Court Opinion

ID: 9732246
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 16:12:57.971588+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:26:25.366317
License: Public Domain

GARRITY, Judge,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent from the majority opinion as to Count # 1.
The appellant’s victim was Chung Sook Choi, a Korean widow who worked in the dental lab on the third floor. Because the hallway was “really dark,” Mrs. Choi turned on a light in the restroom, then started to unlock the door to her lab. At that instant, the appellant plunged a large butcher knife deep into Mrs. Choi’s back at her waist, about two inches to the left of her spine. The knife sliced through several major back muscles, lacerated blood vessels within the abdominal cavity, and amputated the lower portion of her left kidney.1
Mrs. Choi fell to the floor. She looked up and saw a knife on the floor and a man standing over her. The man stepped on her, grabbed her purse and ran.
A passerby saw her almost immediately, and a rescue team arrived within “a matter of seconds.” She was at the hospital in approximately seven minutes. Her doctor testified that during surgery, Mrs. Choi almost died on several occasions.
It has been consistently held in Maryland that a finding either that a killing was wilful, deliberate or premeditated, or that it was in perpetration of a robbery, would support a *221verdict of first degree murder. Parker v. State, 7 Md.App. 167, 254 A.2d 381 (1969), cert. denied, 402 U.S. 984, 91 S.Ct. 1670, 29 L.Ed.2d 150 (1971). While lying-in-wait epitomizes a cold-blooded attack devoid of any warning to the victim and serves as an extreme example of wilfulness, deliberateness, and premeditation, it is also an aggravating factor in its own right. Evans v. State, 28 Md.App. 640, 686, 349 A.2d 300 (1975), aff'd, 278 Md. 197, 362 A.2d 629 (1976).
But for the tenacious refusal of the victim to die, this case would have presented a classic example of first degree murder. Due to her survival, it is clearly one of attempted first degree murder.
Although the trial judge’s loquacious explanation of his thoughts may have given rise to the appellant’s “reasonable doubt” argument, I interpret the court’s comments differently.
In summation of his findings, the trial judge stated: The Court finds, as I stated earlier, that there is independent proof of concealment, and watchful waiting in this case. There was clearly an intent to do grievous bodily harm; witness the knife, the terrible knife.
The Court therefore finds that the State has carried its burden of proof of attempted murder in the first degree with regard to Court # 1. That finding is therefore entered.
I believe that the trier of fact determined that the appellant’s act of lying-in-wait sufficiently evidenced his premeditated intent to murder, when coupled with the actual use of the butcher knife to cause the type of wound which could have resulted in death as a natural consequence.
I would conclude, therefore, beyond any reasonable doubt, that the evidence was sufficient to prove attempted murder in the first degree. I would affirm the finding of the trial court.

. A doctor who treated Mrs. Choi described her wound:
There was only one entrance wound. The entrance wound was extremely wide in its diameter, approximately five inches wide. This would indicate either an extremely large instrument, with a single penetration, or a slicing motion with a single instrument that was very sharp.
The wound was at least six inches deep—there was no way to determine exactly where the blade stopped because the organs were free to move about inside the abdomen.