Opinion ID: 1907388
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: whether the trial court erred in denying rushing's motion to sever counts in the multi-count indictment.

Text: ¶ 11. Rushing asserts that the trial judge improperly denied his motion to sever the counts in his indictment which had the practical effect of disallowing a separate trial before a different jury as to each count. Rushing also asserts that this Court should apply a different standard of review because of a procedural error committed by the trial court in conducting the pre-trial hearing on the motion to sever. ¶ 12. For issues of severance, this Court applies an abuse of discretion standard of review. Brawner v. State, 872 So.2d 1, 6-7 (Miss.2004). However, Rushing argues that in his case today, this Court should apply a de novo standard of review because the trial court improperly placed the burden on him to go forward at the pre-trial hearing on the motion to sever counts, even though the State is required at such a hearing to present a prima facie case that the multi-count indictment meets the requirements of the applicable statute and our case law. ¶ 13. Mississippi law allows for both multi-count indictments and multi-offense trials under certain circumstances. In trials concerning multi-count indictments, severance is unnecessary in Mississippi if the acts or transactions are connected together as part of a common scheme or plan and if the indictment was otherwise proper. Miss.Code Ann. § 99-7-2 (Rev.2000) states in pertinent part: (1) Two (2) or more offenses which are triable in the same court may be charged in the same indictment with a separate count for each offense if: (a) the offenses are based on the same act or transaction; or (b) the offenses are based on two (2) or more acts or transactions connected together or constituting parts of a common scheme or plan. (2) Where two (2) or more offenses are properly charged in separate counts of a single indictment, all such charges may be tried in a single proceeding. The Mississippi Uniform Rules of Circuit and County Court Practice (URCCC) likewise address multi-count indictments. The provisions of URCCC 7.07(A.) & (B.) are identical to the above statutory language. It is no surprise that the State and Rushing disagree as to whether the multiple counts in the indictment were proper, or whether the circumstances of the offenses warranted severance of the counts, thus necessitating a separate jury trial for each count. ¶ 14. Corley v. State, 584 So.2d 769, 772 (Miss.1991), offers guidance to our trial courts concerning the appropriate pre-trial procedure to follow when confronted with a motion to sever offenses in a multi-count indictment. In a Corley hearing, the State carries the burden to make out a prima facie case showing the offenses charged are within the language of the statute. Id. at 772. If the State meets its initial burden, the defendant may thereafter rebut the State's case by showing the offenses were separate and distinct acts or transactions. Id. In Corley, this Court laid out three cornerstone considerations for the trial court: whether the time period between the occurrences is insignificant, whether the evidence proving each count would be admissible to prove each of the other counts, and whether the crimes are interwoven. Id. By way of a footnote, we also stated that the issue of whether these offenses might be admissible pursuant to Miss. R. Evid. 404(b) was totally irrelevant to the trial court's consideration of a motion to sever offenses in a multi-count indictment. Id. n. 1. We will review the trial court's decision under an abuse of discretion standard if the trial court did in fact follow this procedure. Id. Turning to today's case, in relying on Miss.Code Ann. § 99-7-2(2), the State argued at the pre-trial motion hearing that all three counts could appropriately be tried together. While not exactly following the procedural guidelines suggested in Corley, the trial court nonetheless heard from counsel for the State and Rushing, and in due course denied Rushing's motion to sever offenses and allowed the trial to proceed to trial on all three counts. ¶ 15. We stated in Corley: If a trial court follows [the correct] procedure, this Court will review the trial court's decision under the abuse of discretion standard giving due deference to the trial court's findings. Id. at 772 (citing McCarty v. State, 554 So.2d 909, 916 (Miss.1989)). To fully address this issue, we refer to the record of the proceedings when this outstanding motion to sever counts was brought to the trial court's attention shortly before commencement of voir dire on the morning of trial. The following occurred outside the presence of the jury venire: BY THE COURT: All right. Since we do have a copy of the defendant's motion to sever, we can argue that one first and hear on that one first. Are you ready to proceed on your motion, Ms. Jourdan [defense counsel]? BY [DEFENSE COUNSEL]: Thank you, your Honor. Your Honor, I want to be sure that I'm understanding the State's position correctly so that I don't misstate anything. I think Ms. Hayes-Ellis [prosecutor] advised me that she would not be proceeding on Count 2; is that correct? BY [PROSECUTOR]: That's correct. Your Honor, today the State intends to prosecute on Counts 1, 3, and 4. BY THE COURT: All right. BY [DEFENSE COUNSEL]: Your Honor, let me begin by saying that I filed a fairly brief motion to sever, so I'm going to spend a little bit of time expounding on it for the Court. First of all, your Honor.... Rushing asserts that the trial judge placed the burden on him to show why the offenses in the multi-count indictment should be severed when the trial