Cox v. State

Collins, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. This is an appeal by Richard Cox, appellant, born January 29, 1928, from a judgment and sentence of death for the murder of William Richman in Baltimore City on May 12, 1948. One Nathan Richman, with his wife, occupied the upstairs front bedroom at 800 Druid Hill Avenue in Baltimore on May 12, 1948. The back bedroom was occupied by the son, William Richman and his wife.

About 4:15 a. m. Nathan Richman heard someone opening a window in his bedroom. He called to his son in the back bedroom. Someone came through the window while Nathan was sitting on the bed and told him to “shut up” and used profane language.

He said this man had a black gun, his face was covered, and he was wearing a khaki jacket. The son came to the door of the bedroom and Nathan heard a shot. He seized a night lamp, threw it through the window and called for the police. His son was lying in the corner on the floor and the intruder was running out of the room.

He said the man who was in the room was the one who fired the shot. Mrs. Hanna Richman, the wife of William, testified that she and her husband were awakened about 4 a. m. on the morning of May 12, 1948, and heard Mr. Nathan Richman calling her husband by his Jewish name. They both jumped up and her husband ran- ahead of her and as he ran in the door he was shot. She then heard a ⁵²⁹ “scuffling of feet, and I heard a crack.

It must have been when Willy was hit on the head, and I started to run. As I reached the doorway, that was the room before their room, this colored fellow ran right by me and I turned and I saw the top of his head as he went down the stairs.” The injured man was taken to the hospital at 4:30 a. m. May 12, 1948. He was later operated on and a .45 caliber bullet was removed from his body.

He died at 11:25 a. m. on May 14, 1948, of a bullet wound in his chest with generalized peritonitis. Neither Nathan nor Hanna Richman were able to identify the appellant. The wife of Nathan Richman was ill and unable to testify. A confession of the crime was admitted in evidence, after examination and cross-examination as to its admissibility.

According to this confession the appellant told the officers that he realized what he was saying was freely and voluntarily said on his part, that he was not promised anything, beaten, or threatened in any way, and that he wanted to talk about the case. He said he left school in the seventh grade. He also attended a vocational school for about six months and quit when he was sixteen years of age. He had not worked for three months before the commission of the crime.

He was in a lunchroom in the early morning of May 12, 1948, listening to records. He had a .45 automatic pistol in his pocket which he had loaded before leaving home. He was walking by the premises at 800 Druid Hill Avenue and saw the upstairs window on the right side open. He knew that Mr. Richman ran the store on the first floor.

He found the doors and windows on the first floor locked. He said he wanted to get into the store to get something to eat. He did not know whether any one lived upstairs or not. The reason he loaded the gun was “if anyone was in there I could use the gun to scare them away so I could get out.” He did not plan to use the gun on any one unless they prevented him getting out.

When he climbed up to the window he saw Venetian blinds and thought some one might be living there. He had the gun in his hand at that time. The window was open about two feet and the Venetian blinds ⁵³⁰ in back of the window were all the way down. He reached the window by climbing up the porch next door and putting his foot on the rainpipe.

He said he had on an Army jacket, blue pants, navy cap, suede shoes with rubber soles, which were later found in his home. He identified these clothes when shown him by the officer. The suede shoes helped him climp up to the window. He released the safety release on his gun when he was getting ready to “come into the window”.

He had a blue polka dot handkerchief over his face across the bridge of his nose so that he could not be identified. He pushed the Venetian blinds aside and went in the window “head first” at about 4 a. m. He said when he pushed the Venetian blinds aside and got into the room “the old man heard me coming, jumped up from the bed and hollered some kind of language I didn’t understand and pointed by waving his hands towards the hallway.” Cox said he had his hand on the trigger to hold the gun. He said he “didn’t say anything to the old man.

He was hollering for his son and his son came running out from the other room. The boy turned on the light when he got up, before he came into the old man’s room. The young man ran towards me when the old man hollered. I was trying to get out and the son ran into me and we struggled and the gun went off.” He was trying to get out of the house.

When the gun went off he said that William Eichman “was still holding onto the gun but then I swung it and hit him on the head with the barrel.” The gun went off once. He said: “I hit him in the head to get him off of me as I didn’t know if he was shot or not.” He then ran down the steps to the first floor, unlocked the side door and went out. He said that he intended to burglarize the place when he went in. After he got outside he threw the mask away.

He walked to the viaduct on Orleans Street and then went home. The next morning he heard people on the street talking about the shooting. He put his gun in the basement and later took it to his brother’s house. He did not go home again because he was afraid his finger prints would be found on ⁵³¹ the shell that came out of the gun when he shot it.

He left Baltimore the next day and went to Washington where he stayed half a day. He then went to Philadelphia and stayed for one day, and then returned to Baltimore. The appellant claims that the confession should not have been admitted in evidence because the State failed to meet the burden of proof that it was voluntary. The State offered the following evidence: Acting on certain information, Officer Simonsen watched a certain neighborhood about 12:30 a. m. on May 26th and there saw Richard Cox.

He approached Cox and asked him hiá name. Cox replied that his name was Eric Johnson. He was then asked where he lived. He replied 513 Druid Hill.

