Opinion ID: 154173
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Statutory Aggravators.

Text: The trial court instructed the jury on six statutory aggravators.15 The jury found the existence of all six beyond a reasonable doubt. Mr. Davis challenges five of the six. The six aggravators were: 15 (a) The class 1 felony was committed by a person under sentence of imprisonment for a class 1, 2, or 3 felony as defined by Colorado law or United States law . . . . ... (d) The defendant intentionally killed a person kidnapped or being held as a hostage by him or by anyone associated with him; or (e) The defendant has been a party to an agreement to kill another person in furtherance of which a person has been intentionally killed; or ... (g) The defendant committed a class 1, 2, or 3 felony and, in the course of or in furtherance of such or immediate flight therefrom, he intentionally caused the death of a person other than one of the participants; or ... (j) The defendant committed the offense in an especially heinous, cruel, or depraved manner; or (k) The class 1 felony was committed for the purpose of avoiding or preventing a lawful arrest or prosecution or effecting an escape from custody. This factor shall include the intentional killing of a witness to a criminal offense. Colo. Rev. Stat. § 16-11-103(6)(1986). -31- Colorado’s capital sentencing scheme involves four steps. The Colorado Supreme Court has described it as follows: First, the jury must determine if at least one of the statutory aggravating factors exists. §§ 16-11-103(2)(a)(I), -(6). If the jury does not unanimously agree that the prosecution has proven the existence of at least one statutory aggravator beyond a reasonable doubt, the defendant must be sentenced to life imprisonment. §§ 16-11-103(1)(d), -(2)(b)(I), -(2)(c). Second, if the jury has found that at least one statutory aggravating factor has been proven, the jury must then consider whether any mitigating factors exist. §§ 16-11103(2)(a)(II), -(5). “There shall be no burden of proof as to proving or disproving mitigating factors,” § 16-11-103(1)(d), and the jury need not unanimously agree upon the existence of mitigating factors. Third, the jury must determine whether “sufficient mitigating factors exist which outweigh any aggravating factor or factors found to exist.” § 16-11-103(2)(a)(II). Fourth, and finally, if the jury finds that any mitigating factors do not outweigh the proven statutory aggravating factors, it must decide whether the defendant should be sentenced to death or to life imprisonment. § 1611-103(2)(a)(III). People v. Tenneson, 788 P.2d 786, 789 (Colo. 1990) (citations omitted); see also People v. White, 870 P.2d 424, 438 (Colo.), cert. denied, 115 S. Ct. 127 (1994).16 “The constitutional validity of aggravating factors is a question of law subject to de novo review.” United States v. McCullah, 76 F.3d 1087, 1107 (10th Cir. 1996). What happens when an unconstitutional aggravator has been submitted to the sentencer depends, in part, on whether the state sentencing scheme involves weighing of aggravating and mitigating circumstances. The statutory sentencing scheme has been amended a number of times since Mr. 16 Davis’s trial. -32- In a weighing state, “after a jury has found a defendant guilty of capital murder and found the existence of at least one statutory aggravating factor, it must weigh the aggravating factor or factors against the mitigating evidence.” Stringer v. Black, 503 U.S. 222, 229 (1992). By contrast, in a non-weighing state “the jury must find the existence of one aggravating factor before imposing the death penalty, but aggravating factors as such have no specific function in the jury’s decision whether a defendant who has been found to be eligible for the death penalty should receive it under all the circumstances of the case.” Id. at 229-30. If an unconstitutional aggravating factor has been submitted to the jury in a weighing state, an appellate court may independently reweigh the aggravating and mitigating factors, omitting the unconstitutional one, and determine if the sentence is nonetheless appropriate. Clemons v. Mississippi, 494 U.S. 738, 750 (1990). Alternatively, the appellate court may conduct a harmless error analysis, determining whether the submission to the jury of the unconstitutional aggravator was harmless. Id. at 