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Commonwealth v. Boczkowski3/23/2004
affirmative when officers asserted that he had been involved in his wife's death.
Trial testimony also established that in the months preceding Maryann's death, appellant had attempted to portray her to friends as an alcoholic. Maryann's longtime friends, however, testified that they rarely saw Maryann intoxicated. In addition, appellant stipulated that he was the beneficiary of a $100,000 life insurance policy on Maryann's life. Appellant also made incriminating statements to fellow inmates at the Allegheny County Jail, admitting his culpability for the deaths of both Maryann and his previous wife, Elaine, and responding to an inmate query regarding why he had killed both wives in the same manner with, "I don't know. That was stupid, wasn't it."
Independent trial evidence established that appellant's former wife, Elaine Boczkowski, had been found dead in her bathtub in Greensboro, North Carolina, on November 4, 1990. The factual circumstances of that death bore a marked similarity to the circumstances surrounding Maryann's death: Elaine died in her bathtub, Maryann in a hot tub. Both women were in their thirties and in good health. Appellant reported to the North Carolina police that Elaine had been drinking alcoholic beverages before entering the bathtub; he told Ross Township police that Maryann had been drinking prior to entering the hot tub. Appellant told police in both jurisdictions that he and his wife had a minor argument on the evening before the death. In each case, police noticed that appellant had fresh scratch marks on his arms, hands and torso shortly after his wife's death. The autopsies of both women revealed that they had died from asphyxiation, not drowning.
The foregoing evidence adequately supports the jury's finding that Maryann Boczkowski was unlawfully killed, that appellant, who was found with her, killed her, that he acted with the specific intent to kill when he applied blunt force to Maryann's neck, and that the killing was done with premeditation and deliberation.
Turning to appellant's specific sufficiency claim, he argues that the evidence was insufficient to prove that Maryann Boczkowski's death resulted from a homicide rather than an accident. In support of this claim, appellant points to the testimony of both the Commonwealth's pathologist, who performed the autopsy on Maryann, and the defense pathologist. Their findings, appellant argues, are more consistent with accidental drowning than manual strangulation. Appellant suggests that the Commonwealth's pathologist vacillated in his testimony regarding the cause of Maryann's death. The record does not support his argument. The Commonwealth's pathologist testified consistently that the cause of death was manual strangulation. Although appellant's own pathologist testified that the cause of death was drowning, this is of no avail on a sufficiency claim: appellant's argument is fatally flawed because it rests only on the evidence submitted by the defense, evidence which the jury was not obligated to accept. Commonwealth v. Tharp, 830 A.2d 519, 527 (Pa. 2003).
II. Claims of Pre-Trial Error
Appellant raises eight claims of pre-trial error: one claim that his rights under former Pa.R.Crim.P. 1100 were violated; four claims involving his motion in limine seeking to limit the introduction of evidence regarding the murder of his former wife in North Carolina; and three claims of error on the part of the suppression court.
Appellant first claims that the trial court erred in denying his motion to dismiss the charges against him under former Rule 1100. In reviewing the Rule 1100 determination of the trial court, we "must view the facts in the light most f
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