Justices Decline Guilty Plea of Man Asking Execution

Stressing the importance of “eliminating arbitrariness in the death penalty process,” the state Supreme Court on Monday rejected a guilty plea from a man who, for the second time in his life, had confessed to murder and asked to be executed.

The court also struck down the death sentence given to a convicted armed robber involved in a bloody 1980 shoot-out in a crowded Torrance department store.

The court has turned aside the death penalty in 38 of 41 capital cases since the latest death penalty law was enacted.

In the case of Robert L. Massie, the killer who asked to die, the court ruled 5 to 2 that guilty pleas may not be accepted in capital cases without the concurrence of defense lawyers, who must make certain that such pleas by their clients are “fully informed and competent.”

In Massie’s case, his attorney made it clear that he believed it was a mistake for Massie to plead guilty. Ultimately, however, when he was pressed by the trial court judge, the lawyer reluctantly agreed to a guilty plea.

Retired Justice Otto Kaus, writing for the majority, said, “Defense counsel formally ‘consented’ to the guilty plea only because he was unaware of his responsibility to act on the basis of his independent professional judgment. . . .”

A subsequent ruling by the court in the case of the People versus Chadd, together with a new state law, explicitly gives defense attorneys the option to override a client’s wishes when it is in the client’s best interest.

Kaus wrote that this was meant by the Legislature “to serve as a further independent safeguard against erroneous imposition of a death sentence.”

The concern is that without concurrence by a lawyer familiar with court proceedings, a defendant could plead guilty to a capital offense without being mentally competent or without being fully aware of the opportunity to defend himself.

This could lead to an unconstitutionally arbitrary application of the death penalty if an ill-informed person were put to death, while a more sophisticated defendant convicted of a more serious crime received a less-severe punishment.

In his dissent, Justice Malcolm Lucas pointed out that in this particular case, “although Massie’s lawyer informed the court that he had advised his client not to plead guilty, the fact remains that counsel did consent. “ (Lucas’ emphasis.)

Justice Stanley Mosk concurred.

Massie was accused of gunning down a San Francisco shopkeeper in January, 1979, less than one year after being paroled from a life sentence for the 1965 murder of a woman in San Gabriel.

Citing the “misery” of prison life, Massie had declined appeals and pleaded for his own speedy execution.

However, his scheduled 1967 execution was twice stayed by then-Gov. Ronald Reagan. When the state’s old death penalty law was voided as unconstitutional in 1972, Massie’s sentence was commuted to life. He was paroled in 1978.

In the second capital punishment case, the court decided 5 to 2 that Jose L. Fuentes was wrongly sentenced to die, because the jury had been improperly instructed about when capital punishment can be applied.

Chief Justice Rose Elizabeth Bird, writing for the majority, conceded that jurors agreed that Fuentes had shot and killed an armored-car guard during the robbery. However, she said the trial court erred when it neglected to instruct the jury to also consider whether Fuentes intended to kill. Because of that oversight, she wrote, the high court is bound by one of its earlier rulings, in the 1983 case of Carlos versus Superior Court, to strike down the finding of murder under special circumstances.

Murder in California is punishable by death only when it is committed under clearly defined circumstances. In the Fuentes case, the requisite circumstance was that the shooting occurred during the commission of a second felony, armed robbery. A clear intent to kill also must be demonstrated.

Lucas again strongly dissented from the majority, writing, “An intent to kill was demonstrated as a matter of law by (Fuentes’) act of firing five shots at point-blank range into the chest area of the Brinks guard. . . .”

Even if the question of intent had been considered, Lucas added, “it is simply inconceivable” that a reasonable defense could have been presented. Mosk also concurred.

Fuentes was convicted of joining with an unknown accomplice and trying to rob an armored-car guard picking up $85,000 in cash from the Torrance branch of Ohrbach’s in December, 1980. During an ensuing gunfight, the guard, Paul Martinez, was shot and killed. Fuentes was badly wounded. The second robber has never been caught.