[PUBLISH]
IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FILED
FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT COURT OF APPEALS
U.S.
________________________ ELEVENTH CIRCUIT
July 21, 2004
No. 98-6882 THOMAS K. KAHN
CLERK
________________________
D. C. Docket No. 94-02175-CV-B-E
JOHN W. PEOPLES, JR.,
Petitioner-Appellant,
versus
DONAL CAMPBELL, Commissioner
of the Alabama Department of Corrections,
ATTORNEY GENERAL OF THE STATE
OF ALABAMA,
Respondents-Appellees.
________________________
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Northern District of Alabama
_________________________
(July 21, 2004)
Before TJOFLAT, ANDERSON and MARCUS, Circuit Judges.
TJOFLAT, Circuit Judge:
On December 7, 1983, in the Circuit Court for Talladega County, Alabama,
a jury found the Petitioner, John W. Peoples, Jr., guilty on five counts of capital
murder.1 The trial judge accepted the jury’s sentencing recommendations2 and on
January 27, 1984, sentenced Peoples to death on each count. After exhausting his
direct-appeal and post-conviction remedies in state court, Peoples applied to the
United States District Court for the Northern District of Alabama for a writ of
habeas corpus. The district court denied relief, and Peoples now appeals. We
affirm.
1
The five counts alleged essentially read as follows: Count I, Peoples murdered Paul G.
Franklin, Jr. and Judy Franklin by striking them on the head with a rifle or other object, in
violation of Ala. Code § 13A-5-40(a)(10) (1975), as amended; Count II, Peoples murdered Paul
G. Franklin, Sr. by striking him on the head with a rifle or other object while abducting, or
attempting to abduct, him with the intent to inflict physical injury, in violation of Ala. Code §
13A-5-40 (a)(1) (1975), as amended; Count III, Peoples murdered Paul G. Franklin, Jr. by
striking him on the head with a rifle or other object while abducting, or attempting to abduct,
him, in violation of Ala. Code § 13-A-5-40(a)(1) (1975), as amended; Count IV, Peoples
murdered Paul G. Franklin, Sr. by striking him on the head with a rifle or other object while he
knowingly and unlawfully entered or remained unlawfully in Paul G. Franklin, Sr.’s dwelling
located at Rt. 2, Pell City, Alabama, with the intent to commit the crime of theft therein, and
while effecting entry or while in the dwelling or in the immediate flight therefrom Peoples or
Timothy Millard Gooden, a participant in said crime, was armed with a rifle, a deadly weapon, in
violation of Ala. Code § 13-A-5-40(a)(4) (1975), as amended; Count V, Peoples murdered Paul
G. Franklin, Sr. by striking him on the head with a rifle or other object while committing the theft
of a 1968 Corvette automobile or a Winchester .22 caliber rifle by threatening the imminent use
of force against Paul G. Franklin, Sr., with the intent to compel his acquiescence in the taking or
escaping with the property, while Peoples was armed with a deadly weapon, a rifle, in violation
of Ala. Code § 13A-5-40 (a)(2) (1975), as amended.
2
As indicated in Part II.B., infra, the jury, at the conclusion of the sentencing phase of the trial,
recommended that Peoples be sentenced to death for each murder by an 11-to-1 vote.
2
This opinion is organized as follows. In Part I, we recite the facts
established by the evidence presented to the jury during Peoples’s trial. Part II
recounts the procedural history of the case in the Alabama courts—at the
prosecution stage, on direct appeal, and on collateral attack— and in the district
court on habeas corpus. Part III states the issues we address and the legal
standards we apply in resolving them. In Part IV, we analyze these issues and
decide them. Part V briefly concludes.
I.
In the evening of Wednesday, July 6, 1983, after the sun had gone down,
Peoples, accompanied by his younger cousin, Timothy Gooden, drove his Toyota
pick-up truck to the lakeside residence of Paul and Judy Franklin in St. Clair
County, Alabama. Peoples went there intending to purchase Paul Franklin’s red
1968 Chevrolet Corvette.3 When the two men arrived, Peoples got out of the pick-
up truck and entered the residence. Meanwhile, Gooden drove off to a nearby
store to buy a pack of cigarettes. Gooden returned around 9:30 p.m., and he joined
Peoples and the Franklins who were sitting around a table.
