 |
 |
to fill out a simple form to connect to DUI Lawyers in your area.
|
|
|
|
|
North Carolina v. McLaughlin9/7/1988
. Such is not the case here. Here, the State's evidence showed that defendant carefully planned James Worley's murder and schemed about how best to accomplish it. In none of the cases found disproportionate had the
defendant killed another person prior to the murder for which he received the death penalty. Here, defendant had killed once before the James Worley murder and he killed again, twice, after it to cover his involvement. In Stokes and Young, the defendants were relatively young. In Bondurant, the defendant tried to help his victim and exhibited great remorse. In Stokes, Bondurant, Hill and Jackson, the defendants were drunk or mentally impaired at the time of the crimes. Here, none of these mitigating factors existed. We are unable to conclude that defendant's murder of James Worley "does not rise to the level of those murders in which we have approved the death sentence upon proportionality review." State v. Jackson, 309 N.C. at 46, 305 S.E.2d at 717.
Defendant compares his case with State v. Young, 312 N.C. 669, 325 S.E.2d 181; State v. Whisenant, 308 N.C. 791, 303 S.E.2d 784 (1983); and State v. Jackson, 309 N.C. 26, 305 S.E.2d 703, because in common with defendant's case, they all involved the pecuniary gain aggravating circumstance, N.C.G.S. § 15A-2000(e)(6). Unlike Young, Whisenant and Jackson, however, defendant was a contract killer, not an armed robber. Defendant murdered James Worley, a man against whom he had no personal grudge, at the instigation of Worley's wife, for monetary consideration. The calculating nature of this contract killing is illustrated by defendant's preparations -- selecting the weapon and readying the gasoline -- and by his actions after the murder -- dressing the corpse and then burning it in the car to suggest accidental death. This was a cold-blooded contract murder, not comparable to the armed robbery felony-murders in Young, Whisenant and Jackson. We hold that defendant's violent history as well as his brutality and calculation in the killing and disfiguring of his victim's body and his total lack of remorse for the murder as demonstrated by his further murders of James Worley's wife and her small child fully support the jury's recommendation of death in this case.
We have addressed all of defendant's assignments of error and have scoured the record and transcript of his trial in all three cases. We conclude that defendant received a fair trial and a sentencing hearing free from prejudicial error before an impartial judge and jury. The convictions are supported by the evidence. The sentence of death is also supported by the evidence and is not disproportionate.
No error.
Disposition
No error.
Justice Frye dissenting as to sentence.
For the reasons expressed in the Chief Justice's dissenting opinion in State v. McKoy, 323 N.C. 1, 372 S.E.2d 12 (1988), which I joined, I believe the United States Supreme Court's decision in Mills v. Maryland, 486 U.S. , 100 L. Ed. 2d 384 (1988), requires that defendant be given a new sentencing hearing. Accordingly, I dissent from that portion of the Court's opinion which rejects defendant's argument based upon the holding of Mills. I concur in the remainder of the Court's opinion.
Page 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 North Carolina DUI Attorneys
DUI Lawyers
|
| |
to fill out a simple form to connect to DUI Lawyers in your area.
|
|