Opinion ID: 1845235
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: did the trial court commit reversible error in allowing the flight instruction to be given to the jury?

Text: The instruction complained of is set out below: Flight is a circumstance from which guilty knowledge and fear may be inferred. If you believe from the evidence in this case beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant, Larry Wayne Clark, did flee or go into hiding, such flight or hiding is to be considered in connection with all other evidence in this case. You will determine from all the facts, whether such flight or hiding was from a conscious sense of guilt or whether it was caused by other things and give it such weight as you think it is entitled to in determining the guilt or innocence of the defendant, Larry Wayne Clark. The argument here is based upon our decision in Pannell v. State, 455 So.2d 785, 787-88 (Miss. 1984), and the evidence of flight in this case had no substantial probative value. In his ruling allowing the instruction to be given to the jury the trial court stated: In the present case before this Court at this time, there has been no explanation of the reason for the defendant absenting himself from this jurisdiction and from this state for whatever length of time he was gone, to the best of the Court's understanding from the testimony, since immediately after the alleged crime until the date he was apprehended in, I believe, January of 1985. Also, it is the Court's opinion that under the circumstances the absence of the defendant would be of considerable probative value in this case. Under the circumstances and based on the law as the Court interprets it in Pannell and the other cases cited, the Court has determined that Instruction S-3, which is the instruction on flight, should be given, and the Court will give S-3. The evolution of our law on the flight instruction has been well documented by Justice Dan M. Lee in the case of Pannell v. State, 455 So.2d 785 (Miss. 1984). The result of this evolution is the rule that a flight instruction may only be given in cases where the defendant's flight (1) is unexplained and (2) where the circumstance of that flight has considerable probative value. Pannell at 788. In Fuselier v. State, 468 So.2d 45, 56, 57 (Miss. 1985), this Court stated that An instruction that flight may be considered as a circumstance of guilt or guilty knowledge is appropriate only where that flight is unexplained and somehow probative of guilt or guilty knowledge. The first criterion of the Pannell test is met in this case in that There was no attempt by the defense to explain this flight. Pharr v. State, 465 So.2d 294, 304 (Miss. 1984). The evidence reflects that Clark's whereabouts were unknown from the date of the killing on May 7, 1983, until he was apprehended in Florida on May 4, 1984. The record here is sufficient to meet the second prong of the Pannell test as well. In this case the circumstance is certainly one that has considerable probative value regarding the primary issue of guilt or guilty knowledge. The circumstances and witness testimony coupled with unexplained flight is considerably probative intending to show a conscious sense of guilt and flight to avoid punishment. When measuring the facts of this case by the standard set out in Pannell, Pharr, and Fuselier, the trial court acted properly in granting the flight instruction.