Justices Affirm Death Penalty for Killer of 3 : Rule That Jury Needn’t Be Told About Showing Mercy

The state Supreme Court on Thursday upheld the death penalty for the convicted killer of three people in Los Angeles in 1979, rejecting claims that jurors should have been instructed they could exercise mercy and spare the defendant’s life.

With newly appointed Justice Joyce L. Kennard writing her first majority opinion, the court refused in a 6-1 decision to grant a retrial of the penalty phase to Jesse James Andrews, 39, who was found guilty of murdering two men and a woman during a drug-related robbery.

Andrews’ contention that his sentence was disproportionate to the crime was “devoid of merit,” Kennard said. “In an attempt to obtain drugs and money, the defendant committed three cold-blooded killings. He beat all three victims, raped and sodomized one, and strangled two with wire coat hangers.”

No Obligation

The court said also that contrary to Andrews’ claims, the trial judge had no duty to tell jurors they could show the defendant mercy. In any event, the justices said, the jury was told it could consider “compassion” or “any other aspect about the defendant’s character or record” that would justify a sentence of life in prison rather than death.

In dissent, Justice Stanley Mosk agreed with the rest of the court that Andrews’ conviction should be affirmed. But Mosk said the sentence should be overturned because jurors were not instructed they could exercise mercy. It was thus reasonably possible that the jury incorrectly believed it could not be merciful, Mosk said.

In a capital case, jurors must be told of their “absolute power . . . to choose life over death--whether or not the defendant deserves sympathy--simply because life is desirable and death is not,” he said.

Mosk’s dissent also criticized much of the reasoning of Kennard’s opinion--her first for the majority since taking the bench last April as an appointee of Gov. George Deukmejian.

While judges frequently question each other’s legal reasoning, Mosk, the court’s senior justice, appeared to go to unusual lengths in finding fault with Kennard’s analysis of the issues in the case.

Twice, Mosk said the majority’s reasoning “leaves something to be desired.” Twice more, he said the majority justices “miss the point” on an issue. In a discussion of two recent federal decisions, the analysis “appears unnecessary (and) also appears wrong,” he said. And in yet another instance, the majority said “not a word” about a significant issue, Mosk said.

State Deputy Atty. Gen. William T. Harter called the ruling a “just result,” and said in view of the brutal nature of the crime, it was unlikely the jury would have been influenced by the instruction Mosk said should have been given. “The defendant was not someone who was going to generate much merciful feeling,” Harter said.

Tape-Recorded Statement

State Deputy Public Defender Therene Powell assailed the ruling as “very disturbing” and said she would seek a rehearing on Andrews’ behalf. Powell took particular issue with the court’s approval of the admission of a tape-recorded statement to police by an accomplice accusing Andrews of the crime. That statement, which was offered by the prosecution to support the accomplice’s testimony at trial, was not admitted as evidence in an initial trial for Andrews that ended in a hung jury, Powell noted.

“This conviction rested almost entirely on the accomplice’s testimony,” Powell said. “There was a real possibility--as the first jury must have felt--that an innocent person was being convicted. This case is not nearly as strong as the court makes it out to be . . . but apparently the court has no qualms about affirming the conviction and the sentence of death.”

Andrews had been serving a prison sentence in Alabama for murder--committed when he was 16--before he escaped on Christmas Day 1977.

Two years later, according to authorities, Andrews and an accomplice, Charles Sanders, devised a plan to rob Preston Wheeler at his Crenshaw District apartment in Los Angeles. On Dec. 9, 1979, the two went to the apartment in a search for drugs and money, and Andrews went on a rampage, killing Wheeler, 22; Patricia Brandon, 19, a friend of Wheeler; and Ronald Chism, 28, a neighbor visiting Wheeler, police said.

Mistrial and Retrial

Andrews’ first trial ended in a jury deadlock in November, 1983, and he was retried early the next year. Sanders testified against Andrews and, in an agreement with prosecutors, pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and was sentenced to a term of 17 years to life in prison. Andrews did not testify and the defense concentrated mainly on attacking Sanders’ testimony as a self-serving effort to gain leniency.

In addition to Sanders, prosecutors called another witness, a relative of Sanders, who testified that Andrews had admitted to her that he had participated in the crime. Jurors also received evidence that Andrews’ palm print was found on the kitchen floor near Brandon’s body. Andrews was found guilty and later sentenced to death by Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Aurelio N. Munoz.