Opinion ID: 1713224
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: did the trial court err in granting the instruction s-1a on aiding and abetting?

Text: ¶ 19. Mangum argues that the instruction on aiding and abetting was erroneous because it did not instruct the jury that Mangum had to be present, consenting, and encouraging on each and every element of the crime. This, in his view, led to confusion between what was needed for being an aider and abettor as opposed to being merely an accessory after the fact. The jury instruction read as follows: The Court instructs the jury that it is not necessary that a party should be actually physically present at a criminal transaction in order to make him guilty as an accessory; he is, in the eyes of the law, present, aiding and abetting if, with the intention of giving assistance in the commission of the crime, he is near enough to render assistance should the occasion arise. Thus, in this case, if you believe from the evidence in this case beyond a reasonable doubt that at the time of the crime in question, the defendant, Ted Mangum, after discussing and planning the commission of the crime with his accomplice, waited nearby for the purpose of transporting his accomplice away from the scene of the crime, although he, himself was not actually physically present at the crime, such conduct and presence is sufficient to make him guilty as a principal. ¶ 20. In Berry v. State, 728 So.2d 568, 570-71 (Miss.1999), we held that the granting of a Hornburger -type instruction, Hornburger v. State, 650 So.2d 510, 514-15 (Miss.1995), constituted reversible error. That aiding and abetting instruction erroneously allowed a jury to find the accused guilty as a principal if found doing any act which is an element of the crime. In the case at bar, that offensive language is absent. The instruction here allowed the jury to find Mangum guilty as a principal if, after planning the attempted robbery, he purposefully waited nearby to transport his accomplices away from the scene of the crime. That instruction, along with instruction S-3 which outlines all the necessary elements the State had to prove, appropriately fits the facts of this case. See Miss.Code Ann. § 97-3-19(2)(e) (1999). This assignment of error is without merit.