a major hiatus in the Cloman case and its reasoning where the court inspected the entire body of evidence and opined sufficiency to support a finding — as if it had been made — by the jury of conviction on both charges when, in empirical fact, the jury convicted on one, the other, or on both. In that hypothetical resolution, there is absolutely no way to now determine what decision was actually made. Furthermore, there is no way to tell whether the jury thought out the difference since the identical result was reached. In actuality, this appellate court in Cloman factually found that the defendant was guilty of both premeditated and felony murder, but the record lacks capacity to reveal what the fact finding jury itself decided. Some jurors may have found felony murder, some jurors may have found premeditated murder, and since all agreed in the end result, the verdict could have been made without a unanimous decision rendered.
The issue presented in this case on the verdict form addresses the requirement of the jury to render a unanimous verdict on a specifically enumerated offense and make a record which will then authenticate what decision was made. The record demonstrates that neither criteria for equal protection and due process was provided to appellant. This court now hypothetically determines that the jury could have made the unanimous decision and, if they had, it could have been supported by substantial evidence. Recognition of the dichotomy is required which results from the use of a multiplexed theory undesignated verdict form given to the jury for decision which permitted alternative compromise decisions.
By statement filed March 28,1989, appellant was charged disjunctively as follows:

COUNT 1

ELEMENTS

[MURDER IN THE FIRST DEGREE
§ 6-2-101 W.S.1977, as amended]
1. The defendant
2. On or about the 25th day of February, 1989
3. In the County of Teton, State of Wyoming
4. Purposely and with premeditated malice or
in the perpetration of a robbery or in the attempt to perpetrate a robbery
5. did kill a human being.
Responsively, appellant filed a Motion to Elect through his counsel in April 1989:
*920COMES NOW the defendant, Arlen Joe Price, by and through his attorney, * * *, and moves the Court for an order requiring the State to elect the theories on which it intends to proceed in this case and as good cause therefore states as follows:
1. Count I of the Information charges the defendant with MURDER IN THE FIRST DEGREE, based upon two separate and distinct theories. The first theory is that the defendant did purposely and with premeditated malice kill Lewis Price, Jr. The second theory is that the killing took place during the perpetration of and attempt to perpetrate a robbery.
2. The two theories the State is proceeding on are inconsistent and based upon entirely different motives. It would be patently unfair to permit the State to proceed on both theories. The defendant has an absolute right to be informed of the charges against him so that he can properly defend the case. If the charge is ROBBERY MURDER, and the State intends to proceed on the charge, then the defendant needs to be properly informed that this is the State's theory. The same is true if the actual theory is PREMEDITATED MURDER.
(Emphasis in original.) That motion and other variant motions, including suppression of confession and limine motions of both litigants, were considered at an oral argument session held shortly thereafter. Disposition was then made by order entered April 26, 1989 in regard to this issue stated “[t]hat with regard to the defendant’s Motion to Elect, the defendant is only charged with one offense and it will be up to the jury to decide which elements, if any, were violated.”
Instruction No. 6 was then given, quoting the Wyoming Statutes in part:
“(a) Whoever purposely and with premeditated malice, or in the perpetration, or attempt to perpetrate, any * * * robbery * * *, kills any human being is guilty of murder in the first degree.”
The necessary elements of the crime of first degree murder are as follows:
1. The defendant, a person
2. On or about the 25th day of February, 1989
3. In the County of Teton, State of Wyoming
4. Purposely and with premeditated malice; or
in the perpetration of a robbery; or in the attempt to perpetrate a robbery
5. Did kill a human being.
If you find from your consideration of all of the evidence that any of these elements ha[ve] not been proved beyond a reasonable doubt, then you should find the defendant not guilty of first degree murder.
If, on the other hand, you find from your consideration of all of the evidence that each of these elements ha[ve] been proved beyond a reasonable doubt, then you should find the defendant guilty of first degree murder.
The verdict form then used was a matter of complete simplicity which accorded with the trial judge’s ruling and discussion during the instruction conference:
We, the jury, find the defendant, X Guilty _ Not Guilty of murder in the first degree.
(In the event you find the defendant not guilty of murder in the first degree complete one of the following:)
The obvious problem with the jury verdict form and the disjunctive instruction as given was that the jury could find appellant guilty of first degree murder without a unanimous decision among its members that he was guilty of either premeditated murder, felony murder, or both. Each of the jurors could vote for the result without necessarily agreeing with the others that guilt was proved on both bases for the case submission. Two entirely separable proscribed acts within the course of conduct were combined for an either or both perspective for jury decision. Appellant may have either killed or robbed or, during the course of a robbery, his companion may have killed.
