Opinion ID: 1689523
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: During the Commission of an Aggravated Robbery

Text: Appellant argues that his conviction of first-degree felony murder must be reversed because there is insufficient evidence to support the jury's finding that the killing occurred during the commission of an aggravated robbery. The state argues that it is irrelevant whether the killing took place before, during, or after the robbery, so long as the murder and robbery were both part of the same chain of events. The state also argues that because the murder and the robbery occurred at the same location and at virtually the same time, the jury was free to infer that killing Rodgers and removing his identification were part of one continuous transaction. Thus, the state argues that there is sufficient evidence to support the jury's determination that appellant inflicted harm in order to take Rodgers' personal property. Aggravated robbery is a simple robbery [2] committed by someone who is armed with a dangerous weapon or any article that the victim would reasonably believe was a dangerous weapon, or by someone who inflicts bodily harm upon another. Minn.Stat. § 609.245, subd. 1 (2000). A conviction for felony murder will be upheld only when the killing and the felony are part of one continuous transaction. See Kochevar v. State, 281 N.W.2d 680, 686 (Minn.1979). Here, it is not clear that the taking of victim's personal property and the killing were part of one continuous transaction for purposes of Minn.Stat. § 609.185(3). By its plain words, the statute prohibiting first-degree felony murder requires the defendant to have caused the death of the victim while committing or attempting to commit aggravated robbery. Minn.Stat. § 609.185(3). Whoever does any of the following is guilty of murder in the first degree and shall be sentenced to imprisonment for life:     (3) causes the death of a human being with intent to effect the death of the person or another, while committing or attempting to commit    aggravated robbery   . Id. The plain language of the statute indicates that it is generally aimed at prohibiting robberies that result in an intentional killing. [3] See id. This is consistent with the historical purpose behind the unique category of homicide known as felony murder, which was to punish an unintentional killing that results from a felony more severely than other unintentional killings in order to deter killings that might occur during the commission of a felony. See, e.g., People v. Washington, 62 Cal.2d 777, 44 Cal.Rptr. 442, 402 P.2d 130, 133 (1965); State v. O'Blasney, 297 N.W.2d 797, 798 (S.D.1980); see also 40 C.J.S. Homicide § 45 (1991) (The ostensible purpose of the felony-murder rule is    to deter the negligent or accidental killings that may occur in the course of committing [the underlying] felony, by increasing the penalty for nonpurposeful killings during the commission of certain enumerated felonies by implying    premeditation and deliberation.) (footnotes omitted). Consistent with the language of Minn. Stat. § 609.185(3) and the common law roots of felony murder, we have upheld convictions for first-degree felony murder only when there was sufficient evidence for the jury to find that the defendant had formed intent to commit the underlying felony either prior to or during the commission of the act that resulted in the victim's death. See, e.g., State v. Harris, 589 N.W.2d 782, 793 (Minn.1999); State v. Peou, 579 N.W.2d 471, 478 (Minn.1998); State v. Dukes, 544 N.W.2d 13, 15-16, 20 (Minn.1996) (affirming conviction when appellant shot and killed driver of car appellant was robbing); State v. Arrendondo, 531 N.W.2d 841, 843-45 (Minn.1995); State v. Ouk, 516 N.W.2d 180, 186 (Minn.1994) (affirming conviction when appellant and others set out to rob gas station and shot and killed two people during the robbery); State v. Russell, 503 N.W.2d 110, 112-14 (Minn.1993); State v. Nielsen, 467 N.W.2d 615, 618 (Minn.1991); State v. Bergeron, 452 N.W.2d 918, 925-26 (Minn.1990) (affirming conviction when killing occurred after appellant committed a burglary). In Harris, we affirmed a conviction of felony murder and stated that the evidence that [the defendant] `bug[ged]' [the victim] for money earlier in the evening suggests that theft was his primary motive for entering the apartment and not, as [the defendant] asserts, merely an afterthought to the killing. 589 N.W.2d at 793 (second brackets in original). In Peou, we concluded that even though the robbery occurred after the murders, the jury could have believed that [the defendant] entered the store with a motive to commit robbery based upon evidence that he was badly in need of money and that he had quarreled with [the victim] over the value of previously pawned property. 