3
Peoples knew about the Corvette because he had been a member of a work crew that built a
fence around the Franklins’s backyard and from time to time had performed odd jobs in and
around the Franklin residence.
3
Peoples soon left the table to look for the Franklins’ ten-year old son, Paul,
Jr. He found Paul, Jr. wearing his pajamas and watching television in another part
of the house, and he brought him to the table where Gooden and the boy’s parents
were sitting. At this point, Peoples asked Paul Franklin to sell him his Chevrolet
Corvette. Franklin refused, explaining he wanted to keep the car for his son.
Peoples persisted, but to no avail. So, he became angry and left the room.
Peoples returned moments later with Paul Franklin’s .22 caliber Winchester
rifle and some blankets and ropes. With Gooden’s help, he gagged and
blindfolded Judy Franklin and Paul, Jr., then took Paul Franklin4 downstairs to the
basement, leaving Gooden to keep an eye on Judy and the boy. In a minute or
two, Gooden heard a commotion from the basement and started down the stairs
with Judy and Paul, Jr. At this point, Judy Franklin nudged Gooden in the side; he
removed her gag, and she told him she needed to go to the bathroom. Gooden
consented. Once inside the bathroom, Judy Franklin found an eyebrow pencil,
scribbled the name “John Peoples” on the lid of the laundry hamper, and covered
the lid with clothing. When she left the bathroom, Gooden replaced her gag and
4
Paul Franklin was seriously disabled as a result of shrapnel injuries suffered in Vietnam. His
injuries substantially limited his mobility.
4
blindfold and took her and Paul, Jr. to the basement where they found Paul
Franklin lying on the floor by the pool table. He appeared to be dead.
Following Peoples’s instructions, Gooden moved the Toyota pick-up truck
to the basement door. That done, Peoples and Gooden secured Judy Franklin and
Paul, Jr. in the pick-up truck. Peoples then covered Paul Franklin’s body with a
blanket and placed it in the Corvette along with Franklin’s Winchester rifle. With
Gooden following in the pick-up truck, Peoples drove the Corvette to a wooded
area in neighboring Talladega County. After parking, he dragged Paul Franklin’s
body into the woods. On returning, he armed himself with the Winchester rifle
and took Judy and Paul, Jr. out of the truck. With Judy Franklin screaming and
begging for their lives, he pulled them into the woods. There, he murdered them
by crushing their skulls with the rifle. Gooden remained with the Corvette and
pick-up truck while all of this was taking place.
When Peoples had finished, he and Gooden returned to the Franklin
residence and rummaged around the house in search of money. They stayed for
ten to fifteen minutes then left. Peoples, driving the Corvette, went to his
apartment in the City of Talladega, at the Talladega Downs complex, arriving after
midnight. Gooden drove Peoples’s pick-up truck to his home, also located in
Talladega.
5
Barbara Eastwood, one of Peoples’s neighbors, was walking toward the
Talladega Downs when Peoples arrived at the apartment complex. After Peoples
got out of the Corvette, they had a brief conversation about the car, which she had
not seen before. He told her that it was an early birthday present for his wife. As
they were talking, she noticed what he was wearing—a light colored shirt and blue
jeans.
A half hour later, around 2:00 a.m., Peoples left his apartment with his wife
and drove to Gooden’s home to retrieve his pick-up truck. There, he showed
Gooden some cash—in excess of $1,100—and told him he would “fix him up”
later. After a brief conversation, Peoples and his wife departed.
Later that morning, Thursday, July 7, the Franklins’ housekeeper of three
years, Rosa Lee Truss, arrived at the Franklin residence. She found the front door
unlocked and no one at home. Most of the lights in the house and two television
sets were on, and the Corvette, which was usually parked in the garage, was
missing. As she began her housekeeping chores, “a little voice” told her that
something was wrong and to get out of the house.5 So, she left the residence in a
hurry.
5
Testifying as a prosecution witness at Peoples’s trial, Truss said that shortly after she turned on
the vacuum, she heard a voice telling her, “Rosa, get the hell out of here and now.”
