292 Ark. 278, 729 S.W.2d 410 (1987)
The appellant, Ronnie Midgett, Sr., was six feet two inches tall and weighed three hundred pounds. His eight-year-old son, Ronnie Midgett, Jr., weighed between thirty-eight and forty-five pounds at the time of his death.1
Over a substantial period of time, Ronnie Jr. had been abused by brutal beating. School personnel noticed bruises on the child, prompting a school counselor and a SCAN worker to visit the Midgett home. Ronnie Jr. blamed the bruises and his lethargy on rough play with a little brother and did not complain to his siblings.2
Ronnie Jr.'s sister Sherry, aged ten, testified that on the Saturday before the Wednesday of Ronnie Jr.'s death, the appellant drank two to three quarts of whiskey and hit Ronnie Jr. four times with his fist, twice in the stomach and twice in the back. Sherry also testified that the appellant had choked Ronnie Jr. on Sunday nights after church and that bruises noticed over the preceding six months had been caused by the appellant.3
On the Wednesday of Ronnie Jr.'s death, the appellant brought the child's body to a hospital. An autopsy showed the child was poorly nourished and underdeveloped with recent bruises on the lips, chest plate, forehead, back, buttocks, and palms as well as older bruises and recent and healed rib fractures. The medical examiner concluded that death resulted from intra-abdominal hemorrhage caused by blunt force trauma consistent with a human fist.45
The appellant was convicted of first degree murder after a trial and appealed the conviction.
Whether the state's evidence was sufficient to sustain the appellant's conviction of first degree murder?6
To sustain a conviction of first degree murder under Ark. Stat. Ann. § 41-1502(1)(b) (Repl. 1977), the state must prove that the defendant acted with a premeditated and deliberated purpose of causing the death of another person.7 As set forth in Ford v. State, this requires the state to show that the defendant (1) had the conscious object to cause death, (2) formed that intention before acting, and (3) weighed in his mind the consequences of a course of conduct, as distinguished from acting upon sudden impulse without the exercise of reasoning power.8 Premeditation and deliberation require a cool mind capable of reflection and that the defendant did in fact reflect, at least for a short period of time, before the act of killing.9
No. The established facts demonstrate a pattern of repeated brutal beatings over a substantial period of time. This included four fist blows to the stomach and back during a session in which the appellant consumed two to three quarts of whiskey, as well as prior choking incidents.10
Yet the facts contain no evidence that the appellant formed a conscious object to cause death before acting or weighed the consequences of his conduct.11 He acted on impulse in a drunken disciplinary episode.12
The prolonged course of abuse supports the inference that the appellant expected the child to survive repeated mistreatment rather than intending death on any particular occasion. No circumstances such as dumping an immobile body or mutilation indicate premeditation.13
The state's evidence was not sufficient to sustain the appellant's conviction of first degree murder, and the conviction is modified to second degree murder with the sentence reduced to twenty years' imprisonment.14
Related opinions on this issue
Joined by Hays And Glaze, Jj.
Justice Hickman dissented. He contended that the facts of deliberate starvation and repeated beatings that left the child emaciated at thirty-eight pounds with multiple bruises and internal injuries supplied substantial evidence from which the jury could infer premeditation and deliberation.15 The majority improperly substituted its own judgment for the jury's by speculating that the appellant intended only to keep the child alive for further abuse.
He would affirm the first degree murder conviction because the degree of the offense is a question for the jury when substantial evidence supports the verdict.16