Case Title: Parker v. State

Citation: 

Docket Number: 80, 2009

State: delaware

Court: Delaware Supreme Court

Date: 2009-09-28T00:00:00Z

Document:
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE 
MICHAEL PARKER, 
 
 
) 
 
 
 
 
 
 
)  No. 80, 2009 
 
 
Defendant Below,  
) 
 
 
Appellant,  
 
)  Court Below:  Superior Court 
 
 
 
 
 
 
)  of the State of Delaware in 
v. 
 
 
 
 
 
)  and for New Castle County 
 
 
 
 
 
 
) 
STATE OF DELAWARE, 
 
)  Cr. ID No. 08040377807 
 
 
 
 
 
 
) 
 
 
Plaintiff Below, 
 
) 
 
 
Appellee. 
 
 
) 
 
Submitted:  September 2, 2009 
Decided:  September 28, 2009 
 
Before STEELE, Chief Justice, HOLLAND and BERGER, Justices. 
 
 
Upon appeal from the Superior Court.  REVERSED and REMANDED. 
 
 
Bernard J. O’Donnell, Office of Public Defender, Wilmington, Delaware for 
appellant. 
 
 
James T. Wakley and Kevin M. Carroll, Department of Justice, Wilmington, 
Delaware for appellee. 
 
 
 
 
STEELE, Chief Justice: 
 
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The Defendant, Michael Parker, appeals from a Superior Court judgment of 
conviction of Second-Degree Robbery.1  Parker contends and the State concedes 
that the trial judge erred when he refused to instruct the jury on offensive touching 
as a lesser-included offense of second-degree robbery, an instruction the defense 
requested.  Because our case law makes it clear that offensive touching is a lesser-
included offense of robbery, we REVERSE and REMAND for a new trial.   
Factual and Procedural History 
Angel Rodriguez testified that on April 29, 2008 between 6:10 A.M. and 
6:15 A.M., he drove to a convenience store at 4th and Delamore Streets to buy 
lunchmeat for his children.  Before he entered the store, a man (later identified as 
Parker) asked him for a cigarette.  Rodriguez told the man that he did not have any 
cigarettes and continued walking into the store.   
When he left the convenience store, the same man confronted him and 
demanded his money.  Rodriguez testified that the man told him that he would 
“knock him out” if he did not turn over the money.  When Rodriguez tried to leave, 
a second man grabbed his jacket and the first man struck Rodriguez in the face.  
Rodriguez testified that his money fell to the ground and he fled to his car and 
drove away.  He stated he saw the two men pick up the money after he fled.  
                                                 
1   
Parker was indicted and acquitted of conspiracy in the second degree. 
 
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Rodriguez called the police and reported that he had been robbed.  Later that 
afternoon, Rodriguez returned to 4th and Delamore Streets, saw Parker and called 
the police who arrested Parker. 
 
Parker testified that on April 29, 2008, while at his friend’s apartment on 5th 
and Delamore he heard a loud confrontation outside.  He left the apartment to find 
out what was going on.  Parker stated that he saw a drug dealer named Jacob 
arguing with Rodriguez about the size of a piece of crack cocaine.  He testified that 
he knew Rodriguez and had seen him at 4th and Delamore on earlier occasions 
buying cocaine.  Parker told Rodriguez to pay Jacob to prevent any further 
confusion.  In return, Rodriguez started talking to Parker and began to “get in his 
face.”  Parker responded that he was not Jacob and struck Rodriguez.  Parker 
testified that as Rodriguez headed to his car, Rodriguez dropped some money and 
Jacob picked it up.   
At trial, Parker requested a jury instruction on the lesser-included offenses, 
offensive touching and menacing.  The Prosecutor objected, relying on an oral 
argument he had recently made before this Court in Weber v. State.2  After hearing 
the proffer, the trial judge refused to instruct the jury on offensive touching and 
suggested that offensive touching required proof of the additional element of 
annoyance or alarm to the victim.  The jury convicted Parker, a habitual offender, 
                                                 
2   
971 A.2d 135 (Del. 2009).   
 
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of second-degree robbery.  The trial judge sentenced him to five years at Level 
Five imprisonment, and six months of Level Three supervised probation.   
Discussion 
We review a trial judge’s denial of a requested jury instruction de novo to 
determine whether:  “(i) the instruction was available as a matter of law and, if so 
(ii) whether the evidence presented at trial supported a conviction on the lesser 
included offense.”3  The trial judge is not obligated to instruct the jury on a lesser-
included offense “unless there is a rational basis in the evidence for a verdict 
acquitting the defendant of the offense charged and convicting the defendant of the 
included offense.”4    
“A defendant is entitled to an instruction on a lesser included offense if there 
is any evidence fairly tending to bear upon the lesser included offense, however 
weak that evidence may be.”5  The trial judge’s failure to instruct the jury 
regarding a lesser offense is not reversible error per se.6 
                                                 
3   
Weber, 971 A.2d at 141 (citing Wright v. State, 953 A.2d 144, 148-49 (Del. 2008)).   
 
4   
Id.  at 142 (quoting 11 Del. C. § 206(c)).   
5   
Id.  (citing Bentley v. State, 930 A.2d 886, 875 (Del. 2007)). 
6   
Id.  at 143. 
 
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The State prematurely relied upon its oral argument before us on January 21, 
2009.  After argument, we held in Weber v. State7 that offensive touching is a 
lesser-included offense of Robbery and does not require proof of annoyance or 
alarm to the victim.  Even before Weber, Herring v. State.8 listed the lesser-
included offenses of robbery in the first degree:  Robbery in the second degree, 
theft, menacing, offensive touching, and attempt to commit any of the those 
crimes.  Both decisions hold that offensive touching is a lesser offense of robbery 
as a matter of law.  
Having determined that offensive touching is a lesser included offense of 
robbery as a matter of law, we turn to whether the evidence presented at trial 
supported a conviction on the lesser-included offense.  “A person is guilty of 
offensive touching when the person intentionally “touches another person either 
with a member of his or her body or with any instrument ... or strikes another 
person with saliva, urine, feces or any other bodily fluid, knowing that the person 
is thereby likely to cause offense or alarm to such other person.”9   
At trial, Rodriguez testified that Parker struck him after demanding his 
money and Parker testified that he struck Rodriguez after he “got in his face.”  
                                                 
7   
971 A.2d 135, 141 (Del. 2009) 
8   
805 A.2d 872, 875 n.6 (Del. 2002) (citing the 1973 Criminal Code with commentary).   
9   
Weber, 971 A.2d at 141 n. 4. 
 
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Although Rodriguez and Parker dispute the underlying reason for the blow, Parker 
concedes that he struck Rodriguez.   
It is the jury’s task to determine whose factual story about the reason for the 
blow is more credible.  If the jury did not find Rodriguez’s version credible, they 
could have found that the State failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that 
Parker intended to take Rodriguez’s money.  Failure to satisfy that burden negates 
a conviction of second-degree robbery.  If the jury had found Parker’s testimony 
credible, they could have found that Parker intentionally and offensively touched 
Rodriguez but did not intend to take anything from Rodriguez.  That finding would 
support a conviction of offensive touching.      
Conclusion 
Because facts in the record support the crime of offensive touching, and 
offensive touching is a lesser included offense of robbery as a matter of law, there 
is sufficient evidence on the record to support an acquittal of Second-degree 
robbery and a conviction of offensive touching.  Therefore, we reverse the 
judgment of conviction and remand for a new trial.