6
Mr. Franklin’s mother, Rose Franklin, came to the Franklin residence at
approximately 2:00 p.m. that day and was surprised to find no one home. After
waiting at the house for some time, she became increasingly concerned. She
called her other son, Hugh Franklin, in Blakely, Georgia, and Dean Choron, Judy
Franklin’s mother, to find out if either knew the whereabouts of the family.
Neither had heard from Paul or Judy, so she called the St. Clair County Sheriff’s
Office to report that the family was missing.
That night, at around 8:00 p.m., two deputies in that office, Gary Cone and
Jimmy Martin, responding to the phone call, came to the Franklin residence. They
looked around the house but saw nothing suspicious. Nonetheless, they radioed a
message to the sheriff’s office that the Franklin family and their Corvette were
missing. Later, when the deputies returned to the sheriff’s office, Cone filed an
incident report and inputted the Corvette’s license tag number into the National
Crime Information Computer (the “NCIC”), which tracks and compiles a list of
automobiles reported as stolen or missing.
The following evening, Friday, July 8, Investigators Marvin Roye and Ed
Traylor of the Alabama Bureau of Investigation (the “ABI”) arrived at the Franklin
residence along with Owen Harmon, an investigator in the St. Clair County
Sheriff’s Office. Rose Franklin and Dean Choron greeted them when they arrived.
7
Among other things, the investigators wanted to know whether they had noticed
anything missing other than the Corvette. Both women had looked around the
house and felt that everything seemed to be in place; nothing appeared to be
missing. The inspectors spent approximately three hours going about the house.
When they came to the basement, to the place where the Corvette was usually
parked, they noticed a boot print in an oil slick on the floor. The print matched the
sole of one of the boots Peoples was wearing the night of July 6, when he and
Gooden came to the Franklin residence.
Two days later, on Sunday, July 10, with the Franklin family still missing,
Roye and Traylor returned to the residence. They discovered John Peoples’s name
written on the laundry hamper in the upstairs bathroom. Dean Choron recognized
the handwriting as her daughter’s. When Roye asked her if the name John Peoples
was familiar to her, she told him that she had heard the name mentioned but had
never met the man. Rose Franklin said that a John Peoples had done some work
around the house, had borrowed money from her son in the past, and recently had
been trying to borrow more money.
The next day, Monday, July 11, Paul Wesson, the owner and proprietor of
Wesson’s Pharmacy, which was located in Childersburg, Alabama, called the
town’s chief of police, Ira Finn. A man was trying to sell Wesson a red 1968
8
Corvette, and he was interested in buying it. Something about the offer seemed
strange, though, so Wesson decided to call the chief to find out if anything was
amiss about the car. Finn was aware that a red 1968 Corvette had been reported as
missing on the NCIC. He told Wesson that another police department was looking
for a car like the one he was describing and that some of his officers would be
arriving at the drug store in a few minutes.
Shortly after 1:30 p.m., two squad cars carrying Captain Lewis Finn and
Officers Harlow and Watson arrived at the drug store. The Corvette was parked in
front of the store; Peoples was inside the store with Wesson. Captain Finn told
Peoples why they were there and asked him if he would be willing to come down
to the Childersburg police station to discuss the matter. Peoples agreed. He drove
the Corvette to the station, with Harlow as a passenger; Finn and Watson drove the
squad cars. Meanwhile, Chief Finn notified Investigators Traylor and Harmon
that a Corvette matching the missing car’s description had been located and that
the man possessing it was on his way to see him.
Peoples got to the police station at approximately 1:55 p.m. and met with
Chief Finn. Peoples told Finn that he had purchased the car from Paul Franklin
and produced a handwritten document, which he referred to as a “Bill of Sale,”
which reads “I Paul Franklin trade John Peoples one 1968 Corvette for 50 percent
9
ownership of the C. J. Supper Club.” The document bears the following
signatures: “Paul G. Franklin, John W. Peoples, and Judy Franklin.” Two sets of
figures, also handwritten, appear at the bottom of the document: “1946785406573
and 59A7093 59-5560.”6
Traylor and Harmon arrived at the police station at 2:15 p.m. and met with
Chief Finn for twenty to thirty minutes. After that, they met with Peoples and read
him his Miranda rights. They then asked him about the circumstances surrounding
his acquisition of the Corvette and the document he had given Chief Finn. At
some point during the interview, Traylor asked Peoples if he would give them
permission to search the Corvette, his Toyota pick-up truck, and his apartment in
Talladega. Peoples agreed and signed a “Permission to Search” form.
