Byford v. Nevada

116 Nev. 215 (2000)

Facts

D, Williams, and two teenage girls were visiting Smith at his parents' residence in Las Vegas. Byford was 20, Williams 17, and Smith 19. Monica Wilkins, 18, called and told Smith she would pay him for a ride home from a local casino. Smith drove his jeep to pick Wilkins up, accompanied by Williams and one of the girls. After Smith picked up Wilkins and her friend, Jennifer Green, he asked Wilkins for gas money. Wilkins had Smith stop at a Burger King so that she could get some money. Williams went inside the store to see what was taking her so long, and Wilkins told him that she had gotten another ride. Smith and Williams were upset with Wilkins, and after they drove away, Williams fired a handgun out the window of the jeep. Wilkins had angered Smith, Williams, and D before because she had invited them to her apartment to party but then left with other men. D and Williams had talked about 'getting rid of her' because she was always 'playing games with our heads.' Smith, Williams, and D were together at Smith's house when Wilkins called again for a ride home. The three drove to pick her up. Smith then drove all four of them to the desert outside of town to find a party that D heard was taking place. Wilkins told the other three that she had taken LSD earlier and was hallucinating. They found no party. They then stopped so that everyone could urinate. Wilkins walked up a ravine to do so. D handed Williams a handgun and said he 'couldn't do it.' Smith asked D what he was doing with the gun, and D told Smith to 'stay out of it.' Williams then shot Wilkins in the back three to five times. She screamed and fell to the ground. Wilkins got up, walked to Williams, and asked him why he had shot her. He told her that he had only shot around her. Wilkins walked up out of the ravine, felt the back of her neck, saw that she was bleeding, and again confronted Williams. Williams told her that he shot her because she was 'a bitch.' He then walked behind her and shot her again repeatedly. Wilkins screamed and fell to the ground. D then took the gun from Williams, said that he would 'make sure the bitch is dead,' and fired two shots into her head. d got a can of gasoline and poured it on Wilkins. Smith refused to light the gas. D called him a 'wussie' and lit the body. As it burned, the three drove off. As they returned to Las Vegas, D pointed the handgun at Smith and threatened to kill him if he ever told anyone. About a week after the murder, D and Williams had Smith drive them back to the desert to bury the body. D and Williams rolled the corpse into the ravine and partly covered it with a few shovelfuls of dirt. The body was discovered. Smith made a plea deal and testified against D and Williams. The jury was instructed: Premeditation is a design, a determination to kill, distinctly formed in the mind at any moment before or at the time of the killing. Premeditation need not be for a day, an hour, or even a minute. It may be as instantaneous as successive thoughts of the mind. For if the jury believes from the evidence that the act constituting the killing has been preceded by and has been the result of premeditation, no matter how rapidly the premeditation is followed by the act constituting the killing, it is willful, deliberate, and premeditated murder. The jury found D and Williams guilty of first-degree murder with the use of a deadly weapon. D received a sentence of death. Williams received a sentence of life imprisonment without possibility of parole. Ds appealed. Got a new trial and were convicted again. D appealed. D argues that the jury instruction was improper because it mandates a finding of willful, deliberate, and premeditated murder based only on the existence of premeditation.