judge commenced the hearing by inquiring of defense counsel as to her position on severance. This assertion is incorrect. A fair reading of the record reveals that all the trial judge did was to ask defense counsel if she was ready to proceed on the motion to sever. The trial judge did not place upon Rushing the burden of proving why the offenses should be severed. Rushing, through counsel, chose to take the lead and argue the motion first to the trial judge. There was no objection lodged by Rushing's counsel at the time, and in fact, Rushing's counsel unhesitatingly commenced her presentation of the motion when asked by the trial court if she was ready to proceed on the motion. A close reading of the record also reveals that the trial judge asked questions of counsel for both the State and Rushing, and in fact, Rushing got two chances to argue to the trial judge, with the prosecutor's argument being sandwiched in between Rushing's two arguments. After the presentation by counsel for the State and Rushing, the trial judge issued a detailed bench ruling on Rushing's motion to sever, wherein he stated, inter alia: The factors the Court must look at when confronted with a severance issue is the time period between the offenses, whether the evidence proving each offense would be admissible to prove the other counts, and whether the offenses are interwoven. Here the State seeks to try Count 1 of an indictment that the allegation is this occurred on or about the 18th day of February, 2003; Count 3 that the allegation is that this occurred on or about the 23rd day of September, 2002; and Count 4 that it occurred on or about the 25th day of November, 2002. You're talking from the 23rd day of September of 2002 until the 18th of February, 2003, essentially about five months. All of these are alleged to have occurred within about a five-month time period, the three that the State is seeking to try. That is not an overly long time period. It's not as if this has occurred over the course of years. Five months is a relatively short period of time. The second factor the Court may consider or must consider is whether evidence proving each offense would be admissible to prove the other counts. While the Court does not know this case, but what I've heard from both and what I can tell from the indictment is the same doctor is apparently going to be a witness in all three counts. One pharmacist is a witness in at least two of the three counts and then there is yet another pharmacist who is in Count 1, but the allegation was in Count 2 that he was also in that. The State has indicated they are not going to proceed on Count 2. It seems to be a fairly small universe of witnesses that will be called in this case to try this case. Finally, the last factor that the Court looks at is whether the offenses are interwoven. They are the same offense. They are obtaining controlled substances apparently by fraud and it does seem that this would militate, quite frankly, in favor of trying these together because it's not like he's charged with murder that occurred February of 2003 and in 2002 of September he's charged with child abuse or child molestation or rape or something totally different. The State has alleged that there is a common scheme or plan. That is something that the Court is supposed to look at and that's what the Mississippi Supreme Court has said in Ott versus State, 722 So.2d 576 . That's a 1998 Mississippi case. The allegation here is that there is some kind of scheme or plan that Mr. Rushing had adopted to be able to cash or to distribute these prescriptions. The defendant argues that he has separate offensessome that he was allowed to pass; some he did not pass. The Court does not see how trying these together will deprive him of those defenses. The trial court again observed that these three offenses occurred within a five-month period, and the trial court likewise observed that the evidence concerning each of these three offenses would involve basically the same witnesses, and that all three offenses were alleged to have occurred within the city limits of Columbus. In the end, the trial court denied Rushing's motion to sever. From our review of the record, we can thus conclude with confidence that the trial court did not misapply our recommended procedures as discussed in Corley. Therefore, we will review the trial court's decision on Rushing's motion to sever under an abuse of discretion standard, affording due deference to the trial court's findings. Corley, 584 So.2d at 772. ¶ 16. In discussing the propriety of the trial court's denial of Rushing's motion to sever, we find that the trial court properly allowed the single trial based on the merits of the arguments after weighing the three Corley considerations. First, for a multi-count trial to be proper, the trial judge must determine that the time period between the occurrences is insignificant. The time period involved here is five months. The trial judge found that five months was not an overly long time period. Rushing argues otherwise, citing numerous cases where this Court dealt with shorter time periods involving different offenses in multi-count indictments. See, e.g., Patrick v. State, 754 So.2d 1194 (Miss.2000) (separate counts of burglary, armed robbery, aggravated assault, and grand larceny occurring within seven hours of each other were properly tried together); Ott v. State, 722 So.2d 576 (Miss.1998) (multi-counts of drug offenses occurring in one day were properly tried together); McCarty v. State, 554 So.2d 909 (Miss.1989) (trial judge abused his discretion by refusing to sever two counts of burglary committed two days apart and on two different homes); Gray v. State, 549 