Court Opinion

ID: 9776655
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 19:41:35.158647+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:09:16.874956
License: Public Domain

OPINION ON PETITION TO REHEAR
[Filed April 11, 1994]
O’BRIEN, Justice.
A petition to rehear has been filed by defendant in this case asserting that the Court’s opinion is in conflict with the rule regarding proof of premeditation and deliberation enunciated in State v. Brown, 836 S.W.2d 530 (Tenn.1992) and State v. West, 844 S.W.2d 144 (Tenn.1992).
The petition was granted to consider the sufficiency of the evidence to sustain the conviction of premeditated first degree murder and felony murder, and, because the issues are connected, our adoption of the rule vesting the confidential marital communications privilege in a criminal proceeding in the witness spouse rather than the accused.
The defendant cites from both Brown and West, supra, for the premise that the law in Tennessee has long recognized that once the homicide has been established it is presumed to be murder in the second degree. The State bears the burden of proof on the issue of premeditation and deliberation sufficient to elevate the offense to first-degree murder; and that the element of premeditation requires a previously formed design or intent to kill. Deliberation on the other hand, requires that the killing be done with a cool purpose ... in other words, that the killer be free from the passions of the moment. Moreover, the fact that “premeditation can be formed in an instant” must be viewed in contrast to the element of deliberation, which obviously cannot be formed instantaneously.
We note at the outset that this Court vacated and set aside the conviction for felony murder. The Court held that the weight of the evidence adduced at trial was sufficient to support the jury verdict of first degree murder beyond a reasonable doubt, based on the evidence in the record. It is true, as *73defendant insists, that, except for his admission to Regina Hayes that he had “blown the victim’s head off with a punkin ball,” that the evidence against him was largely circumstantial. However, there were numerous inferences for the jury to draw from the other evidence in the record. Hayes’ testimony that defendant and Sarge West left defendant’s 9th Street trailer in separate vehicles was somewhat equivocal, but probative. Sarah Proctor, was indicted as an accomplice after the fact of the homicide. She was not yet married to the defendant and her in-court testimony was admissible. She testified she came to the Middlecreek Road residence late in the afternoon on 15 April 1988. Both defendant and West were present. Defendant asked her to pick him up on Rocky Top where the victim’s body was later found burned in his truck. She says she picked him up about dusk dark and delivered him to the trailer on 9th Street. Her testimony conformed to that of Regina Hayes concerning the time he arrived there. Defendant instructed Proctor to tell officers that on the day of the homicide West had left the house on Middlecreek Road and that she and the defendant remained there together for the rest of the evening. On 19 April 1988 law enforcement officers stopped and questioned Proctor and the defendant in the driveway of the house on Middlecreek Road. At this time the defendant gave officers a receipt for $251 received from the defendant and signed by Daniel R. West, dated April 15, 1988. The officers found a live .20 gauge shotgun shell in Proctor’s purse. The wadding and slug from this shell were similar to that found in the victim’s brain. Proctor testified she “assumed” the unfired round was the property of the defendant. She had earlier claimed it was her father’s and also tried to get a friend to say it belonged to him. Officers found an assortment of 10 long guns in the defendant’s house including a .20 gauge shotgun. This shotgun was the only one among the weapons found which had been freshly oiled and cleaned.
Defendant and Sarah Proctor were married on 7 June 1988 while he was in prison. On June 18th Proctor’s father gave to the authorities an undated letter to his daughter from the defendant in which he wrote, “Sarah, about the Sarge man, please don’t turn on me now. Just stick with your and my story we already told everybody, okay?” In another letter he asked Proctor to write a letter to him saying she had killed West. She wrote the letter and even told some people that she had shot West after he had tried to rape her. Proctor also testified that she heard defendant tell his son that the victim’s gun was buried on Rocky Top on his uncle’s land, although this was denied by the son.
Defendant presented an alibi defense. One female witness testified she had met him on Rocky Top after Sarah Proctor had left the Middlecreek Road house. She subsequently recanted that statement. Another female testified that defendant had been at her home from 8:00 p.m. on April 15th until the next morning. Defendant presented testimony that Regina Hayes was jealous of his relationship with Sarah Proctor and had threatened to get him and to have Clifford “Bee” Fine “fix” defendant. Another female witness testified she had seen Dan West on April 15th at 8:30 p.m. on the sidewalk in downtown Newport.