752. Additionally, the Supreme Court has indicated that “a state appellate court may itself determine whether the evidence supports the existence of the aggravating circumstance as properly defined,” Walton v. Arizona, 497 U.S. 639, 654 (1990), and on federal habeas review of such a decision, “the state court’s application of the narrowing construction should be reviewed under the ‘rational factfinder’ standard of Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307 (1979).” Richmond v. Lewis, 506 U.S. 40, 47 (1992). -33- In a non-weighing state, by contrast, so long as the sentencing body finds at least one valid aggravating factor, the fact that it also finds an invalid aggravating factor does not infect the formal process of deciding whether death is an appropriate penalty. Assuming a determination by the state appellate court that the invalid factor would not have made a difference to the jury’s determination, there is no constitutional violation resulting from the introduction of the invalid factor in an earlier stage of the proceeding. Stringer, 503 U.S. at 232; see also Tuggle v. Netherland, 116 S. Ct. 283 (1995); Zant v. Stephens, 462 U.S. 862 (1983); Tuggle v. Netherland, 79 F.3d 1386 (4th Cir. 1996) (applying harmless error analysis to Ake v. Oklahoma, 470 U.S. 68 (1985), error in capital sentencing proceeding in a non-weighing state), cert. denied, 1996 WL 442391 (U.S. Oct. 7, 1996) (No. 96-5364). Step three of Colorado’s four-step capital sentencing scheme clearly requires weighing of aggravating and mitigating circumstances. Step four, however, “require[s] the jury to make an independent decision whether to impose a sentence of life imprisonment or death where mitigating factors did not outweigh aggravating factors.” People v. District Court, 834 P.2d 181, 185 (Colo. 1992); see also People v. Young, 814 P.2d 834, 841 (Colo. 1991). It thus is more similar to the sentencing decision made in a non-weighing state.17 The Supreme Court has not specifically indicated whether the 17 The Colorado Supreme Court in Davis I considered Colorado’s sentencing scheme to be a weighing one. Davis I, 794 P.2d at 178; see also People v. Rodriguez, 914 P.2d 230, 329 (Colo. 1996) (Lohr, J., dissenting); Stephen Hornbuckle, Note, Capital Sentencing Procedure: A Lethal Oddity in the Supreme Court’s Case Law, 73 Tex. L. (continued...) -34- Clemons reweighing/harmless-error analysis or the Zant analysis applies to states having “hybrid” systems like Colorado’s. See Flamer v. Delaware, 68 F.3d 736, 769 (3d Cir. 1995) (Lewis, J., dissenting), cert. denied, 116 S. Ct. 807 (1996). Mr. Davis suggests that a harmless error analysis is not possible under Colorado’s capital sentencing scheme, apparently because of the fourth step. While he is not completely clear, we assume his argument is that a harmless-error analysis is unavailable in a non-weighing scheme, and therefore unavailable in Colorado because of that fourth step. We disagree with his characterization of Colorado’s capital sentencing scheme. While the fourth step in the sentencing process does indeed appear to give the jury the opportunity to consider any and all reasons for imposing a sentence of life or death, the third step clearly and specifically requires the jury to weigh aggravating and mitigating factors. The jury does not reach the fourth step unless it has determined that any mitigating factors do not outweigh the proven statutory aggravators. Because weighing thus performs a critical function in the jury’s sentencing scheme, we apply, where 17 (...continued) Rev. 441, 448 n.38 (1994) (including Colorado’s capital sentencing scheme among list of weighing states). The state’s position on whether Colorado is a weighing or a nonweighing jurisdiction is interesting. In its answer brief, the state argued that Colorado is a weighing state, such that appellate reweighing or harmless error analysis could cure any error in the submission of an invalid aggravator to the jury. Resp’t-Appellee’s Answer Br. at 80. At oral argument, however, in an effort to avoid the effect of one part of our recent decision in McCullah, 76 F.3d at 1111-12, the state argued that the fourth step really makes Colorado more like a non-weighing state. -35- appropriate, the Clemons harmless error analysis.18 We turn now to the specific allegations of error. A. Aggravating