Court Opinion

ID: 9590781
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 23:58:21.203653+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:43:09.779463
License: Public Domain

Justice Martin
dissenting.
At the outset it is to be noted that the peril of fabricated evidence is not unique to the trials of battered wives who kill. The possibility of invented evidence arises in all cases in which a party is seeking the benefit of self-defense. Moreover, in this case there were a number of witnesses other than defendant who testified as to the actual presence of circumstances supporting a claim of self-defense. This record contains no reasonable basis to attack the credibility of evidence for the defendant.
Likewise, the difficulty of rebutting defendant’s evidence because the only other witness to many of the events is deceased is not unique to this type of case. This situation is also commonplace in cases in which self-defense is raised, although, again, *267in the case sub judice there was more than one surviving witness to such events. In considering the argument that the state is faced with a difficult burden in attempting to rebut evidence of which defendant is the only surviving witness, one must not overlook the law: the burden is always on the state to prove that the killing was intentional beyond a reasonable doubt. “Defendant may always rest ultimately on the weakness of the state’s case and the state’s failure to carry its burden of proof.” State v. Patterson, 297 N.C. 247, 256, 254 S.E. 2d 604, 610 (1979).
At the heart of the majority’s reasoning is its unsubstantiated concern that to find that the evidence presented by defendant would support an instruction on self-defense would “expand our law of self-defense beyond the limits of immediacy and necessity.” Defendant does not seek to expand or relax the requirements of self-defense and thereby “legalize the opportune killing of allegedly abusive husbands by their wives,” as the majority overstates. Rather, defendant contends that the evidence as gauged by the existing laws of self-defense is sufficient to require the submission of a self-defense instruction to the jury. The proper issue for this Court is to determine whether the evidence, viewed in the light most favorable to the defendant, was sufficient to require the trial court to instruct on the law of self-defense. I conclude that it was.
In every jury trial, it is the duty of the court to charge the jury on all substantial features of the case arising on the evidence, whether or not such instructions have been requested. See State v. Dooley, 285 N.C. 158, 203 S.E. 2d 815 (1974). All defenses presented by the defendant’s evidence are substantial features of the case, even if that evidence contains discrepancies or is contradicted by evidence from the state. Id. This rule reflects the principle in our jurisprudence that it is the jury, not the judge, that weighs the evidence.
A defendant is entitled to an instruction on self-defense when there is evidence, viewed in the light most favorable to the defendant, that these four elements existed at the time of the killing:
(1) it appeared to defendant and he believed it to be necessary to kill the deceased in order to save himself from death or great bodily harm; and
*268(2) defendant’s belief was reasonable in that the circumstances as they appeared to him at the time were sufficient to create such a belief in the mind of a person of ordinary firmness; and
(3) defendant was not the aggressor in bringing on the affray, i.e., he did not aggressively and willingly enter into the fight without legal excuse or provocation; and
(4) defendant did not use excessive force, i.e., did not use more force than was necessary or reasonably appeared to him to be necessary under the circumstances to protect himself from death or great bodily harm.
State v. Gappins, 320 N.C. 64, 71, 357 S.E. 2d 654, 659 (1987). See also State v. McCray, 312 N.C. 519, 324 S.E. 2d 606 (1985) (to be entitled to an instruction on self-defense defendant must produce evidence tending to show he was free from fault and it was necessary or reasonably appeared to be necessary to kill in order to protect himself from great bodily harm or death). See generally State v. Wallace, 309 N.C. 141, 305 S.E. 2d 548 (1983); State v. Bush, 307 N.C. 152, 297 S.E. 2d 563 (1982); State v. Wilson, 304 N.C. 689, 285 S.E. 2d 804 (1982); State v. Norris, 303 N.C. 526, 279 S.E. 2d 570 (1981); State v. Potter, 295 N.C. 126, 244 S.E. 2d 397 (1978) (cases setting out these elements as requisites of proof of self-defense). The first element requires that there be evidence that the defendant believed it was necessary to kill in order to protect herself from serious bodily harm or death; the second requires that the circumstances as defendant perceived them were sufficient to create such a belief in the mind of a person of ordinary firmness. Both elements were supported by evidence at defendant’s trial.