579 N.W.2d at 478. We held that there was no error in the instructions given to the jury regarding the intent required for felony murder when the trial court instructed the jury that the defendant must have been engaging in the act of aggravated robbery or must have been attempting aggravated robbery at the time of the killings: [T]he trial court instructed the jury that it does not matter if the aggravated robbery was attempted or committed before, during, or after the death of [the victim], as long as it was done as part of a continuous transaction. The trial court also instructed the jury that [the defendant] must have intended to cause the deaths of the victims and also must have been engaging in the act of committing or attempting to commit the crime of aggravated robbery at the time of the killings to be found guilty of this charge. Id. at 475-76 (emphasis added). We concluded that the trial court's instruction to the jury was a correct statement of the substantive law. Id. at 476. In Nielsen, we affirmed a conviction of first-degree felony murderwhere the underlying felony was a sexual assaultbecause the jury could have believed that the assault [that resulted in death] was sexually motivated and that the criminal sexual conduct and the homicide were one continuous transaction, making the crime first degree felony murder. Id. at 618. Our decisions are consistent with felony murder as developed at common law and in other jurisdictions: The law does not require that the felony necessarily precede the murder in order to support the felony-murder conviction. It is enough that the murder facilitate the felony. However, in order to support a conviction of felony murder the evidence must establish that defendant harbored a felonious intent either prior to or during the commission of the acts which resulted in the victim's death, and evidence which establishes that defendant formed the intent only after engaging in the fatal act cannot support a conviction of felony murder. 40 C.J.S. Homicide § 47 (1991) (footnotes omitted). It is true, as the state contends, that the act that constitutes the underlying felony may occur before, during, or after the killing. See, e.g., Harris, 589 N.W.2d at 792. However, even though two crimes may have been committed at or about the same time and place, our decisions indicate that the one continuous transaction requirement of felony murder will not be satisfied automatically simply because the two events occur near each other in time and place. Instead, we have held that the causal relationship between the murder and the underlying felony is only satisfied when there is evidence to support a finding that the defendant formed the requisite felonious intent before or during the act resulting in death. See, e.g., Nielsen, 467 N.W.2d at 618. Under the facts of this case, the evidence shows that appellant caused the death of the victim and left the scene of the crime for a few moments, driving approximately 50 yards before returning to the body to retrieve the victim's identification. The short period of time and short distance between the two crimes are not enough to sever the single chain of events as pertains to the act of the underlying felony. See Harris, 589 N.W.2d at 793. However, a felony murder charge also requires sufficient evidence to support a jury determination that appellant had formed the intent to rob Rodgers by the time he intentionally killed him. See Minn.Stat. § 609.185(3); Peou, 579 N.W.2d at 475-76; Nielsen, 467 N.W.2d at 618. The state offered no evidence that appellant intended to take the identification before or during the time appellant killed Rodgers. By the state's own theory, the homicide was in retaliation for violating gang rules, and appellant likely returned to retrieve the identification cards either to offer proof of the deed to his fellow Gangster Disciples or to stymie the investigation. But the state offered no evidence that appellant had formed the intent to rob Rodgers when he set out either to beat up Rodgers or to kill him. It is at least as likely that appellant determined after he had killed Rodgers to take his identification in order to offer proof to Johnson and the other Gangster Disciples that he had taken care of Rodgers. See State v. Bias, 419 N.W.2d 480, 484 (Minn. 1988) (concluding that conviction based on circumstantial evidence merits stricter scrutiny and may stand only when the circumstances proved are consistent with the hypothesis that the accused is guilty and inconsistent with any rational hypothesis other than that of guilt and form a complete chain that leads so directly to the guilt of the accused as to exclude, beyond a reasonable doubt, any reasonable inference other than that of guilt). We hold that the state failed to produce sufficient evidence that appellant had formed the intent to rob Rodgers at or before the time of the killing. Thus, the state failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that appellant caused the victim's death while committing an aggravated robbery. We therefore reverse appellant's conviction of first-degree murder during the commission of an aggravated robbery.