Factor of “Avoiding or Preventing Lawful Arrest or Prosecution”: One of the statutory aggravators presented to the jury was the following: The class I felony was committed for the purpose of avoiding or preventing a lawful arrest or prosecution or effecting an escape from custody. This factor shall include the intentional killing of a witness to a criminal offense. Colo. Rev. Stat. § 16-11-103(6)(k). Mr. Davis objected to the instruction on the ground that the aggravator should only apply when a witness of a crime is killed to prevent the investigation or prosecution of that other, separate, crime or when a law enforcement officer is killed while attempting to arrest someone. The trial court overruled the objection. 18 Although neither party pursues this, there is actually a question whether harmless error analysis is available to us on federal habeas review where the error involves the submission to the jury of an unconstitutionally vague aggravating circumstance. There is currently a split in the circuits on whether federal habeas courts have the power to conduct a harmless error analysis when reviewing a capital sentencing proceeding that involved an invalid statutory aggravating circumstance. Compare Smith v. Dixon, 14 F.3d 956, 974-81 (4th Cir. 1994) (en banc) (holding that it had authority to review whether submission of unconstitutionally vague heinousness aggravator to jury was harmless error), cert. denied, 115 S. Ct. 129 (1994) and Williams v. Clarke, 40 F.3d 1529, 1539-40 (8th Cir. 1994) (same), cert. denied, 115 S. Ct. 1397 (1995) with Wiley v. Puckett, 969 F.2d 86, 94 n.8 (5th Cir. 1992) (holding that federal habeas courts cannot conduct harmless error analysis where invalid aggravator was submitted to jury in capital sentencing proceeding but instead must remand to state courts in the first instance); see also O’Guinn v. Dutton, 88 F.3d 1409, 1461 (6th Cir. 1996) (Batchelder, J., dissenting); Flamer, 68 F.3d at 770-71 (Lewis, J., dissenting). We agree with the Fourth and the Eighth Circuits, for the reasons set forth in their decisions, that we have the authority. -36- To be constitutional, an aggravating circumstance must “not apply to every defendant convicted of a murder; it must apply only to a subclass of defendants convicted of murder.” Tuilaepa v. California, 114 S. Ct. 2630, 2635 (1994). “If the sentencer fairly could conclude that an aggravating circumstance applies to every defendant eligible for the death penalty, the circumstance is constitutionally infirm.” Arave v. Creech, 507 U.S. 463, 474 (1993). Additionally, “the aggravating circumstance may not be unconstitutionally vague.” Tuilaepa, 114 S. Ct. at 2635. The Colorado Supreme Court agreed with the state’s interpretation of this aggravator, that it “is appropriate if the evidence indicates that a defendant has murdered the victim of a contemporaneously or recently perpetrated offense and the reason for the murder was to prevent the victim from becoming a witness.” Davis I, 794 P.2d at 187. The “antecedent crime must be one which is not inherent or necessarily incident to murder such as assault or battery, otherwise every murder would be punished by death.” Id. at 187 n.22. The Colorado court observed that “[b]y putting the focus on the purpose of the murder, this aggravating factor cannot be said to include all murder victims because they are all potential witnesses.” Id. at 187. Mr. Davis argues this interpretation fails to effectively narrow the class of defendants subject to the death penalty, because all murder victims are thereby prevented from testifying against their murderers. He argues “Mrs. May was not a witness to a criminal offense independent of the murder. Rather, -37- the crimes upon her that she had witnessed were part of the same continuous criminal transaction as the murder.” Appellant’s Opening Br. at 78. We agree with the Colorado Supreme Court, whose analysis the district court adopted, that the statutory aggravator sufficiently narrows the class of defendants to whom it applies. Several other states have a similar statutory aggravating circumstance. Arkansas, for example, includes among its aggravating circumstances that “[t]he capital murder was committed for the purpose of avoiding or preventing an arrest or effecting an escape from custody.” Ark. Code Ann. § 5-4-604(5). The Eighth Circuit