People v. Jeter

PEEK, J. Defendants Claude Leonard Jeter and Charles Joshua appeal from judgments of conviction of murder and robbery both in the first degree. A motion for a new trial was denied and the penalty as to each defendant was fixed at life imprisonment on the murder convictions. Defendants’ purported appeals from the order denying a new trial, which order is not appealable, are dismissed. (Pen. Code, § 1237.)

Defendants, together with James Evans and Mack Burton, were charged with several counts of armed robbery (Pen. Code, § 211) and with the murder of one Zethery Marshall (Pen. Code, § 187). Thereafter the charges against Evans were dismissed, and at the trial he was a witness for the prosecution. The original jury was unable to agree on a verdict and on retrial Burton was acquitted on all charges, while the instant defendants were found guilty of a single count of robbery in addition to murder.

On the afternoon of Thanksgiving Day, November 24, 1960, a group of - nine men including the decedent Marshall weré engaged in gambling at the apartment of J. B. Stephenson in downtown Los Angeles. The host acted as doorman, admitting only those persons xyho knocked on the kitchen door and were acceptable to him.

[673]Witnesses for the prosecution testified that at approximately 3:30 p.m. on the day in question the defendants entered Stephenson’s apartment through its kitchen door; that defendant Jeter was armed with an automatic pistol, while Joshua had a knife; and that upon entering Jeter shouted: “This is a stickup. Everybody lie on the floor.” It appears from the prosecution’s evidence that Marshall at first obeyed the order to lie on the floor, but later jumped up, pulled a concealed gun from inside of his belt, and exchanged shots with Jeter. A scuffle ensued, but was terminated when Marshall lost possession of his weapon when hit on the head with Jeter’s pistol. At this point Thomas, one of the gamblers, knocked Jeter’s weapon out of his hand and picked it up. Jeter retrieved Marshall’s gun, and fled with Joshua when Thomas threatened them with the weapon he had taken from Jeter. The robbery count on which defendants were convicted is for the theft of Marshall’s gun, which Jeter pawned the following day.

Marshall, who had been wounded during the exchange of shots, later walked away from the apartment, but collapsed in the street and died. The county medical examiner testified that Marshall suffered several fractures of the skull, but that the cause of death was a gunshot wound through the heart.