Evidence presented by defendant described a twenty-year history of beatings and other dehumanizing and degrading treatment by her husband. In his expert testimony a clinical psychologist concluded that defendant fit “and exceeded]” the profile of an abused or battered spouse, analogizing this treatment to the dehumanization process suffered by prisoners of war under the Nazis during the Second World War and the brainwashing techniques of the Korean War. The psychologist described the defendant as a woman incarcerated by abuse, by fear, and by her conviction that her husband was invincible and inescapable:
*269Mrs. Norman didn’t leave because she believed, fully believed that escape was totally impossible. There was no place to go. He, she had left before; he had come and gotten her. She had gone to the Department of Social Services. He had come and gotten her. The law, she believed the law could not protect her; no one could protect her, and I must admit, looking over the records, that there was nothing done that would contradict that belief. She fully believed that he was invulnerable to the law and to all social agencies that were available; that nobody could withstand his power. As a result, there was no such thing as escape.
When asked if he had an opinion whether it appeared reasonably necessary for Judy Norman to shoot her husband, this witness responded:
Yes. ... I believe that in examining the facts of this case and examining the psychological data, that Mrs. Norman believed herself to be doomed ... to a life of the worst kind of torture and abuse, degradation that she had experienced over the years in a progressive way; that it would only get worse, and that death was inevitable; death of herself, which was not such, I don’t think was such an issue for her, as she had attempted to commit suicide, and in her continuing conviction of J. T. Norman’s power over her, and even failed at that form of escape. I believe she also came to the point of beginning to fear for family members and her children, that were she to commit suicide that the abuse and the treatment that was heaped on her would be transferred onto them.
This testimony describes defendant’s perception of circumstances in which she was held hostage to her husband’s abuse for two decades and which ultimately compelled her to kill him. This testimony alone is evidence amply indicating the first two elements required for entitlement to an instruction on self-defense.
In addition to the testimony of the clinical psychologist, defendant presented the testimony of witnesses who had actually seen defendant’s husband abuse her. These witnesses described circumstances that caused not only defendant to believe escape was impossible, but that also convinced them of its impossibility. Defendant’s isolation and helplessness were evident in testimony that her family was intimidated by her husband into acquiescing *270in his torture of her. Witnesses also described defendant’s experience with social service agencies and the law, which had contributed to her sense of futility and abandonment through the inefficacy of their protection and the strength of her husband’s wrath when they failed. Where torture appears interminable and escape impossible, the belief that only the death of the oppressor can provide relief is reasonable in the mind of a person of ordinary firmness, let alone in the mind of the defendant, who, like a prisoner of war of some years, has been deprived of her humanity and is held hostage by fear.
In State v. Mize, 316 N.C. 48, 53, 340 S.E. 2d 439, 442 (1986), this Court noted that if the defendant was in “no imminent danger” at the time of the killing, then his belief that it was necessary to kill the man who had pursued him eight hours before was unreasonable. The second element of self-defense was therefore not satisfied. In the context of the doctrine of self-defense, the definition of “imminent” must be informed by the defendant’s perceptions. It is not bounded merely by measurable time-, but by all of the facts and circumstances. Its meaning depends upon the assessment of the facts by one of “ordinary firmness” with regard to whether the defendant’s perception of impending death or injury was so pressing as to render reasonable her belief that it was necessary to kill.
Evidence presented in the case sub judice revealed no letup of tension or fear, no moment in which the defendant felt released from impending serious harm, even while the decedent slept. This, in fact, is a state of mind common to the battered spouse, and one that dramatically distinguishes Judy Norman’s belief in the imminence of serious harm from that asserted by the defendant in Mize. Psychologists have observed and commentators have described a “constant state of fear” brought on by the cyclical nature of battering as well as the battered spouse’s perception that her abuser is both “omnipotent and unstoppable.” See Comment, The Admissibility of Expert Testimony on the Battered Woman Syndrome in Support of a Claim of Self-Defense, 15 Conn. L. Rev. 121, 131 (1982). Constant fear means a perpetual anticipation of the next blow, a perpetual expectation that the next blow will kill. “[T]he battered wife is constantly in a heightened state of terror because she is certain that one day her husband will kill her during the course of a beating. . . . Thus from the perspec*271tive of the battered wife, the danger is constantly ‘immediate.’ ” Eber, The Battered Wife’s Dilemma: To Kill or To Be Killed, 32 Hastings L.J. 895, 928-29 (1981). For the battered wife, if there is no escape, if there is no window of relief or momentary sense of safety, then the next attack, which could be the fatal one, is imminent. In the context of the doctrine of self-defense, “imminent” is a term the meaning of which must be grasped from the defendant’s point of view. Properly stated, the second prong of the question is not whether the threat was in fact imminent, but whether defendant’s belief in the impending nature of the threat, given the circumstances as she saw them, was reasonable in the mind of a person of ordinary firmness.1
Defendant’s intense fear, based on her belief that her husband intended not only to maim or deface her, as he had in the past, but to kill her, was evident in the testimony of witnesses who recounted events of the last three days of the decedent’s life. This testimony could have led a juror to conclude that defendant reasonably perceived a threat to her life as “imminent,” even while her husband slept. Over these three days, her husband’s anger was exhibited in an unprecedented crescendo of violence. The evidence showed defendant’s fear and sense of hopelessness similarly intensifying, leading to an unsuccessful attempt to escape through suicide and culminating in her belief that escape would be possible only through her husband’s death.