After he executed the form, Peoples and the two investigators left the police
station and rode to the home of Peoples’s parents in Childersburg, where he had
left his pick-up truck. The investigators surveyed the truck but found nothing of
interest. Next, they headed to Talladega to search Peoples’s apartment. There,
Traylor found a box of dirty clothes which contained a light-colored shirt and a
6
The State’s case-in-chief included handwriting-comparison evidence that the signature Paul G.
Franklin was written by Judy Franklin.
10
pair of blue jeans that appeared to be blood-stained.7 Peoples was wearing these
clothes when he encountered Barbara Easterwood outside the Taladega Downs
apartment complex the night of the murders. When Traylor inquired about the
stains, Peoples, now visibly upset, explained that they were probably caused by
barbecue sauce he spilled while barbecuing on the Fourth of July. Traylor took
custody of the shirt and blue jeans (and they were introduced into evidence at
Peoples’s trial).
On July 13, 1983, law enforcement officers recovered the bodies of the
missing Franklins in a wooded area near Talladega County Road No. 377.
Sometime around midnight on July 14, or very early the next day, July 15, Traylor
and Harmon showed Gooden the blood-stained shirt and blue jeans they had
recovered from Peoples’s apartment.8 They had learned that Gooden was present
when Peoples acquired the Corvette. At this point, Gooden decided to lead them
to the location where the bodies had been found on July 13. He took them there
shortly after daylight, and he told them how the murders had occurred.
The next week, on Tuesday, July 19, Peoples, who had at some point been
taken to the Ashville County Jail, gave Neil Woodall, a police officer in Ashville,
7
Paul, Jr.’s blood had caused the stains. Fibers from Paul, Jr.’s pajamas were also found on the
shirt and blue jeans.
8
By this time, the police had determined that the stains were blood stains.
11
a handwritten note in which he stated that he wanted to see the Sheriff of St. Clair
County, Lewis Brown. Brown promptly came to the jail, arriving around 8:30
p.m. Peoples told Brown that he also wanted to speak to the Sheriff of Talladega
County, Jerry Studdard, so Brown summoned him to the jail. When Studdard
arrived, Peoples told the two sheriffs that he wanted to tell them something.
Brown asked him if he wanted an attorney present. Peoples said yes, Ray
Robbins. Brown found Robbins’s home telephone number in the telephone book
and gave it to Peoples. Peoples dialed the number but received no answer. Brown
then asked Peoples if he would like to try another attorney. Peoples suggested
George Sims. Brown called information for Sims’s telephone number and gave it
to Peoples. Peoples then said he did not need an attorney; he would “just speak to
y’all.” Brown began reading Peoples his Miranda rights, but Peoples interrupted,
pointing out that he had “heard those hundreds of times. I probably know more
about them than you do.” Brown nevertheless continued reading Peoples his
rights.
After Peoples acknowledged that he understood his Miranda rights and
repeated that he did not want to have an attorney present, he began telling the
12
sheriffs what was on his mind and promptly confessed to the crime.9 He told the
sheriffs where they could find the blanket he used to cover Paul Franklin’s body.
He also informed them of the approximate location of the rifle he had used to
murder Judy Franklin and Paul, Jr. When he finished, Peoples wrote a brief
statement on a waiver of rights form he and the two sheriffs had signed. The
statement reads, “The Case I am in I did DO IT Concerning the Franklin Family I
did DO IT.” After making this statement, Peoples told the sheriffs that he felt
relieved sharing this information with them.
Three days later, on Friday, July 22, 1983, Peoples volunteered to take Terry
Brewer and Ricky Daniel, deputies in the Talladega County Sheriff’s Office, to the
murder weapon which the police had not been able to locate. Daniel immediately
read Peoples his Miranda rights from a waiver of rights form, and Peoples signed
the form. He also initialed the following statement that Daniel had added to the
form: “I already have a Lawyer, but I do not wish to talk to him or have him
present with me at this time.” After this, Peoples led Daniel and Brewer to the .22
caliber Winchester rifle he had taken from the Franklin residence on July 6. He
9
After Brown finished reading Peoples his rights, Peoples told him that he understood them then
repeated that he wanted to speak to the two sheriffs and that he did not want to call a lawyer. He
added, however, that he did not want them to write down what he said or to tape record the
conversation. The sheriffs agreed to this request.