So.2d 1316 (Miss.1989) (eight counts of making harassing phone calls committed on different victims with different subject matter and occurring two weeks apart were not part of a common scheme or plan). Rushing even cites two cases with comparable or longer time periods than the one involved here. In Eakes v. State, 665 So.2d 852, 861-62 (Miss.1995), we found five months between the first and last counts of sexual crimes insignificant where only one victim was involved, but also considered that the crimes were the same type of act. In Allman v. State, 571 So.2d 244, 248-49 (Miss.1990), this Court found a nine-month time span did not justify severance when the acts of child rape were committed by the same defendant upon the same victim. ¶ 17. Rushing attempts to distinguish these cases from the facts in his case by pointing out that there were common victims in the above-mentioned cases, whereas, in his case, there was no common victim and thus the five-month time frame becomes more significant. Whether the victim is common to all crimes has never alone been a factor to determine questions of trials involving multi-count indictments. Additionally, the fact that the pharmacy or manufacturer of the prescription drugs lost no money when these prescriptions were obtained through forgery is an immaterial consideration here. Though five months may be too long a period of time for certain crimes to retain their character as being part of a common scheme or plan, this is not so in this case. The five-month time frame does not alone warrant severance in this case when the first two offenses are almost identical and the third offense bears such a strong resemblance to the first two. Combined with the evidence of blank prescriptions forms found at the scene, the five-month span is insufficient to say the offenses were separate and distinct actions or transactions. While we agree with Rushing that there is no bright line test as to the amount of time that is significant or insignificant when considering motions to sever counts/offenses, we refuse to attempt to create a bright line test where the law clearly views the time together with the other factors. Rushing also concedes, The time factor has to be looked at with regard to the totality of the events. When reading the Corley factors together with regard to the totality of the events, the trial judge did not abuse his discretion in finding that five months was not such a significant amount of time so as to require severance. The first Corley consideration is met. ¶ 18. Second, the trial judge must determine if the evidence proving each count would be admissible to prove each of the other counts. As the State correctly points out, the source of evidence in this case is limited. The witnesses consisted of the arresting officer, the investigating officer, the two pharmacists, and Dr. Smith. All the witnesses except the two pharmacists were witnesses for all three counts of the indictment. One pharmacist testified concerning Count 1, while the other pharmacist testified as to Counts 3 and 4. The total physical evidence at trial consisted of the blank prescription forms, one valid prescription, the forged prescriptions given to Miles and Bailey, and various pills found on Rushing at the time of the arrest. All of this physical evidence would have been admissible in any single trial of one of these counts if the offenses had been severed. As this Court pointed out in Ott, the Mississippi Rules of Evidence allow the admissibility of evidence of other offenses to prove intent, preparation, and plan. 722 So.2d at 581. Evidence of other crimes, wrongs, or acts is not admissible to prove the character of a person in order to show that he acted in conformity therewith. It may, however, be admissible for other purposes such as proof of motive, opportunity, intent, preparation, plan, knowledge, identity, or absence of mistake or accident. Miss. R. Evid. 404(b). Without question, the total evidence in this case would have been admissible in separate trials of each count. The second Corley consideration is met. ¶ 19. Finally, the trial judge must find that the crimes are interwoven. Succinctly stated, these counts involve too many similar factors when viewed together, to be anything but clearly linked and part of the same common scheme or plan. The crimes here are clearly interwoven. See Neal v. State, 451 So.2d 743, 758-59 (Miss.1984). The third Corley consideration is thus met. ¶ 20. In Corley, this Court was clear concerning its policy against trying unrelated counts in a single trial. We have been, and remain, unwilling to allow separate and distinct offenses to be tried in the same criminal proceeding. We do so in order to avoid potential problems of a jury finding a defendant guilty on one unproven count due to proof of guilt on another, or convicting a defendant based upon the weight of the charged offenses, or upon the cumulative effect of the evidence. 584 So.2d at 772. This Court remains faithful to the principle that a jury should not find the defendant guilty of at least one offense, simply because he is charged with so many. However, this strong policy consideration is not in danger here. The evidence offered at trial by the State was not to establish that guilt of one offense automatically equals guilt of all of the offenses, but rather to show a common scheme or plan on Rushing's part. Simply put, these offenses were separate and distinct acts or transactions in this case. ¶ 21. For these reasons, we find that the trial court did not abuse its discretion in refusing to sever the three counts of forged prescription as alleged in Rushing's indictment. Therefore, we find this issue to be without merit.