Title: State v. Shaw

State: vermont

Issuer: Vermont Supreme Court

Document:

State v. Shaw  (96-546); 168 Vt. 412; 721 A.2d 486

[Opinion Filed 25-Sep-1998]
[Motion for Reargument Denied 15-Oct-1998]

       NOTICE:  This opinion is subject to motions for reargument under
  V.R.A.P. 40 as well as formal revision before publication in the Vermont
  Reports.  Readers are requested to notify the Reporter of Decisions,
  Vermont Supreme Court, 109 State Street, Montpelier, Vermont 05609-0801 of
  any errors in order that corrections may be made before this opinion goes
  to press.

                                 No. 96-546

State of Vermont                          Supreme Court

                                          On Appeal from
     v.                                   District Court of Vermont,
                                          Unit No. 2, Addison Circuit

Patrick Thomas Shaw                       February Term, 1998

Matthew I. Katz, J.

       William H. Sorrell, Attorney General, David Tartter, Assistant
  Attorney General, Montpelier, and John Quinn, Addison County State's
  Attorney, Middlebury, for Plaintiff-Appellee.

       Robert Appel, Defender General, William A. Nelson and Anna Saxman,
  Appellate Attorneys, and Karen Misbach and Robert Hubbard, Law Clerks (On
  the Brief), Montpelier, for Defendant-Appellant.

PRESENT:  Amestoy, C.J., Dooley, Morse, Johnson and Skoglund, JJ.

       AMESTOY, C.J.   Defendant appeals his conviction for second-degree
  murder, claiming error in the district court's failure to instruct the jury
  on the doctrine of imperfect self-defense. Defendant contends that the
  court's jury instruction on complete self-defense and "heat of passion"
  manslaughter did not place his defense theory squarely before the jury.  We
  hold that the doctrine of imperfect self-defense is not recognized in
  Vermont and thus affirm.

       Defendant Patrick Shaw and the victim, John Hallock, both residents of
  the Town of Orwell, were neighbors who had developed an antagonistic
  relationship.  Defendant testified that on several occasions before the
  shooting, he and Hallock had hostile confrontations.  Defendant also
  understood the victim to have threatened to shoot a number of people in
  town.

       On a September morning in 1995, defendant left his auto body shop,
  drove to the woods near Hallock's house, and parked his truck about 500
  yards away from  the house.  Defendant

 

  walked through the woods with a loaded .22 gauge rifle, allegedly to hunt
  squirrel and scout for deer.  At the base of a hill located approximately
  300 yards from Hallock's home, defendant  claims to have fired his rifle
  twice at a squirrel.  Defendant then heard Hallock yelling, "Get the f___
  out of here or I will  put a bullet in you."  Defendant was perched on a
  rock ledge some  twenty to thirty feet above Hallock and could see that
  Hallock was approximately forty to sixty yards away.  He testified that he
  felt exposed and vulnerable on the rock shelf, and believed that Hallock
  would shoot him. According to defendant's testimony,  in an effort to scare
  Hallock, defendant turned and fired a shot at Hallock before running to his
  truck.  Defendant testified that he returned to the auto body shop unaware
  that the shot he fired had hit Hallock, and told no one of the incident. 
  Hallock's body  was found approximately one hundred yards from his home the
  day after the shooting.  Hallock had died from a single gun-shot wound to
  his head.  The State charged defendant with second-degree murder.

       At trial, defendant argued that he fired at Hallock in self-defense. 
  The court instructed the jury on complete and lawful self-defense, see 13
  V.S.A. § 2305 (justifiable homicide), but denied defendant's request for an
  instruction on imperfect self-defense.  The court also instructed the jury
  that it could convict defendant of the lesser-included offense of voluntary
  manslaughter if it found that (1) defendant shot Hallock "out of passion or
  provocation brought about by adequate cause and before defendant had
  reasonable time to calm down," or (2) defendant did not intend to kill
  Hallock but nonetheless "acted with unreasonable disregard for life."  It
  charged the jury that a conviction of second-degree murder could be based
  on defendant's "wanton disregard of the likelihood that his conduct would
  naturally cause death or great bodily harm."  The jury found defendant
  guilty of murder in the second degree.

       Defendant urges us to recognize the doctrine of imperfect self-defense
  under which a charge of murder will be reduced to manslaughter where a
  defendant had an honest but unreasonable belief that he faced immediate and
  grave physical danger and that he had to use deadly force upon the
  adversary to prevent the danger.  See 2 W. LaFave & A. Scott,

 

  Substantive Criminal Law § 7.11(a) (1986).

       We first examine the law of complete or legal self-defense in Vermont. 
  Vermont law provides that a person who kills or wounds another  "[i]n the
  just and necessary defense of his own life . . . shall be guiltless."  13
  V.S.A. § 2305(1).  In State v. Wheelock, 158 Vt. 302, 307, 609 A.2d 972,
  975 (1992), we reiterated the longstanding requirement that, for
  self-defense to be "just and necessary," a defendant's belief that he faces
  imminent peril, and his belief in the need to employ deadly force to repel
  that peril must be reasonable.  "A defendant must have an honest belief of
  imminent peril, but that honest belief by itself is insufficient to invoke
  the defense.  The belief must be grounded in reason."  Id. at 308, 609 A.2d 
  at 976; see also State v. Darling, 141 Vt. 358, 361-62,