recently rejected an argument that the provision “does not genuinely narrow the class of persons eligible for the death penalty.” Wainwright v. Lockhart, 80 F.3d 1226, 1231 (8th Cir. 1996), petition for cert. filed, (U.S. Aug. 29, 1996) (No. 96-5760). In Wainwright, the court held that the aggravator was properly applied to a murder which was committed in the course of a robbery, in order to prevent the murderer’s identification by the victim. See also Joubert v. Hopkins, 75 F.3d 1232, 1247 (8th Cir.) (upholding validity of Nebraska statutory aggravator that the killing was committed to hide the perpetrator’s identity where defendant kidnaped victims before killing them), cert. denied, 116 S. Ct. 2574 (1996); Ruiz v. Norris, 71 F.3d 1404, 1408 (8th Cir. 1995), petition for cert. filed, (U.S. May 28, 1996) (No. 95-9119); Miller v. State, 605 S.W.2d 430, 439-40 (Ark. 1980) (upholding validity of statutory aggravator that murder was committed for purpose of avoiding arrest where defendant robbed victim before killing him), cert. denied, 450 U.S. -38- 1035 (1981); Thompson v. State, 648 So. 2d 692, 695 (Fla. 1994) (upholding validity of statutory aggravator that murder was committed for purpose of avoiding arrest where defendant kidnaped and robbed victims before murdering them), cert. denied, 115 S. Ct. 2283 (1995); Walker v. State, 671 So. 2d 581, 602 (Miss. 1995) (upholding validity of statutory aggravator that murder was committed for purpose of avoiding or preventing a lawful arrest where defendants kidnaped and raped victim before murdering her), petition for cert. filed, (U.S. July 16, 1996) (No. 96-5259); State v. Hightower, 680 A.2d 649, 663 (N.J. 1996) (upholding validity of statutory aggravator that murder was committed to avoid apprehension where victim was robbed prior to murder, and observing that “[t]he fact that a murder occurs contemporaneously with the witnessed underlying crime does not mitigate the evil of killing a potential witness”); State v. Gregory, 459 S.E.2d 638, 664 (N.C. 1995) (upholding validity of statutory aggravator that murders were committed for the purpose of avoiding or preventing a lawful arrest where defendants had kidnaped and raped victims prior to killing them), cert. denied, 116 S. Ct. 1327 (1996). In each of these cases, the aggravating circumstance was applied where an antecedent crime (rape or kidnaping or robbery) occurred, and the murderer killed the victim to prevent the victim’s identification of the murderer for the antecedent crime.19 That is exactly what occurred in 19 Among the cases upon which Mr. Davis relies in his argument that the avoiding arrest aggravator is unconstitutional is People v. Silva, 754 P.2d 1070 (Cal. 1988), cert. denied, 488 U.S. 1019 (1989), in which the California Supreme Court invalidated the application of a witness-murder statutory aggravator where a kidnaping, robbery and (continued...) -39- this case: Mr. Davis testified that he killed Ms. May so she would not be a live witness. R. Vol. V, Vol. 32 at 73. Further, the evidence in this case concerning the Davises’ motivation for murdering Ms. May, which Mr. Davis does not dispute, supports the conclusion that their motivation for kidnaping Ms. May was to subject her to various sexual abuses, and she was then murdered so she would not identify them. We find nothing unconstitutional in the application of this aggravator to Mr. Davis. B. Application of the “Party to an Agreement” Aggravator: Mr. Davis also challenges the statutory aggravator that Mr Davis “has been a party to an agreement to kill another person in furtherance of which a person has been intentionally killed.” Colo. Rev. Stat. § 16-11-103(6)(e). He argues, as he did at his trial, that this aggravator should only apply to contract killings, not to “simple conspiracy.” Appellant’s Opening Br. at 87. As the Supreme Court has stated, “[s]tates must properly establish a threshold below which the [death] penalty cannot be imposed.” Romano v. Oklahoma, 114 S. Ct. 2004, 2009 (1994); McCleskey v. Kemp, 481 U.S. 279, 305 (1987). To that end, they 19 (...continued) murder “were part of one continuous transaction.” Id. at 1084. However, the California statute in question specifically excludes from its ambit the killing of a witness-victim where the killing was “committed during the commission, or attempted commission of