*921The principal vice of this character of alternative decision submission is that it removes from the jury the unanimous decision making requirement and places guilt determination upon first, the discretion of the prosecutor to charge in the alternative and second, the trial court to instruct so that a specific decision is not required. Intrinsically, this readjusts a fact finding function to this court for determination of what the jury could have done but did not because they were not appropriately instructed, and if they had been appropriately instructed, whether there was sufficient evidence to sustain those alternatively potential but non-made decisions.
In this case, the dichotomy is highlighted when the trial judge determined that insufficient evidence was available to submit a robbery charge against appellant and then submitted a felony murder theory based on the same apparently unproved robbery. The discomfort of appellant with the structure of the case where the evidence against him of robbery was insufficient to justify jury conviction on that charged offense, yet sufficient to justify a felony murder verdict, is certainly to be appreciated.
The problem really results from the haste of the appellate court, as did this court in its per curiam decision of Cloman, 574 P.2d at 422, to affirm the conviction and then not take time to tell the trial bench and practicing bar how it should be done so that it is right. Too many appellate decisions are composed as if this court is an intermediate appellate court responsible only for deciding cases and not for creating a structure of the law that provides the stability and specificity for future cases.
Disjunctive instruction and verdict cases of charged premeditated murder and felony murder create a particularly pervasive error since the basis of conviction is partly competitive or contradictory. In first instance, the charged offense claims to be the result of premeditated and/or intended killing where the felony murder is based on a presumed intent derived from another character of conduct where direct intent to kill is not a factor in the offense. This is not to suggest that a dual theory of prosecution is inappropriate where the prosecution contends that evidence of plan and premeditation was present as a character of first degree murder, but that if that element is not proved beyond a reasonable doubt, the second criteria of the offense, mainly felony murder, can supply the missing evidence for murder conviction. Jury instructions and the verdict form should follow the concept of alternative criminal conduct and permit and require the jury to make the finite decision in a given case. That decision could be that the killing was planned and consequently premeditated, but the killing was also in conjunction with a planned felony offense and, consequently, constituted felony murder, or that either or both of the foregoing may not have existed. If both did not exist, then a lesser included offense should be properly presented for consideration. See, for example, Annotation, Propriety ofLesser-In-cluded-Offense Charge to Jury in Federal Homicide Prosecution, 101 A.L.R.Fed. 615 (1991) and Annotation, Lesser-Related State Offense Instructions: Modern Status, 50 A.L.R.4th 1081 (1986).
In direct reference to the Cloman application now made, the question is not whether the evidence “justified the holding,” id. at 412, but rather whether the jury made a decision that there was guilt of first degree murder either because of the premeditated character, or because it was felony murder, or both. It is not that as a result of the occurrence it must have been either one or the other and, as such guilt exists, without proof that each one or either one was specifically determined. Significant in this case is that evidence of appellant’s interest in robbery is less than overwhelming. All of his confessions and statements which were of a consistent trend, as well as all of the supporting evidence, indicate a hatred and willingness to kill, but no indication of a larceny proclivity. Conversely is the convincing evidence that Chief clearly was only involved for monetary purposes. Nothing is shown in this record that Chief went to the scene of the homicide with the intent to commit a homicide.
*922The statement of the majority sets forth quite clearly the principle now adopted for our future cases: “If each alternative ground for a defendant’s first degree murder conviction is supported by substantial evidence, we will not set aside the conviction solely because we are unable to determine which ground served as the basis for the jury’s decision.” By this adaptation, this majority creates a new rule for insufficiency of evidence to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt and to require a unanimous decision of the jury which extrudes from this factual climate of horror and perversion with the apparition of a Hollywood monster. The principle now created for Wyoming law as a result of this analysis directly attacks the unanimous verdict requirement of Wyo.Const. art. 1, § 9. Taylor v. State, 612 P.2d 851 (Wyo.1980).
Guidance should be taken from United States v. Natelli, 527 F.2d 311, 325 (2nd Cir.1975), cert. denied 425 U.S. 934, 96 S.Ct. 1663, 48 L.Ed.2d 175 (1976):
When there is more than one specification as a predicate for guilt, each dependent on particular evidence which is unrelated to the other, it would be sound practice to instruct the jury that they must be unanimous on a particular specification to convict.