13
had wrapped the rifle in an orange towel and hidden it in some underbrush shortly
after committing the murders. The rifle was noticeably bent and damaged.
Strands of hair stuck to the rifle’s barrel were “microscopically consistent” with
Judy Franklin’s hair. Autopsy findings confirmed that Judy Franklin and Paul, Jr.
had died as a result of blunt trauma to the skull; these findings were consistent
with the impact a tremendous blow from the rifle would cause.
II.
A.
On August 3, 1983, a Talladega County grand jury indicted Peoples for the
Franklin murders.10 After the indictment was lodged in the Talladaga County
Circuit Court, William A. Short, Jr., a lawyer practicing out of Bessemer,
Alabama, filed his appearance as Peoples’s attorney. Short represented Peoples
throughout the pretrial, trial and sentencing proceedings in the Talladega County
Circuit Court and, after Peoples was convicted and sentenced, prosecuted his
appeals to the Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals and the Alabama Supreme
Court. Short also represented Peoples in his collateral attacks on his convictions
and sentences in the Alabama courts.
10
See supra note 1.
14
On August 19, Short moved the circuit court to dismiss the indictment on
the ground that the State had granted Peoples immunity.11 Short alleged that,
during the period July 13 – 15, an Assistant District Attorney of St. Clair County,
Dennis Abbott, had promised Peoples that if he “would give a statement[,] assist
law enforcement authorities in locating the bodies of the victims . . . and submit to
a polygraph examination[,] he would not be further charged in the matter.” Short
further alleged that Peoples gave the statement and assisted the police in locating
the victims’ bodies, and that he was prepared to take a polygraph examination
when the District Attorney of Talladega County, Robert Rumsey, acting for the
State of Alabama, revoked Abbott’s offer of immunity.
The court held an evidentiary hearing on the motion on October 4, 1983.
On October 14, it entered a written order denying the motion. In the order, the
court found the following facts:12 On July 13, Peoples, still insisting that he
11
On August 19, Short also moved the circuit court for a change of venue—to a county where
the publicity about the case had been minimal. Short renewed his motion on August 30 and
November 11, as the publicity increased. The court denied his motion on each occasion. Venue
is not an issue in this appeal; hence, we do not discuss it further.
12
Many pieces of evidence on which the court based its findings of fact were not presented to
the jury during the trial. For example, the jury heard nothing about the events that transpired
between Traylor and Harmon’s search of Peoples’s Talladega Downs apartment (where they
found the blood-stained shirt and blue jeans) in the afternoon of July 11 and Peoples’s note to
Officer Woodall on July 19, stating that Peoples wanted to see Sheriff Brown. The same is true
with respect to the evidence introduced at the suppression hearing the circuit court held on
December 1 and 2 (during Peoples’s trial), and at the hearing held on Peoples’s motion for a new
trial. See infra Parts II.B and II.C. Much of the testimony the court heard at those two hearings
15
bought the allegedly stolen Corvette from Paul Franklin and that he had no
knowledge of the Franklins’ disappearance, informed an officer at the St. Clair
County jail (where he was being detained in connection with his arrest for the theft
of the 1968 Corvette) that he wanted to take a polygraph examination. After
Peoples discussed the matter with Ray Robbins, his attorney, Robbins met with
Dennis Abbott, and they agreed that if Peoples submitted to a polygraph
examination and the examination “establish[ed] that he was not involved in the
disappearance and murders of the Franklins,” he would be released from custody
on the theft charge. On July 15, Peoples, accompanied by Robbins, appeared in
Gadsden, Alabama, for the polygraph examination. The examiner told Peoples
that he would ask him these questions: “did he take the Franklin family from their
house that night; did he hit Judy Franklin in the head last week; were you
physically present when Judy Franklin was hit in the head; and do you know for
sure who hit Judy Franklin.”13 At that point, Peoples “said that he was having
trouble remembering if he committed the crime.” Then, after the examiner “told
[him] that if he lied during the examination the test would show it, [Peoples]
was not presented to the jury.