Defendant testified that on 10 June, two days before her husband’s death, he had again forced her to go to a rest stop near Kings Mountain to make money by prostitution. Her daughter Phyllis and Phyllis’s boyfriend Mark Navarra accompanied her on this occasion because, defendant said, whenever her husband took her there, he would beat her. Phyllis corroborated this account. She testified that her father had arrived some time later and had begun beating her mother, asking how much money she had. Defendant said they all then drove off. Shortly afterwards an officer arrested defendant’s husband for driving under the influence. He *272spent the night in jail and was released the next morning on bond paid by defendant’s mother.
Defendant testified that her husband was argumentative and abusive all through the next day, 11 June. Mark Navarra testified that at one point defendant’s husband threw a sandwich that defendant had made for him on the floor. She made another; he threw it on the floor, as well, then insisted she prepare one without touching it. Defendant’s husband had then taken the third sandwich, which defendant had wrapped in paper towels, and smeared it on her face. Both Navarra and Phyllis testified that they had later watched defendant’s husband seize defendant’s cigarette and put it out on her neck, the scars from which defendant displayed to the jury.
A police officer testified that he arrived at defendant’s home at 8:00 that evening in response to a call reporting a domestic quarrel. Defendant, whose face was bruised, was crying, and she told the officer that her husband had beaten her all day long and that she could not take it any longer. The officer told her that he could do nothing for her unless she took out a warrant on her husband. She responded that if she did, her husband would kill her. The officer left but was soon radioed to return because defendant had taken an overdose of pills. The officer testified that defendant’s husband was interfering with ambulance attendants, saying “Let the bitch die.” When he refused to respond to the officer’s warning that if he continued to hinder the attendants, he would be arrested, the officer was compelled to chase him into the house.
Defendant’s mother testified that her son-in-law had reacted to the discovery that her daughter had taken the pills with cursing and obscenities and threats such as, “Now, you’re going to pay for taking those pills,” and “I’ll kill you, your mother and your grandmother.” His rage was such that defendant’s mother feared he might kill the whole family, and knowing defendant’s sister had a gun in her purse, she took the gun and placed it in her own.
Defendant was taken to the hospital, treated, and released at 2:30 a.m. She spent the remainder of the night at her grandmother’s house. Defendant testified that the next day, 12 June, she felt dazed all day long. She went in the morning to the county mental *273health center for guidance on domestic abuse. When she returned home, she tried to talk to her husband, telling him to “straighten up. Quit drinking. . . . I’m going to have you committed to help you.” Her husband responded, “If you do, I’ll see them coming and before they get here, I’ll cut your throat.”
Later, her husband made her drive him and his friend to Spartanburg to pick up the friend’s paycheck. On the way, the friend testified, defendant’s husband “started slapping on her” when she was following a truck too closely, and he periodically poured his beer into a glass, then reached over and poured it on defendant’s head. At one point defendant’s husband lay down on the front seat with his head on the arm rest, “like he was going to go to sleep,” and kicked defendant, who was still driving, in the side of the head.
Mark Navarra testified that in the year and a half he had lived with the Normans, he had never seen defendant’s husband madder than he was on 12 June, opining that it was the DUI arrest two days before that had ignited J. T.’s fury. Phyllis testified that her father had beaten her mother “all day long.” She testified that this was the third day defendant’s husband had forbidden her to eat any food. Phyllis said defendant’s family tried to get her to eat, but defendant, fearing a beating, would not. Although Phyllis’s grandmother had sent over a bag of groceries that day, defendant’s husband had made defendant put them back in the bag and would not let anyone eat them.
Early in the evening of 12 June, defendant’s husband told defendant, “Let’s go to bed.” Phyllis testified that although there were two beds in the room, her father had forbidden defendant from sleeping on either. Instead, he had made her lie down on the concrete floor between the two beds, saying, “Dogs don’t lay in the bed. They lay in the floor.” Shortly afterward, defendant testified, Phyllis came in and asked her father if defendant could take care of her baby while she went to the store. He assented and eventually went to sleep. Defendant was still on the floor, the baby on the small bed. The baby started to cry and defendant “snuck up and took him out there to [her] mother’s [house].” She asked her mother to watch the baby, then asked if her mother had anything for headache, as her head was “busting.” Her mother responded that she had some pain pills in her purse. De*274fendant went in to get the pills, “and the gun was in there, and I don’t know, I just seen the gun, and I took it out, and I went back there and shot him.”