In Brown, supra at p. 539, the Court said, “In order to establish first-degree murder, the premeditated killing must also have been done deliberately, that is, with coolness and reflection.” In State v. West, supra at p. 147 the Court remarked that it remains true that no specific length of time is required for the formation of a cool, dispassionate intent to kill. We are satisfied that the evidence in this case was abundantly sufficient to establish the elements of premeditation and deliberation so as to warrant the jury’s guilty verdict.
We elected for two (2) reasons to reconsider our adoption of the rule vesting the confidential marital communications privilege in a criminal proceeding in the witness spouse rather than the accused. First, we profess to an error in the statement in the opinion that, “at the time of defendant’s trial, there was not any constitutional or statutory provision in reference to spousal testimony in criminal cases, leaving us to look to the common law of this State for guidance.” Defen*74dant’s trial took place in May 1990. T.C.A. § 40-17-104 was repealed by the Public Acts of 1991, Ch. 273, § 33. Thus, defendant’s wife was a competent witness against him under the statute, notwithstanding the common law dictates of Brewer v. Ferguson, supra; Barker v. James McAuley, supra; Goodwin v. Nicklin, supra, basing the common law rejection of spousal testimony upon the grounds of public policy. These cases were the predecessors of McCormick v. State, supra, which is commonly referred to as the “watershed of the policy.”
To recapitulate, as stated by one text writer,1 We are dealing here with a late offshoot of an ancient tree, involving three (3) rules. First, the rule that the spouse of a party or person interested is disqualified from testifying for the other spouse. Second, the privilege of a party against having the party’s husband or wife called as an adverse witness. Third, the privilege presently under discussion, testimonial communications between spouses gained in the course of the marital relationship. The enactment of Tennessee Rules of Evidence 501 and 601 have effectively abrogated any statute or rule in Tennessee disqualifying spouses as witnesses for or against one another except for the marital privilege. The rule against adverse spousal testimony was abolished on a federal level by the United States Supreme Court in Trammel, supra. Insofar as can be ascertained this disqualification never existed in Tennessee unless it might be classified as being inclusive under McCormick v. State, supra.
In the McCormick case, after reviewing a number of cases which preceded the enactment of Ch. 161 of the Acts of 1915, the Court undertook the task of deciding whether or not, after the passage of the Act, a husband or wife would be permitted, over objection, to testify in criminal cases, as to any matter that occurred between them by virtue or in consequence of the marital relation, or as to any confidential communications between them. They reviewed two (2) cases from the State of Florida, as well as some general texts on the subject and expressed the opinion that while Ch. 161 of the Acts of 1915 made a husband or wife a competent witness to testify for or against each other in all criminal cases, it did not abrogate the rule as to privilege or confidential communications. The Court concluded that sound public policy required that neither the husband nor the wife should be permitted to testify, in criminal cases as to any matter coming to his or her knowledge by reason of the marital relation on the premise that the sacredness of the home and the peace of families can only be preserved and protected by enforcing this long-established rule of the common law.
Accepting the existence of the rule and the soundness of the public policy by the McCormick court in its 1916 decision, under the evolving conditions existing in today’s world we see no reason why an innocent spouse should suffer the risk of personal incrimination by having a miscreant marriage partner divulge acts of criminal conduct with the expectation that this information would remain secret. We are satisfied that the modification of the rule to vest the privilege in the testifying spouse is appropriate.
As the Trammel court noted, when one spouse is willing to testify against the other in a criminal proceeding — whatever the motivation — their relationship is almost certainly in disrepair; there is probably little in the way of marital harmony for the privilege to preserve. In these circumstances a rule of evidence that permits an accused to prevent adverse spousal testimony seems far more likely to frustrate justice than to foster family peace.
The petition to rehear is denied.
REID, C.J., and DROWOTA and ANDERSON, JJ., concur.
DAUGHTREY, J., not participating.

. McCormick on Evidence, supra at note 2.