Opinion ID: 1119440
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 20

Heading: Comments about possible future crimes.

Text: The prosecutor made the following comments during the penalty phase closing argument: Don't let him go back where he can murder again, and perhaps this time a corrections officer, because that is exactly what he has threatened to do. He told the police officers that [t]ake these handcuffs off of me so I can kill a police officer. That's all I need to do to raise my reputation higher. Don't give him the chance. Don't let it happen because it wouldn't be fair; it wouldn't be justice. .... But we are going to place William Witterat least if we do what the defense wants you to do, we are going to place him in prison, where he can heighten his reputation and perpetrate unspeakable crimes on perhaps unsuspecting guards. And certainly guards are trained individuals; they are trained to protect themselves, but they don't have eyes in the back of their heads, and they don't know when a William Witter will wrap a shank that he made in a towel and become angry and thrust that into the life of a corrections officer and bring about another tragedy. .... History repeats itself. What unsuspecting prisoner might William Witter's life cross and what might happen to that prisoner? Oh, certainly, that's just a prisoner and he's a wrongdoer and maybe he gets what he deserves. .... Interestingly enough, the defense didn't ask their witness perhaps the most important question for you people: Doctor, let's talk about the future dangerousness of this man. Can anybody in your profession predict future dangerousness? .... So I took the doctor through a history of violence and asked: Does history repeat itself? Are the acts of the defendant indicators of his future dangerousness? Because you people need to know what kind of danger rests in the future of lives of other individuals that come in contact with Dr. Etcoff. Now that's a question that they didn't ask. It's a question I wanted you to know; and the answer was clear: History repeats itself. .... Knowing the future dangerousness, it would be disrespectful to the dead and irresponsible to the living to let this man have his life of prison, to let him create another personal jungle for himself like the jungle that he created in the parking lot on November 14, 1993. In Collier, we held that a prosecutor's remarks which sought to promote a conclusion that a defendant's rehabilitation was improbable, that he might well kill again while in prison, and that he should therefore be put to death were highly inappropriate. 101 Nev. at 478, 705 P.2d at 1129. In Riley v. State, 107 Nev. 205, 219, 808 P.2d 551, 560 (1991), cert. denied,  U.S. , 115 S.Ct. 1431, 131 L.Ed.2d 312 (1995), we modified our holding in Collier to allow a prosecutor to ask a jury to draw an inference of future dangerousness when there is evidence of a defendant's past conduct that would support a reasonable inference that even incarceration would not deter the defendant from endangering others' lives. Finally, in Redmen v. State, 108 Nev. 227, 828 P.2d 395 (1992), cert. denied, 506 U.S. 880, 113 S.Ct. 229, 121 L.Ed.2d 165 (1992), overruled on other grounds, Alford v. State, 111 Nev. 1409, 906 P.2d 714 (1995), we expanded our holding in Riley to allow prosecutors to argue the future dangerousness of a defendant even when there is no evidence of violence independent of the murder in question. Witter contends that the prosecutor's statements were improper under Collier. We disagree. In accordance with our holding in Redmen, the prosecutor was allowed to argue that Witter posed a threat of future dangerousness based solely on his murder of James. Moreover, in Haberstroh, 105 Nev. 739, 782 P.2d 1343, we held that a defendant's past conduct in jail justifies a prosecutor's comment that defendant could pose a continuing threat to others. In this case, the record clearly shows that a shank was found in Witter's cell while he was awaiting trial. We therefore conclude that the prosecutor's statements emphasized the potential future threat Witter posed to society. As such, we conclude that those statements were proper.