Clark v. State

309 Ga. 566

847 S.E.2d 160

CLARK

v.The STATE.

S20A1021

Supreme Court of Georgia.

Decided: August 10, 2020

David J. Walker, for appellant.

Richard G. Milam, District Attorney, Cynthia T. Adams, Assistant District Attorney; Christopher M. Carr, Attorney General, Patricia B. Attaway Burton, Deputy Attorney General, Paula K. Smith, Senior Assistant Attorney General, Michael A. Oldham, Assistant Attorney General, for appellee.

Warren, Justice.

A jury convicted Jennifer Clark of malice murder and other crimes in connection with the death of Donald Clark.¹ On appeal, Clark contends that her trial counsel rendered constitutionally ineffective assistance by failing to request that the jury be instructed that it could consider Michael Yost's felony convictions in assessing his credibility. Because Clark has failed to demonstrate that she was prejudiced by her trial counsel's alleged deficient performance, we affirm.

1. Viewed in the light most favorable to the jury's verdicts, the evidence presented at trial showed the following. Jennifer Clark was married to Donald, and they had two young sons, ages eight and ten. During the course of the Clarks’ marriage, which ended in divorce four months before Donald's murder, Jennifer had at least four extramarital affairs. At the time of Donald's murder, Clark's most recent affair was with Yost, who was the son of Donald's best friend.

In January or February 2008, Yost was having difficulty getting along with his father and stepmother, so the Clarks allowed Yost—whose affair with Clark was unknown to Donald—to move in with them. Yost and Clark continued their affair without Donald's knowledge. On March 7, Donald called 911 in the middle of the night when he woke up to find Clark looming over him with an aluminum baseball bat. Clark told the responding officer that Donald did not provoke her and she had no reason for her actions. Nonetheless, Donald told officers that he did not want Clark to be arrested. Sometime after this incident, Clark told Donald's sister, Brenda Maddox, that Clark had held the bat over Donald to see "if she could go through [with] it."

The day after the baseball-bat incident, Clark and Donald agreed to get divorced and went to the courthouse to initiate the process. Later that day, Donald confronted Yost about Donald's suspicions that Yost and Clark were having an affair, and Yost quickly admitted to it. Donald made Yost move out of the house, and Clark left to live with Yost at his grandmother's house. Around the same time, Clark discovered she was pregnant with a child whose father she later determined was Yost.

After Clark moved out of the house, Donald hired Danielle Young to move in and help him take care of the children. Young agreed and moved in with her two children. In early May 2008, Clark came to Donald's house unannounced and discovered Young living there. Clark began screaming, cursing, and throwing things around the house in front of her children and Young's children. Clark also grabbed an aluminum bat that was kept in the house and threatened Donald. Clark would later complain to Yost about Donald and on multiple occasions made comments to Yost about "[g]etting rid" of Donald and asked Yost "stuff like" "[i]f [Clark] led [Donald] out in the road, would [Yost] run him over."

The Clarks's divorce was finalized in July 2008. Donald retained sole custody of their minor sons and became the sole owner of the house. In September 2008, Clark and Yost began living with Maddox. While Clark was living at Maddox's house, Donald would visit Clark with their children two to three times a week and repeatedly asked Clark to move back in with him, but she always refused. In October 2008, Clark asked Donald if she could come back home, and Donald agreed. The night before Clark returned to Donald's home, she asked Yost to help her hatch a plan to "get rid" of Donald. Yost responded by calling Clark "crazy," and Clark did not pursue the conversation any further. After Clark's return to Donald's home, however, she reached out to Yost and informed him that she wanted to leave Donald again.

In the early morning hours of November 18, 2008, Clark attacked Donald by bludgeoning him multiple times with an aluminum baseball bat as he slept. Yost was also present, and the children were asleep in the home. Clark then convinced Yost to help her move and dispose of Donald's body before she cleaned up and attempted to mislead Donald's family and friends about his whereabouts.