From this evidence of the exacerbated nature of the last three days of twenty years of provocation, a juror could conclude that defendant believed that her husband’s threats to her life were viable, that serious bodily harm was imminent, and that it was necessary to kill her husband to escape that harm. And from this evidence a juror could find defendant’s belief in the necessity to kill her husband not merely reasonable but compelling.
The third element for entitlement to an instruction on self-defense requires that there be evidence that the defendant was not the aggressor in bringing on the affray. If the defendant was the aggressor and killed with murderous intent, that is, the intent to kill or inflict serious bodily harm, then she is not entitled to an instruction on self-defense. State v. Mize, 316 N.C. 48, 340 S.E. 2d 439. A hiatus between provocation by the decedent and the killing can mark the initiation of a new confrontation between the defendant and the decedent, such that the defendant’s earlier perception of imminent danger no longer appears reasonable and the defendant becomes the aggressor. For example, in Mize, the defendant, who had been told the day before that the decedent was “out to get” him, went to the decedent’s trailer with a shotgun, knocked on the front door, and hid under the steps when the decedent opened the door and asked who was there. Defendant then went to the back door, knocked again, and shot the decedent. When the defendant went with his shotgun to the decedent’s trailer, this Court said, it was a new confrontation, and if the defendant still believed that it was necessary to kill the decedent to avoid his own imminent death, that belief was unreasonable.
Where the defendant is a battered wife, there is no analogue to the victim-turned-aggressor, who, as in Mize, turns the tables on the decedent in a fresh confrontation. Where the defendant is a battered wife, the affray out of which the killing arises can be a continuing assault. There was evidence before the jury that it had not been defendant but her husband who had initiated “the affray,” which the jury could have regarded as lasting twenty years, three days, or any number of hours preceding his death. And there was evidence from which the jury could infer that in *275defendant’s mind the affray reached beyond the moment at which her husband fell asleep. Like the ongoing threats of death or great bodily harm, which she might reasonably have perceived as imminent, her husband continued to be the aggressor and she the victim.
Finally, the fourth element of self-defense poses the question of whether there was any evidence tending to show that the force used by defendant to repel her husband was not excessive, that is, more than reasonably appeared to be necessary under the circumstances. This question is answered in part by abundant testimony describing defendant’s immobilization by fear caused by abuse by her husband. Three witnesses, including the decedent’s best friend, all recounted incidents in which defendant passively accepted beating, kicks, commands, or humiliating affronts without striking back. From such evidence that she was paralyzed by her husband’s presence, a jury could infer that it reasonably appeared to defendant to be necessary to kill her husband in order ultimately to protect herself from the death he had threatened and from severe bodily injury, a foretaste of which she had already experienced.
In State v. Wingler, 184 N.C. 747, 115 S.E. 59 (1922), in which the defendant was found guilty for the murder of his wife, Justice (later Chief Justice) Stacy recognized the pain and oppression under which a woman suffers at the hands of an abusive husband: “The supreme tragedy of life is the immolation of woman. With a heavy hand, nature exacts from her a high tax of blood and tears.” Id. at 751, 115 S.E. at 61. By his barbaric conduct over the course of twenty years, J. T. Norman reduced the quality of the defendant’s life to such an abysmal state that, given the opportunity to do so, the jury might well have found that she was justified in acting in self-defense for the preservation of her tragic life.
It is to be remembered that defendant does not have the burden of persuasion as to self-defense; the burden remains with the state to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that defendant intentionally killed decedent without excuse or justification. See State v. Mash, 323 N.C. 339, 346, 372 S.E. 2d 532, 537 (1988) (the state must satisfy the jury beyond a reasonable doubt that, despite evidence of intoxication, defendant did form a deliberate and *276premeditated intent to kill). If the evidence in support of self-defense is sufficient to create a reasonable doubt in the mind of a rational juror whether the state has proved an intentional killing without justification or excuse, self-defense must be submitted to the jury. This is such a case.

. This interpretation of the meaning of “imminent” is reflected in the Comments to the Model Penal Code: “The actor must believe that his defensive action is immediately necessary and the unlawful force against which he defends must be force that he apprehends will be used on the present occasion, but he need not ap prehend that it will be immediately used.” Model Penal Code § 3.04 comment (ALI 1985).