The officer knew there was no such address as 513 Druid Hill. The officer asked him who lived on the first floor. Cox could not answer that question. He was then placed under arrest and taken to the North Western Police Station.

A stipulation was entered into by the State and the defendant, through his counsel, and was filed in the case. This stipulation shows that Richard Cox was taken to the North Western Police Station and docketed at 12:35 a. m., May 26, 1948. He was questioned there by Lieutenant Burk between the hours of 3 a. m. and 5 a. m. on May 26; between 12:30 a. m. and 3:30 a. m., and 6 a. m. and 7:15 a. m. on May 27th; and between 1 a. m. and 4 a. m. on May 28th. He remained in his cell until 7:50 a. m. on May 28th when he was delivered to Lieutenant Burk.

He made his confession at 10:50 a. m. that day. The appellant testified, when called only for the limited purpose of showing that his confession was involuntary, that after he was struck twice on the arm and leg with a police club he admitted certain burglaries. He said after he was beaten and smacked twice by Lieutenant Burk and Officer Simonsen, he was forced to sign the statement about the murder. He said while he was at the police station he had food and sleep.

When asked when he slept, he said: “Well, not much, maybe a couple of hours.” On cross-examination as to whether his con ⁵³² fession was voluntary, appellant admitted that he did not tell one Christine Reed who visited him at the police station, that he had been beaten. Appellant also admitted that he told the Assistant State’s Attorney, when he was questioned before making his confession, that the statement was made freely and voluntarily on his part, that he had not been beaten or threatened in any way, and that he had no complaints about the way he was treated. He said the reason he told this to the Assistant State’s Attorney was because he was afraid that he would be taken “back upstairs”. All of the officers connected with the case denied that the accused was beaten or threatened.

Evidence was offered to show that the police officers charged with the investigation of the murder were assigned to night duty, and that is why appellant was questioned during the early morning hours. The State also offered evidence to show that when he was taken to various locations in the city it was done at appellant’s direction as he wanted to show the officer certain things apparently connected with burglaries and the murder. At the time the appellant made his confession in this case he had not been charged with killing William Rich-man and had not been brought before the justice of the peace sitting at the police station. In England, according to Wigmore, there appear to have been four distinct stages in the history of law regarding use of confessions.

In the earliest stage, no further back than the time of the Tudors and the Stuarts, there was no restriction upon the reception of confessions. In the second stage, comprising the second half of the 1700s, the matter of admission of confessions began to be considered and it became recognized that some confessions should be rejected as untrustworthy. In the third stage, comprising the 1800s, the principle of exclusion was developed, under certain influences, to be abnormal extent and exclusion became the rule, admission the exception. In the last stage a reaction sets in here and there, but it represents a future rather than a pres ⁵³³ ent movement and little is accomplished in the way of changing the law or practice.

Wigmore on Evidence, 3rd Edition, Sections 817, 818, 819, and 820. In the case of Rex v. Voisin, (1918), 1 K. B. 531; 87 L. J. K. B. 574; 118 L. T. 654; 82 J. P. 96; 34 T. L. R. 263; 62 Sol. Jo. 423; 26 Cox C. C. 224; 13 Cr. App. Rep. 89, C. C. A., part of the body of the deceased was found wrapped in a paper containing the words “Bladie Belgian”.

The prisoner, not charged with the crime but detained in custody for inquiries, was asked whether he had any objection to writing the two words “Bloody Belgian”. He replied: “Not at all” and wrote “Bladie Belgian”. It was argued by the defense that the writing was inadmissible in evidence on the ground that it was obtained by the police without having first cautioned the prisoner and while he was in custody. It was said in that case: “It has long been established as a positive rule of English criminal law, that no statement by an accused is admissible in evidence against him unless it is shown by the prosecution to have been a voluntary statement, in the sense that it has not been obtained from him either by fear of prejudice or hope of advantage exercised or held out by a person in authority.” The Court further said, in holding this paper admissible, that the question as to whether a person had been duly cautioned before the statement was made is one of the circumstances to be taken into consideraton by the judge, who should exercise his discretion.

It could not be said as a matter of law that the absence of a caution makes the statement inadmissible. The Court said that the mere fact that the words were written at the request of police officers while he was being detained at the police station did not make the writing inadmissible in evidence. The Court further said in that case: “It is desirable in the interests of the community that investigations into crime should not be cramped.” In the case of Rex v. Grayson, (1921), 16 Cr. App. Rep. 7, C. C. A., the appellant and two other men were convicted for shop-breaking.

The police questioned the ap ⁵³⁴ pellant before trial and accepted statements of the other two men, both of whom pleaded guilty at the trial implicating appellant. The Court, in reversing conviction, held that the police had no right to examine appellant or to invite statements against him from other persons in custody whose sole aim was to throw blame upon the appellant. The only evidence against him was the statement given at the police station by two other prisoners. In Gach v. Rex (Canada 1943), 2 D. L. R. 417; S. C. R. 250; 79 Can.

C. C. 221, it was held that when a person has been arrested, all confessions made by him to a person in authority as a result of questioning are inadmissible in evidence unless a proper caution has been given, because the accused may expect from a person in authority some advantage. In Rex v. Lantin (Canada 1943), 80 Can. C. C. 375,