the crime to which he or she was a witness.” Cal. Penal Code § 190.2(a)(10). Colorado’s statutory aggravator has no such specific limitation excluding a killing committed during the commission of the crime to which the victim was a witness. -40- must “establish rational criteria that narrow the decisionmaker’s judgment as to whether the circumstances of a particular defendant’s case meet the threshold.” Id. We have recognized that “aggravating circumstances must be described in terms that are commonly understood, interpreted and applied. To truly provide guidance to a sentencer who must distinguish between murders, an aggravating circumstance must direct the sentencer’s attention to a particular aspect of a killing that justifies the death penalty.” Cartwright v. Maynard, 822 F.2d 1477, 1485 (10th Cir. 1987), aff’d, 486 U.S. 356 (1988). An aggravating circumstance cannot be so vague that it fails to effectively channel the sentencer’s discretion, and it must contribute to the kind of individualized sentencing necessary for the imposition of the death penalty. “Beyond these limitations, . . . the Court has deferred to the State’s choice of substantive factors relevant to the penalty determination.” California v. Ramos, 463 U.S. 992, 1001 (1983). Mr. Davis makes no specific argument why the “party to an agreement” aggravator is not a rational criterion by which Colorado could select those for whom the death penalty is permissible. He simply argues that the Colorado legislature did not intend it to apply other than to contracts for hire, an argument the Colorado Supreme Court rejected, and that no other state includes such an aggravator in its capital sentencing scheme. Neither argument persuades us that habeas relief is necessary. The Colorado Supreme Court examined the legislative history behind the statute, and determined that it was not limited to “contract-murders,” as Mr. Davis argues. -41- Absent some compelling argument that that interpretation violates the federal constitution, we will not disturb it. See Bowser v. Boggs, 20 F.3d 1060, 1065 (10th Cir.) (“We will not second guess a state court’s application or interpretation of state law on a petition for habeas unless such application or interpretation violates federal law.”), cert. denied, 115 S. Ct. 313 (1994); Hamm v. Latessa, 72 F.3d 947, 954 (1st Cir. 1995) (same), cert. denied, 1996 WL 375754 (U.S. Oct. 7, 1996) (No. 95-9428); see also Mansfield v. Champion, 992 F.2d 1098, 1100 (10th Cir. 1993) (“In a habeas corpus proceeding under section 2254, a federal court should defer to a state court’s interpretation of state law in determining whether an incident constitutes one or more than one offense for double jeopardy purposes.”). And the fact that Colorado may be the only state which permits such an aggravator by itself indicates no constitutional infirmity. As the Supreme Court has made clear, unless the aggravator is unconstitutionally vague on its face, or otherwise impedes the requirement that sentencing determinations be individualized, states are free to select whatever substantive criteria they wish to determine who is eligible for the death penalty. See Spaziano v. Florida, 468 U.S. 447, 464 (1984) (“The Eighth Amendment is not violated every time a State reaches a conclusion different from a majority of its sisters over how best to administer its criminal laws.”). -42- C. Consideration of the “Especially Heinous, Cruel or Depraved” Aggravator: The jury was also instructed on the aggravating factor that “[t]he defendant committed the offense in an especially heinous, cruel, or depraved manner.” Colo. Rev. Stat. § 16-11-103(6)(j). The trial court offered no elaboration of the language of the statute, and overruled Mr. Davis’s objection to the aggravator as unconstitutionally vague. The United States Supreme Court in Maynard v. Cartwright, 486 U.S. 356 (1988), held that Oklahoma’s “especially heinous, atrocious or cruel” statutory aggravator, if presented to a jury without further elaboration and explication, was unconstitutionally vague. The Colorado Supreme Court in Davis I correctly concluded that, under Cartwright, the trial court improperly permitted the jury to consider the “especially heinous, cruel or depraved” aggravator. The Colorado court further held that, under Proffit v. Florida, 428 U.S. 242 (1976), “the prosecutor