The circuit court went on to reverse the conviction of one appellant and remand it for retrial. Upon rehearing, the panel of the federal appellate court reversed the decision on a basis of improper objection during trial. A second rehearing consideration was then given where the court stated:
Yates v. United States, 354 U.S. 298, 311-312, 77 S.Ct. 1064 [1073], 1 L.Ed.2d 1356 (1957), and Stromberg v. California, 283 U.S. 359, 367-68, 51 S.Ct. 532 [535], 75 L.Ed. 1117 (1931), can be read as covering the situation where a jury may have convicted on the very specification which is insufficiently proved to make out an offense.
That is true, especially, when the specifications in the single count relate to two distinct incidents or fact patterns, * * *, rather than being merely a charge of alternate ways of violating a statute stated in the conjunctive.
Id. at 328 (footnote and citations omitted). In finite result, the circuit court then found a sufficient objection and reversed on the basis of the undefined alternative basis for jury decision.2
The basis for these offenses is more thoughtfully provided by State v. Thomas, 325 N.C. 583, 386 S.E.2d 555, 560-61 (1989):
Premeditation and deliberation is a theory by which one may be convicted of first degree murder; felony murder is another such theory. Criminal defendants are not convicted or acquitted of theories; they are convicted or acquitted of crimes.
As that case would reflect, it is my premise that the prosecution is required to elect either or both theories and the jury then to determine separately which of either theo*923ries is proved in its unanimous decision by finding proof beyond a reasonable doubt. Institutional due process is not provided if the prosecution elects an either/or basis and the theory is left among the jury’s individual membership to select an either/or basis so that no unanimous decision is necessarily made.
The proper analysis and construction requirement has been carefully developed and expertly defined by the Colorado Supreme Court as most recently stated in People v. O’Neill, 803 P.2d 164, 173 (Colo.1990):
In [People v.] Lowe, [660 P.2d 1261 (Colo.1983)], we stated the rule of lenity required the first-degree murder statute be construed in favor of the defendant, and “that construction is that a defendant can be convicted only of one first-degree murder for one killing.” Id. at 1269. We held that murder after deliberation and felony murder were alternative ways in which to commit first-degree murder, and the proper procedure was to inform the jury
“that the defendant is charged with one crime, first-degree murder. The jury’s special verdict should indicate which theories of first-degree murder, if any, have been proved by the evidence. ... If the jury is asked only for a general verdict, then on appeal there is no way to decide upon which theory the jury reached its verdict. In such a case an error relating to either count would void the entire verdict.”
Id. at 1271. [Colorado followed] Lowe in People v. Bartowsheski, 661 P.2d 235, 246 (Colo.1983), and more recently in People v. Saathoff, 790 P.2d 804, 807 (Colo.1990).
This case is dissimilar from Natelli, where an issue was made of the form of issues submission or People v. Sampson, 145 A.D.2d 910, 536 N.Y.S.2d 291 (1988), where defendant failed to preserve his contention because of a lack of request for submission in an appropriate fashion. See likewise People v. Paxhia, 140 A.D.2d 962, 529 N.Y.S.2d 638 (1988), where, although the New York court found error involving intentional murder and depraved mind murder, the defendant could not preserve his claim by timely objection and State v. Duhan, 194 Conn. 347, 481 A.2d 48 (1984). The joinder of felony murder and premeditated murder in a single count, when resolved by the jury in a general verdict without appropriate instructions for identifying criteria, leaves a completely unresolved question whether the jury was unanimous in making any decision. United States v. Starks, 515 F.2d 112 (3rd Cir.1975). Cf. United States v. Alsobrook, 620 F.2d 139, 143 (6th Cir.), cert. denied 449 U.S. 843, 101 S.Ct. 124, 66 L.Ed.2d 51 (1980), where the form of the verdict or the method of instruction left no doubt as to the unanimity of jury decision and United States v. Berardi, 675 F.2d 894, 899 (7th Cir.1982).
It should be recognized that Stromberg v. People of State of California, 283 U.S. 359, 51 S.Ct. 532, 75 L.Ed. 1117 (1931); Williams v. State of North Carolina, 317 U.S. 287, 63 S.Ct. 207, 87 L.Ed. 279 (1942); and, to a degree, Yates, 354 U.S. at 312, 77 S.Ct. at 1073, do not reach or address the stage of evaluation presented here. Those cases provide factual situations and pleading status where none of the bases of an undifferentiated general verdict were declared to be invalid and consequently serve to invalidate the conviction itself when the determination could not be made of what actually was the basis for jury verdict. This case reaches a more advanced stage of consideration of the issue of a non-unanimous jury verdict where we find alternatives were presented and then apply fact finding in the appellate court which had not been provided in any definable jury decision. See likewise Cramer v. United States, 325 U.S. 1, 36, 65 S.Ct. 918, 935, 89 L.Ed. 1441 (1945). What the jury was not here requested to determine is embossed upon the decision by a nisi prius fact finding activity by the majority of this court.