13
The court found that before the examiner informed Peoples that he would be asked these
questions, Peoples “told the examiner he wanted two questions asked: did he kill all of the
Franklins at the same time; and did he kill all of them at their house. The examiner told him that
those would not be the questions.”
16
refused to take the polygraph examination.” Peoples later “acknowledged . . . that
the story [he] had told was false.”
The court found that “[t]he reason [Peoples] refused to take the polygraph
examination was that he knew or believed the examination would show that the
story he had been telling that he was not involved in the murders was false and
would show that in fact he was involved in the murders.” Assuming that the State
had struck the immunity agreement Peoples alleged it had made, the court found
that “his refusal to take the examination amounted to a material breach of the
agreement’s terms.” The court concluded its findings with this statement: “none
of the . . . representatives of the State of Alabama violated any agreement with
[Peoples], revoked or attempted to revoke any agreement with [him], or engage[d]
in any trickery, deceit, or sharp practices involving him.”
On August 19, the same day he moved the court to dismiss the indictment,
Short moved the court to suppress “any and all statements and the fruits thereof
including physical evidence [Peoples gave] to any law enforcement officer after he
was taken to police headquarters in Childersburg” on July 11, 1983. According to
Short, the police arrested Peoples at Wesson’s Pharmacy without probable cause;
17
therefore, what Peoples said and gave (the Bill of Sale)14 to Chief Finn and
Inspectors Traylor and Harmon at the police station, the evidence Traylor and
Harmon obtained at his apartment with his consent, and the incriminating evidence
he disclosed (including the location of the victims’ bodies and Paul Franklin’s 22.
caliber Winchester rifle) after he was taken to the St. Clair County jail and held for
the theft of the 1968 Corvette constituted the fruit of a poisonous tree. The court
deferred ruling on the motion to suppress until trial.
B.
The trial began on November 30, 1983.15 The court entertained Peoples’s
motion to suppress during the second and third days of the proceeding. What
prompted the hearing was a question the prosecutor put to Investigator Ed Traylor.
The prosecutor asked Traylor whether he had a conversation with Peoples on July
11 at the Childersburg Police Station; Short objected, and the court excused the
jury. The prosecutor thereafter presented the testimony of the law enforcement
14
As recounted in Part I, supra, the purported bill of sale stated that Peoples had traded his
ownership rights in a supper club in exchange for Paul Franklin’s Corvette. Curtis Jackson, the
actual owner of the supper club, informed the Chief on July 11 that Peoples did not have the
rights in the club that he purported to “trade.”
15
On November 28, Short moved the court to allow Peoples to act as co-counsel during the trial.
The court granted the motion. As far as we can tell, however, other than conferring with Short,
Peoples remained silent throughout the guilt and penalty phases of the trial.
18
officers who had interacted with Peoples at Wesson’s Pharmacy and at the police
station.16
Captain Finn told of encountering Peoples at Wesson’s Pharmacy and
asking him to accompany him and Officers Harlow and Watson to the police
station to see Chief Finn. They arrived at the police station shortly before 2:00
p.m. and took Peoples to Chief Finn’s office.17 Chief Finn described what took
place next:
John - he was asking me why the hell we had him, what we were arresting
him for and I told him we did not arrest him. What we was after, I said,
“John, see right here in the paper, this car is on the NCIC Machine and it’s
also in the paper and I had it wrote down on this big pad on my desk.” I had
the tag number and all and I said this car is reported stolen from Pell City,
and three members of a family.
Peoples responded to what Finn said by throwing down a handwritten document,
and exclaiming, “Well, by God, I didn’t steal the damn car. I’ve got [this] bill of
sale for it.” (The “Bill of Sale” is described in Part I, supra. It was introduced into
16
The prosecutor also presented the testimony of the Sheriffs of St. Clair and Talladega
Counties, Brown and Studdard, who on July 19 received from Peoples the statement quoted in
Part I, supra, and Deputies Brewer and Daniels of the Talladega County Sheriff’s Office, whom
Peoples led to the location of Paul Franklin’s .22 caliber Winchester rifle on July 22. The
testimony the deputies gave at the suppression hearing described in the text was essentially
repeated before the jury after the court denied Peoples’s motion to suppress. See supra Part I.