could prove the existence of this aggravator by showing that the defendant committed the crime in a ‘conscienceless or pitiless’ manner which was ‘unnecessarily torturous to the victim.’” Davis I, 794 P.2d at 176-77. The court went on to determine whether, “beyond a reasonable doubt, . . . had the aggravator properly been narrowed the jury would have returned a verdict of death.” Id. at 179. It concluded that it would have, and that the error was therefore harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. Mr. Davis argues the Colorado Supreme Court erred in two respects: (1) it emphasized heavily the evidence supporting the “heinous, cruel or depraved” aggravator, -43- while failing to mention or discuss any mitigating evidence in conducting its harmless error review; and (2) harmless error review is impossible because of Colorado’s peculiar capital sentencing scheme. We have already rejected this second argument and concluded that harmless error analysis is available. We must still determine whether the Colorado Supreme Court properly cured the error, either by correctly applying a narrowing construction or otherwise conducting a harmless error analysis. The Colorado Supreme Court held that the properly narrowed definition of the “heinous, cruel or depraved” aggravator was the one set out in Proffit. Mr. Davis does not dispute the validity of that narrowed definition. He simply disagrees with the way the Colorado court applied that standard, arguing it is “‘nothing but a facile guess at what the jury would have found under a totally hypothetical set of instructions that realistically could not possibly have been within the contemplation of any juror when this case was decided.’” Appellant’s Opening Br. at 81 (quoting Davis I, 794 P.2d at 222 (Quinn, C.J., dissenting)). He further argues the court made no reference to the mitigating evidence presented to the jury. When reviewing a state court’s application of a properly narrowed definition of a facially vague aggravator, we “uphold the state court’s finding so long as a rational factfinder could have found the elements identified by the construction--here, that the crime involved [conscienceless or pitiless conduct and was unnecessarily torturous to the victim].” Hatch v. Oklahoma, 58 F.3d 1447, 1469 (10th Cir. 1995), cert. denied, 116 S. -44- Ct. 1881 (1996); see also Richmond v. Lewis, 506 U.S. 40, 47 (1992); Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 319 (1979). The Colorado Supreme Court found the necessary facts to establish that the murder was committed in a conscienceless or pitiless manner, and was unnecessarily torturous to the victim. Davis I, 794 P.2d at 179-80. It then held that, because a jury given a properly narrowed definition of the “heinousness” aggravator would still have found the aggravator established, it was harmless error beyond a reasonable doubt to instruct the jury without that narrowed definition. Under Richmond, Walton and our Hatch decision, we perceive no error in the Colorado Supreme Court’s “curing” the submission to the jury of the vague aggravator. Alternatively, were we to agree that, despite its use of the term “harmless error,” the Colorado Supreme Court did not properly conduct a harmless error analysis because it did not explicitly consider mitigating evidence, we could apply the harmless error standard of Brecht v. Abrahamson, 507 U.S. 619, 637 (1993). Under Brecht, federal courts on habeas review of trial errors must ask “whether the error ‘had substantial and injurious effect or influence in determining the jury’s verdict.’” Id. (quoting Kotteakos v. United States, 328 U.S. 750, 776 (1946)). In making that evaluation, the Supreme Court has indicated that “where the record is so evenly balanced that a conscientious judge is in grave doubt as to the harmlessness of an error,” the error is not harmless. O’Neal v. -45- McAninch, ___ U.S. ___, ___, 115 S. Ct. 992, 995 (1995).20 Thus, under Brecht, we would inquire whether the submission of the vague aggravator had a substantial and injurious effect on the jury’s verdict. As we have previously stated, “our task is not merely to determine whether there was sufficient evidence to convict . . . in the absence of [the error].” Tuttle v. Utah, 57 F.3d 879, 884 (10th Cir. 1995). Rather, it is to “determine, in light of the entire record, whether [the error] so influenced the jury that we cannot conclude that it did not substantially affect the verdict, or whether we have grave doubt as to the harmlessness of the error alleged.” Id. Applying that standard, we conclude that the submission to the jury of the vague “heinousness” aggravator was harmless error. The jury was given six statutory aggravators. Mr. Davis does not dispute the applicability of one of the six (that the crime was committed while he was on parole for another crime). We have just held that two 20 While there is some disagreement as to whether the Brecht/Kotteakos standard applies in all federal habeas proceedings where a trial error is claimed to be harmless, or only when the state appellate court has previously applied the more stringent Chapman “harmless beyond a reasonable doubt” standard to the claimed error, our circuit agrees with those courts holding that the Brecht/Kotteakos standard applies in all proceedings. See Castro v. Oklahoma, 71 F.3d 1502, 1515-16 and n.14 (10th Cir. 1995); Brewer, 51 F.3d at 1529; see also Sherman v. Smith, 89 F.3d 1134, 1140 (4th Cir. 1996); Tyson v. Trigg, 50 F.3d 436, 446-47 (7th Cir. 1995), cert. denied, 116 S. Ct. 697 (1996); Horsley v. Alabama, 45 F.3d 1486, 1492 n.11 (11th Cir.), cert. denied, 116 S. Ct. 410 (1995); but see, Starr v. Lockhart, 23 F.3d 1280, 1292 (8th Cir.) (holding that Chapman standard applies because state courts did not apply that standard on direct review), cert. denied, 115 S. Ct. 499 (1994); Orndorff v. Lockhart, 998 F.2d 1426, 1430 (8th Cir. 1993) (same), cert. denied, 114 S. CT.. 1631 (1994). At least one panel of the Ninth Circuit has declined to decide the issue. Hanna v. Riveland, 87 F.3d 1034, 1038 n.2 (9th Cir. 1996), modified, No. 95-33700, 1996 WL 473208 (9th Cir. June 25, 1996). -46- other aggravators, that the murder was committed to avoid arrest and that Mr. Davis was a party to an agreement to murder, were properly submitted to the jury and supported by the evidence. Thus, three valid aggravators were clearly before the jury.21 In discussing the “heinous, cruel or depraved” aggravator in his closing argument, the prosecutor did not allude to any evidence or facts not already properly before the jury. Nor was that particular aggravator emphasized disproportionately in that closing argument. The valid aggravators, in our view, powerfully outweighed the mitigating evidence before the jury. In light of the entire record, we conclude that the submission of the unconstitutionally vague “heinousness” aggravator to the jury did not have a “substantial and injurious effect or influence in determining the jury’s verdict.” Brecht, 507 U.S. at 637. D. Consideration of “Felony Murder” and “Kidnaping” Aggravators: Two additional aggravating factors submitted to the jury were that Davis committed the felony of second degree kidnaping, and “in the course of or in furtherance of such or immediate flight therefrom, he intentionally caused the death of a person other than one of the participants,” Colo. Rev. Stat. § 16-11-103(6)(g), and that he “intentionally killed a person kidnapped or being held as a hostage by him or by anyone associated with him.” Colo. Rev. Stat. § 16-11-103(6)(d). Mr. Davis argues that these 21 Additionally, as discussed infra, two duplicative aggravators were submitted to the jury. They were not invalid; they merely overlapped. Thus, another valid aggravator was before the jury, in that Mr. Davis killed a person whom he had kidnaped. -47- two aggravating circumstances “involve the same indivisible course of conduct,” Appellant’s Opening Br. at 84, and that the submission of both to the jury fails to genuinely narrow the class of defendants eligible for the death penalty. The Colorado Supreme Court in Davis I found that Mr. Davis “did not object to the presentation to the jury of the ‘felony murder’ aggravator[,] [n]or did he present a ‘doubling up’ argument to the court during the presentation of the ‘kidnaping’ aggravator.” Davis I, 794 P.2d at 188. The court went on to observe that it was aware of no federal cases addressing the constitutionality, under federal law, of overlapping or duplicative aggravators, but found no error in Mr. Davis’s case “[b]ecause, by the plain language of our statute, both aggravators applied under the facts of this case.” Id. at 189. The court also observed