The issue of compatible charges of premeditated and intended murder, where each is the subject of a guilty verdict and where the verdict is unreconcilable, is sim*924ilar, albeit not identical, to that of negligence or reckless conduct, State v. Moore, 458 N.W.2d 90 (Minn.1990), and intentional murder or reckless manslaughter, People v. Gallagher, 69 N.Y.2d 525, 516 N.Y.S.2d 174, 508 N.E.2d 909 (1987). The thesis is identical that the appellate court should not be called to invade the jury’s function or, following jury failure, to make the critical determination by “ ‘exercise of interest of justice jurisdiction’ ” to weigh the facts. Moore, 458 N.W.2d at 94 (quoting Gallagher, 516 N.Y.S.2d at 176, 508 N.E.2d at 911). Furthermore, in this case, a waiver cannot be extracted nor a harmless error benefit applied. State v. Olson, 459 N.W.2d 711 (Minn.App.1990).
This case is also different than the dual convictions or the separate murder offenses committed within one murder where the issue of alternative convictions and dual sentences is created. People v. Fields, 199 Ill.App.3d 888, 145 Ill.Dec. 859, 557 N.E.2d 629 (1990). See likewise Conway v. State, 489 So.2d 641 (Ala.Cr.App.1986), where that court found the trial court did not error in refusing to accept the jury’s initial verdict which included clearly conflicting convictions, e.g. guilty of felony murder, not guilty of intentional murder and guilty of manslaughter, but guilty of kidnapping. Upon resubmission and after six minutes, the jury returned for a finding of guilty of kidnapping.
In acting like a supreme court, we should create productive and definable principles for our legal future and not stop short by only absolving past insufficiencies or mistakes. This jury was not properly directed to a unanimous jury verdict on either of the bases upon which their decision was required. Consequently, I dissent from the majority decision on this subject. The proper difference between the stature and responsibility of the supreme court and that of an intermediate appellate tribunal is an achieved responsibility for us to teach and build for the future, to move beyond the maintenance responsibility of the intermediate appellate tribunal, which is only to correct or absolve for the past. Too often, in hurry or disinclination, we as the constitutionally created supreme court, ignore our responsibility for the future to do more than affirm or reverse in absolution or justification of harmless error in croaking, “nothing is perfect.”
IV. COURT DECISION TO REQUIRE APPELLANT TO TESTIFY IN ORDER TO PRESENT HIS DEFENSE
Appellant’s defense to a first degree murder conviction was anchored on absence of intent to commit robbery to avoid felony murder and the lack of mental capacity to form the requisite specific intent to be guilty of premeditated murder. The first defense was shipwrecked by lack of a properly differentiated verdict form and the second defense went down when the trial court required appellant to testify as the price of establishing a foundation for the expert psychologist to testify. Then, after appellant had “spilled his guts” to authenticate his expert witness’s appearance, the expert witness was stopped short from presenting his testimony on the basis that it would invade the province of the jury. This case personifies climactic developments during trial which denied appellant any real opportunity to defend or to even rationally approach presentation of a theory of his defense during the proceeding.
Procedurally, structurally and academically, this case is so bad that even the laws of chance or chaos should foreclose repetition. Hope then exists that perhaps the detrimental law here created will confine itself by obviousness to only this case. Consequently, the extended dissection of the obviousness of the adjudicatory misdirection may be avoided.3
There is no question that by trial court decision, the price for defense witness testimony was testimony by appellant himself. In result, appellant was required to prove his own guilt in order to have the opportu*925nity to use his expert defense witness who would testify about character of factors which directly related to the charged guilt. I agree with neither the majority nor the special concurrence in judicial amendment for this decision to decimate the rights provided by both the federal and state constitutions against compelled self-incrimination. Wyo. Const. art. 1, § 11. “No person shall be compelled to testify against himself in any criminal case.” Id. “[N]or shall he be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself.” U.S. Const. amend. V.