17
On March 12, 1984, during Peoples’ motion for a new trial, Chief Finn explained that he had
known Peoples “all his life” because Finn’s grandfather-in-law was the brother of Peoples’
grandfather, and Finn spoke with Peoples’s father on numerous occasions.
19
evidence after the court denied Peoples’s motion to suppress.) Chief Finn looked
at the document and said, “well that ain’t too much [of] a bill of sale. It’s not
notarized.” In response, Peoples said, “well, I’ve got a goddamn tag receipt” and
slammed down another piece of paper on the Chief’s desk. At this point, Chief
Finn said, “Well, John, me and you don’t have too much problems. . . . Now, I do
have a warrant on you for a bad check.” Peoples asked, “who in the hell got that?”
and Chief Finn answered, “Mr. Dennis out there at the auction barn.” Peoples
replied, “Well, I done told that son-of-a-bitch when I was going to pick this check
up.” Finn concluded the conversation by telling Peoples, “Well me and you don’t
have any problems. We are waiting for the ABI [Alabama Bureau of
Investigators] to get down here.”
When the hearing ended, on December 2, the court read its findings of fact
into the record and denied Peoples’s motion to suppress. The court concluded that
the police had probable cause on July 11 to arrest Peoples without a warrant for
theft of a motor vehicle. However, the court neglected to pinpoint when on July
11 they acquired such probable cause or whether Peoples was arrested before or
after Traylor and Harmon, having found what appeared to be blood-stained blue
jeans and shirt in Peoples’s Talladega apartment, decided to take him to the St.
Clair County jail. The court also concluded that Peoples knowingly and
20
voluntarily gave the Bill of Sale to Chief Finn at the police station. The court did
not address the question of whether Peoples was in custody at the time—and thus
entitled to an advice of rights—apparently because Short’s motion to suppress did
not allege that Peoples was in custody when he arrived at Chief Finn’s office and
thereafter.
In announcing its findings of fact and conclusions of law from the bench,
the court stated that it would enter a written order on the motion. It did so on
January 23, 1984. Although the findings of fact and conclusions of law contained
in that order were expressed in far greater detail than what the court announced
from the bench on December 2, the order echoed the findings of fact and
conclusions of law the court made that day.
During the hearing on Peoples’s motion to suppress, Short renewed his
August 19 motion to dismiss the indictment. He contended once again that the
State had breached its promise to give Peoples immunity for having revealed the
location of the victims’ bodies and agreeing to a polygraph examination. Short
rested his motion on the evidence presented to the court at the October 4 hearing.
After hearing further argument on the motion—which, in essence, replicated the
arguments the parties made at the October 4 hearing—the court denied it.
21
Following the court’s denial of Peoples’s motion to suppress, the State
continued with its case-in-chief, during which time it introduced some of the
tangible evidence that the motion had challenged under the fruit-of-the-poisonous-
tree doctrine.18 After the prosecution rested, the defense called two witnesses,
Gooden and Peoples’s mother, Rebecca. Short called Gooden as an adverse
witness and, with leading questions, attempted to have him retract the testimony
he gave in the State’s case-in-chief—that Peoples had killed the Franklins.
Gooden did not recant. Rebecca Peoples, though obviously sympathetic to the
defendant, could say nothing to rebut the prosecution’s case.19
The guilt phase of the trial concluded on December 7 with the jury’s
verdicts of guilty on all counts. The penalty phase of the case began, and ended,
the same day. The State rested its case on the evidence presented during the guilt
phase; the defense called four witnesses. They attested to Peoples’s good
character and urged the jury to spare Peoples’s life. By a vote of eleven to one, the
jury recommended the death penalty on all five counts.
18
This tangible evidence is described in Part I, supra.
19
Under cross-examination, Rebecca Peoples could not recall whether a few days after the
Franklins’ disappearance, on July 10, Peoples had responded to her request for money—to pay
some of Peoples’s bills—by showing her a large wad of cash. She did acknowledge, however,
that on the morning of July 11, when her son was informed in her presence that police were
looking into the disappearance of the Franklin family (whose car he was driving), his only
response was, “I’ll take care of it.”
