Two others were injured
A man convicted of stabbing a moviegoer with a digital thermometer and injuring two other men who tried to intervene after his companion was asked to turn off her cell phone at a Lancaster movie theater has lost his latest appeal.
The three-justice panel from California's 2nd District Court of Appeal on May 12 rejected Landry Boullard's claim that he could not be convicted of attempted murder under the state's current law.
Boullard, now 52, is serving a state prison sentence of 40 years and four months to life.
He was convicted of one count each of attempted murder and possession of a firearm by a felon and two counts of assault with a deadly weapon involving the Feb. 27, 2010 attack on the moviegoer during a showing of the film “Shutter Island'' at the Cinemark 22.
In its 19-page opinion, the appellate court panel noted that the moviegoer had asked Boullard's companion to turn her cell phone off after she answered it and began talking during the movie.
Boullard left the theater and returned later to stab the moviegoer in the neck, authorities said. He was identified through an anonymous tip and arrested less than three weeks later.
The thermometer–which had a five-to six-inch metal road–was found in the aisle of the theater, and was determined to be the same kind of thermometer used by students in an air-conditioning technician program that the defendant had attended, according to the appellate court panel's ruling.
In 2012, a state appeals court panel rejected Boullard's claim that there was insufficient evidence to convict him of assault with a deadly weapon involving a man who tackled the defendant following the attack on the moviegoer.
That appeal did not challenge Boullard's conviction for the attempted murder of the moviegoer, who suffered permanent vision damage, or for assault with a deadly weapon on another man who struggled with Boullard after the attack.