Simply stated, by trial court action, appellant was foreclosed use of his defense witness unless he chose to testify. The results were anything but harmless. Clear, explicit and direct violations of the constitutional rights against self-incrimination were created. No one provides any authority that an effort to defend waives the right against self-incrimination. The error is not sugarcoated by the transference to waiver of the privilege by election to testify. Here, in order to have the assistance of a proposed witness, the trial court required that appellant first testify since, as a rule for the case, a defense of insanity had not been pleaded. The degree of the enormity of the mistake or the insufficiency of reasoning for justification defies my adequate characterization.
Y. REQUIREMENT OF TESTIMONY FOR ADMISSIBILITY FOUNDATION
This majority comes no closer to reason or precedent in justification of the trial court decision that appellant had to testify in order for a foundation to exist for Dr. Brian Miracle, a well-recognized psychologist, to be permitted to testify about the mental condition of appellant. Stripped of side-stepping and persiflage, justification of the trial court requirement cannot be authenticated by the record or defined in present decision. One of the strangest rules of current creation emerges — whether defined as harmless by majority or intentional waiver by a special concurrence. The trial court extracted the price of forced testimony defined as foundational evidence, in order for the expert witness to even be allowed to take the stand to testify within a field and about a subject where he was unquestionably an expert and had previously testified dozens of times in the Wyoming court system.
VI. REJECTION OF TESTIMONY OF THE EXPERT WITNESS AFTER APPELLANT TESTIFIED TO PROVIDE FOUNDATION
As a postscript, after appellant had satisfied the foundational basis for the injected requirement to testify to gain the right to present the expert witness, which in effect resulted in appellant’s confession in open court, the trial court then dispositively rejected all of the psychologist’s testimony on the basis that it invaded the province of the jury in calling for an opinion about the mental state or condition of appellant. In direct observation, the trial court was overtly wrong since an intent crime was at issue. What this majority now does not only serves to pervert long established rules for the use of expert witnesses, but also pollutes our law for future cases.
VII. CONCLUSION
Appellant testified as a requirement of the trial court in order for an effort to be made to defend and then the proposed defense was denied as invading the province (or providence) of the jury. Appellant’s constitutional rights against self-incrimination and to defend were trampled upon under the concept of a requirement to provide foundation. Inane attitudes about admissibility were then bruskly applied and ultimately an improper verdict form was used permitting a non-unanimous jury decision. In anticipation that we may accidentally, but almost deliberately, propagate the evil of this case in future law, I now strongly dissent.

. There are literally thousands, if not tens of thousands, of felony murder cases since the crime exists in a majority of the jurisdictions as the equivalent of intended or premeditated murder for assessment of the first degree murder crime with variations predominating. Among the perhaps 40,000 violent caused deaths arising annually in this country, a significant percentage go to trial on a felony murder basis since most murders do not occur in the abstract, but *919are accompanied by other crimes of some character — frequently robbery, rape or to silence the witness,

. The disjunctive undefined jury decision directly conflicts with the thesis found in one of the few current academic reviews supporting retention of felony murder. The certainty and specificity premise is lost if a separate jury decision is not required to apply a preclusive pathway to achieve first degree murder.
If properly defined and applied, the felony murder doctrine sometimes provides the advantage of greater clarity. The mental state of intention to commit robbery, rape, or kidnapping is less ambiguous than the terms generally governing homicidal mental states. Particularly when the offense is spontaneous, occupies only a brief time span, and is dependent upon mental impulses evidenced only the defendant’s actions, such terms premeditation, deliberation, malice, or even "intent" leave jurors with a difficult judgment. Such ambiguity is undesirable because it produces disparity in verdicts, dissatisfaction with the basis of decision, and a perception of discrimination. These disadvantages are reduced by the felony murder doctrine.
******
* * * The rule has beneficial allocative consequences because it clearly defines the offense, simplifies the task of the judge and jury with respect to questions of law and fact, and thereby promotes efficient administration of justice.
Crump & Crump, In Defense of the Felony Murder Doctrine, 8 Harv.J.L. & Pub.Pol’y 359, 372, 375 (1985) (footnote omitted).
The authors then recognized from citation of People v. Burton, 6 Cal.3d 375, 388, 99 Cal.Rptr. 1, 9-10, 491 P.2d 793, 801-02 (1971), that availability of the felony murder charge eliminates the requirement for the fine judicial calibration involved in direct proof of intent.

. Obviousness as the test here leaves future consideration for the reader to supply precedential authority to contradict or confirm.