22
On January 27, 1984, the court convened a sentencing hearing. As required
by Alabama law, Ala. Code § 13A-5-47 (1975),20 the court reviewed the jury’s
sentencing recommendations and heard argument of counsel. The court thereafter
entered its “Findings of Fact in Regard to the Punishment Phase of the Trial.” It
found that “the aggravating factors far outweigh the mitigating circumstances” and
that the death penalty was the appropriate punishment.21 Accordingly, the court
sentenced Peoples to death on each count of the indictment.
20
The statute reads as follows:
(a) After the sentence hearing has been conducted, and after the jury has returned an
advisory verdict, or after such a verdict has been waived as provided in Section 13A-5-
46(a) or Section 13A-5-46(g), the trial court shall proceed to determine the sentence.
(b) Before making the sentence determination, the trial court shall order and receive a
written pre-sentence investigation report. The report shall contain the information
prescribed by law or court rule for felony cases generally and any additional information
specified by the trial court. No part of the report shall be kept confidential, and the
parties shall have the right to respond to it and to present evidence to the court about any
part of the report which is the subject of factual dispute. The report and any evidence
submitted in connection with it shall be made part of the record in the case.
(c) Before imposing sentence the trial court shall permit the parties to present arguments
concerning the existence of aggravating and mitigating circumstances and the proper
sentence to be imposed in the case. The order of the arguments shall be the same as at the
trial of a case.
21
The court found the following aggravating circumstances: (1) the “capital offense was
committed while the appellant was engaged . . . in the commission of . . . or flight after
committing . . . robbery,” Ala. Crim. Code § 13A-5-49(4) (1975); and (2) the “capital offense
was especially heinous, atrocious or cruel compared to other capital offenses,” Ala. Crim.
Code § 13A-5-49(8) (1975). The court determined that the only mitigating circumstance was the
absence of a prior criminal record. See Ala. Crim. Code § 13A-5-51 (1975).
23
C.
On February 1, 1984, Peoples moved the court for a new trial. The motion
reiterated what Short had asserted (1) in his August 19 motion to dismiss the
indictment which was heard on October 4, and (2) in his August 19 motion to
suppress evidence which the court considered on December 1-2 during the State’s
case-in-chief. The motion also cited some “new evidence” the State had disclosed
during the sentencing hearing of January 27. This new evidence concerned an
arrest warrant issued by the magistrate of the Childersburg Municipal Court, Ella
Williams, on July 12, 1983, which charged Peoples with a misdemeanor—issuing
a worthless check on October 12, 1982 to “Dennis Auction” in the amount of
$221.68.22 Someone had changed the warrant’s date to indicate that it issued on
July 10 rather than July 12. According to Short, the warrant had a bearing on
whether Peoples was under a lawful arrest and in custody at the time he arrived at
the Childersburg police station to meet Chief Finn on July 11.
On March 12, 1984, the court held an evidentiary hearing on the motion.
What became clear during the hearing was this: When Chief Finn testified at the
suppression hearing the previous December, he said that he told Peoples—after he
arrived at the jail—that he had a warrant for a bad check Peoples had given “Mr.
22
This warrant was not introduced into evidence at Peoples’s trial.
24
Dennis at the auction barn.” See supra Part II.B. As it turned out, and as the court
found in its written order denying Peoples’s motion for a new trial,23 the warrant
did not issue on July 10; instead, it issued on July 12, the day Ella Williams signed
it. She changed the date to July 10 at Chief Finn’s request.24 In its order, the court
found as fact that when Peoples asked if he was being “arrested, Chief Finn told
him no.” The court further found that Chief Finn did not have the warrant in his
possession on July 11 and could not have arrested Peoples on the bad check
charge that day.25 However, as the court indicated in its order, the back-dated
warrant had no bearing on its decision to deny Peoples’s motion to suppress. The
court subsequently denied Peoples’s motion for a new trial.
D.
Peoples appealed his convictions and death sentences to the Alabama Court
of Criminal Appeals. That court affirmed, Peoples v. State, 510 So. 2d 554 (Ala.
23
The court entered the order on March 12, 1984, following the hearing on Peoples’s motion for
a new trial.
24
In addition to her job as magistrate, Ella Williams also served as Chief Finn’s secretary. Her
testimony during the evid