At trial, Yost testified to the following. On November 17, Clark instructed Yost to come to the Clarks’ house very early the next morning, telling him that she would be ready with some clothes packed. Clark called him later that same day to instruct him to wait for her to signal with the back porch light to indicate when it was safe for Yost to come to the door. Yost went to the house as directed on November 18 and waited for the porch light signal from Clark. When Yost entered the house, he saw Clark retrieve the aluminum baseball bat and proceed to hit Donald in the head with it several times while he slept. Donald began making gurgling sounds as a result of the trauma. Clark said Yost either had to help dispose of Donald's body or risk losing their unborn child. Yost argued with Clark, but eventually agreed to help her.

Yost admitted that, after the beating, he tied two plastic bags around Donald's head. He and Clark rolled Donald's body in the bed linens and placed Donald in the trunk of Donald's own car along with his wallet, work boots, and the aluminum bat. Clark gave Yost the keys to Donald's car and Donald's cell phone. She instructed Yost to get rid of the items, the body, and the car, and to make it appear like Donald merely left home. Yost did not clean anything in the house before leaving in Donald's car.

Yost drove to a field, dragged Donald's body into the woods, and covered it with a camouflage blanket. He also disposed of Donald's wallet and work boots and the aluminum bat. Yost parked Donald's car at a motel in Forsyth, Georgia, and waited for Clark to contact him. Clark sent a text to Donald's phone stating that the children were on the school bus, and Yost, who was carrying the phone, responded with "K." Clark then picked up Yost and tossed Donald's cell phone out of the car window. Clark had already cleaned the bloodied bedroom before they returned to Donald's house.

During Yost's trial testimony, he acknowledged that he had pleaded guilty to murder, concealing the death of another, and tampering with evidence, and that part of his plea deal was to testify at Clark's trial. Yost also testified about several untruthful statements he had previously made to law enforcement officers during their investigation of the crimes. On cross-examination, he admitted to having two previous burglary convictions as well.

Maddox, Donald's sister, testified that Donald had a habit of calling her daily and she therefore became concerned when neither she nor the family had heard from Donald for two days. When Maddox called Clark and questioned her about Donald's whereabouts, Clark told Maddox that Donald appeared to have left during the night while Clark was asleep with their sons in an adjacent room and stated that Donald was "probably off with one of his whores." When Maddox questioned her further, Clark informed Maddox that she tried calling Donald but when she did not hear from him, she sent the children to school and went about her day cleaning the house. Maddox expressed concern because it was highly uncharacteristic of Donald to leave his children. Maddox called the Sheriff's Office and reported Donald's absence, handed out flyers, talked to the local newspaper, and "talked to everybody [she] could think of to talk to" about where Donald may be. One of Donald's co-workers testified that on the day of Donald's murder, he received a phone call from Clark relaying specific details about the prior evening and suggesting that Donald might have run off with Young, his former roommate. He stated that Clark had never called him before and "[i]t just felt weird to me." The Clarks’ two children also testified at trial, including about Clark's actions toward them related to Donald's disappearance and death and the mental and emotional trauma they suffered as a result.

After Donald's disappearance, crime scene investigators discovered the presence of Donald's blood and cleaning chemicals in Donald's home. In late December 2008, over a month after the murder, Lamar County Sheriff Joe Buice found Donald's body, as well as Donald's wallet, his work boots, and the aluminum bat. Donald's body was in a state of "advanced decomposition." Donald's car was later located at a motel near the interstate. The GBI medical examiner testified that Donald's death could have resulted from either blunt force trauma to the head or from asphyxia as a result of the plastic bags being tied over his head.

At trial, Clark testified in her own defense. She denied inviting Yost to the house on the morning of the murder. Contrary to Yost's testimony, Clark testified that on the morning of Donald's murder she was awakened by a "loud crack" and then saw Yost standing by the side of the bed wearing a ski mask and holding an aluminum bat. Clark recalled being so pregnant at the time that she could not sit up "without taking ten or fifteen minutes." Clark told the jury that Yost began taunting and threatening her and the safety of her children if she told anyone about what Yost had done or if she did not do what he said. She said that Yost told her he was sparing her life because she was pregnant with his child. Clark testified that she did not help Yost murder Donald or dispose of Donald's body. She insisted that Yost acted alone. Clark explained that Yost gave her instructions on what to do and what to say after the murder. Clark admitted to picking up Yost the morning after the murder but said she did so because it was "part of what [she] was...