that the jury was instructed that it was the weight assigned each aggravating factor, not their mere number, that guided the jury’s deliberation. Id. Thus, the Colorado court found no error. Since Davis I, our court has held that the submission of duplicative aggravating factors is constitutional error, at least under the weighing scheme of the federal death penalty statute, 21 U.S.C. § 848. United States v. McCullah, 76 F.3d 1087, 1111-12 (10th Cir. 1996); see also United States v. Tipton, 90 F.3d 861, 899 (4th Cir. 1996). In McCullah, we remanded for a “reweighing of the aggravating and mitigating factors.” McCullah, 76 F.3d at 1112. -48- The state responds that Colorado’s particular capital sentencing scheme includes both a weighing and a non-weighing component, and the fourth and last step in the sentencing process makes it ultimately a non-weighing state in which, under Zant v. Stephens, 462 U.S. 862 (1983), duplicative aggravators are not a problem. As we have indicated, in our view, Colorado’s capital sentencing scheme contains a crucial weighing component. We thus treat it as a weighing state. In federal habeas review of a state court trial in which an error occurred in the submission of aggravating factors to a jury which must weigh aggravating and mitigating factors, we may conduct a harmless error analysis. See Clemons, 494 U.S. at 750; see also Brecht, 507 U.S. at 637. Applying the Brecht standard, we must determine whether, in light of the entire record, the submission of the two aggravators addressing the same basic conduct had a “substantial and injurious effect or influence” on the jury’s verdict. Id. As we stated above in discussing the effect of the “heinousness” factor on the jury, the jury had three valid aggravating factors before it. It also had Mr. Davis’s own statement describing his involvement in the crime, and taking full responsibility for it. The jury was further specifically instructed that it could “assign any weight you wish to each aggravating and mitigating factor. It is the weight assigned to each factor, and not the number of factors found to exist that is to be considered.” Jury Instruction No. 2, R. Vol. IV, Vol. 2 at 389. Similarly, Instruction No. 5 directed the jury that the weighing of mitigating and aggravating factors “is not a mere counting process in which numbers of aggravating -49- factors are weighed against numbers of mitigating factors. The number of the factors found is not determinative. . . . You must consider the relative substantiality and persuasiveness of the existing aggravating and mitigating factors in making this determination.” Jury Instruction No. 5, id. at 394. We assume that the jury did not blindly or unthinkingly add up the total number of aggravators, and weigh that number against the number of mitigators. Rather, we assume they followed the instructions to critically evaluate each factor, applying their “common sense understanding” to their obligation to weigh aggravating and mitigating factors. See Boyde v. California, 494 U.S. 370, 381 (1990). An instruction that the weighing process is not simply a mathematical exercise, but instead requires critical evaluation of the factors, can help to countervail any improper influence occasioned by the submission of duplicative aggravators. See United States v. Chandler, 996 F.2d 1073, 1093 (11th Cir. 1993) (noting that an instruction that “the weighing process was not a mechanical one and that different factors could be given different weight” can alleviate concern that the jury would be influenced by the number of aggravating factors), cert. denied, 114 S. Ct. 2724 (1994); United States v. Bradley, 880 F. Supp. 271, 289 n.8 (M.D. Pa. 1994) (noting that a curative instruction might countervail “any unfairness inherent in the weighing of a duplicative factor.”); see also Parsons v. Barnes, 871 P.2d 516, 528-30 (Utah) (finding no prejudice to defendant from improper double-counting of aggravators where the jury was instructed “not in terms of the relative numbers of the aggravating and mitigating factors, -50- but in terms of their respective substantiality and persuasiveness.”), cert. denied, 115 S. Ct. 431 (1994). In light of the entire record, we cannot conclude that the submission of both the felony murder and the kidnaping aggravators substantially influenced the jury’s verdict.