Opinion ID: 2399779
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The uncharged predicate felony.

Text: The Appellate Division phrased the question as whether the predicate felony for a felony murder conviction must stem from an indictment charging the defendant with the predicate felony as a separate charge. 301 N.J.Super. at 329, 693 A. 2d 1272. The Appellate Division found it obvious from the jury's question that the jury convicted defendant of felony murder based on its finding that the defendant robbed [Pettie] Leea person who[m] defendant was not charged in an indictment with robbing. Id. at 330, 693 A. 2d 1272. It found that any references in the indictment to the underlying robbery of Mosley or to the robberies of Pettie and Dortch would have been surplusage. Reasoning that the indictment adequately informed defendant of the felony-murder charge against him (killing Mosley in the course of a robbery) and that the grand jury had heard evidence of the robbery of Pettie, the Appellate Division concluded that the jury was justified in basing its felony-murder verdict on the robbery of Pettie Lee. Ibid. We can agree with that proposition as a correct principle of law provided that the defendant is given fair notice of the predicate felony being used to satisfy the elements of the felony-murder statute. However, we are not convinced that the felony-murder conviction was based on the robbery of Pettie, and even if it was, defendant did not have notice of his need to defend against that possibility. An indictment charging a defendant with the commission of crime must identify and explain the criminal offense so that the accused may prepare an adequate defense. State v. LeFurge, 101 N.J. 404, 502 A. 2d 35 (1986); State v. Talley, 94 N.J. 385, 466 A. 2d 78 (1983). However, that principle is not applied rigidly. It is sufficiently flexible to permit a defendant to be found guilty of an offense not charged in the indictment. Talley, supra, 94 N.J. at 392, 466 A. 2d 78. In Talley, the defendant was indicted for first-degree robbery. The Court held that the consolidation-of-theft-offenses provision, N.J.S.A. 2C:20-2a, gave notice to the defendant that he could be charged with theft by deception when his own testimony disclosed that additional offense. Id. at 391, 466 A. 2d 78. Talley testified that rather than having robbed his victims at gunpoint, he had sold them counterfeit drugs to their distress. Id. at 389, 466 A. 2d 78. In LeFurge, the defendant was indicted for theft. The trial court instructed the jury on conspiracy to commit theft as a lesser-included offense, pursuant to N.J.S.A. 2C:1-8d(2). LeFurge, supra, 101 N.J. at 410-11, 502 A. 2d 35. The jury acquitted the defendant of theft but convicted him of the conspiracy charge because, although he may not have stolen the goods from the warehouse himself, there was abundant evidence that he had conspired with the thieves. Id. at 411, 502 A. 2d 35. Within this analytical framework, the Appellate Division found no constitutional infringement caused by defendant's felony-murder conviction. The theory is sound and could have been used to sustain the conviction in this case had defendant been given fair notice that the State intended to use the robbery of Pettie as a predicate to the felony-murder charge. However, the precise opposite occurred. Recall that the jury had specifically inquired of the trial court why Pettie was not indicted and whether it could consider the robbery of Pettie as one of the predicate felonies. The court took the possibility of using the Pettie robbery as the predicate felony out of the jurors' hands, saying he's not being charged with the robbery of Pettie. Moreover, that the jury based guilt on the theory of the robbery of Pettie is belied by the record. The jury asked the trial court whether the predicate felony had to be one of the other felony charges on the list. The very last thing that the jury heard before rendering its verdict was the court's response to the jury's question that it could base the felony-murder conviction on any crime on that list. The Pettie robbery was not on the list. The Pettie theory has been developed on appeal and imposed on the verdict. The theory eliminates the possibility that the jury found defendant guilty of felony murder based on its guilty verdicts of possession of a weapon, pointing a gun, possession of hollow point bullets, or resisting arrest, all offenses that do not satisfy the requirements of the felony-murder statute, N.J.S.A. 2C:11-3a(3). However, the Appellate Division recently observed that [a] jury may not convict on a theory of guilt not advanced by the State at trial and not charged by the court. State v. Burnett, 245 N.J.Super. 99, 105, 584 A. 2d 268 (1990). It is the non-delegable and nonremovable responsibility of the jury to decide the question of guilt or innocence in accordance with [the court's] instructions. The `question is not whether guilt may be spelt out of a record, but whether guilt has been found by a jury ...' To this we would add only that the question is not whether a theory of guilt may be spelt out of a record, but whether guilt on that theory has been found by a jury. [ State v. Schmidt, 110 N.J. 258, 265, 540 A. 2d 1256 (1988) (citations omitted).] In addition, both LeFurge, supra, 101 N.J. at 415-16, 502 A. 2d 35, and Talley, supra, 94 N.J. at 392-93, 466 A. 2d 78, emphasized that the defendants had adequate notice to permit a defense against the charge not stated in the indictment. Not only is it unfair to require defendant to prepare a defense to a crime that he did not have notice of, but here the trial court instructed the jury that it should not consider the uncharged offense. Hence, we are unable to agree with the theory of the uncharged predicate felony as a basis to sustain this conviction.