Opinion ID: 1386655
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 10

Heading: Constitutionality of Issue Three

Text: Defendant next assigns as error the denial of his motion to change the wording of the Issues and Recommendation as to Punishment form and the correlating jury instructions regarding Issue Three. Specifically, defendant requested the trial court to instruct the jury that it must recommend a sentence of life imprisonment unless it found the aggravating circumstance outweighed the mitigating circumstances. The trial court denied this request. Utilizing the established pattern jury instruction, the trial court instructed the jury: Issue 3 is, Do you unanimously find beyond a reasonable doubt that the mitigating circumstance or circumstances found is or are insufficient to outweigh the aggravating circumstances found by you? If you find from the evidence one or more mitigating circumstances, you must weigh the aggravating circumstance against the mitigating circumstances. When deciding this issue, each juror may consider any mitigating circumstance or circumstances that he or she deemed to exist by a preponderance of the evidence in [I]ssue 2. In so doing, you are the sole judge of the weight to be given to any individual circumstance which you find, whether aggravating or mitigating. You should not merely add up the number of aggravating circumstances and mitigating circumstances. Rather, you must decide from all the evidence what value to give to each circumstance, and then weigh the aggravating circumstance, so valued, against the mitigating circumstances, so valued, and finally determine whether the mitigating circumstance[s] are insufficient to outweigh the aggravating circumstance. If you unanimously find beyond a reasonable doubt that the mitigating circumstances found are insufficient to outweigh the aggravating circumstance found, you would answer [I]ssue 3 yes. If you unanimously fail to so find, you would answer [I]ssue 3 no. Defendant argues this instruction violated his constitutional rights because it impermissibly shifted the burden of proof to defendant on this issue by requiring the jury to determine whether the mitigating circumstances found are insufficient to outweigh the aggravating circumstance found, creating a presumption the answer should be yes. We find defendant's arguments to lack merit and therefore overrule this assignment of error. Initially, we note it was proper for the trial court to deny defendant's request to change the language in the jury instructions and the Issues and Recommendation as to Punishment form regarding Issue Three. [R]equested instructions need only be given in substance if correct in law and supported by the evidence. State v. Morgan, 359 N.C. 131, 169, 604 S.E.2d 886, 909 (2004), cert. denied, ___ U.S. ___, 126 S.Ct. 47, 163 L.Ed.2d 79 (2005). North Carolina's capital punishment statute requires the jury to make the following finding before imposition of the death penalty is allowed: [T]he mitigating circumstance or circumstances are insufficient to outweigh the aggravating circumstance or circumstances found. N.C.G.S. § 15A-2000(c)(3) (2005). A very similar instruction was upheld as constitutionally sufficient by the Supreme Court of the United States in Walton v. Arizona, in which a judge was required to sentence the defendant to death if one or more aggravating circumstances are found and mitigating circumstances are held insufficient to call for leniency. 497 U.S. 639, 651, 110 S.Ct. 3047, 111 L.Ed.2d 511 (1990) (plurality), overruled on other grounds by Ring v. Arizona, 536 U.S. 584, 122 S.Ct. 2428, 153 L.Ed.2d 556. North Carolina's capital punishment statute actually provides greater protection against the arbitrary imposition of the death penalty than the statute upheld in Walton, as our statute does not mandate death solely on the weighing of aggravating and mitigating circumstances. See N.C.G.S. § 15A-2000(b), (c) (2005) (jury must also decide whether the aggravating circumstance or circumstances found are sufficiently substantial to call for imposition of the death penalty). As the instruction proffered by defendant was an incorrect statement of the law articulated in N.C.G.S. § 15A-2000, it would have been improper for the trial court to give that instruction to the jury. Additionally, we do not believe the instruction as given impermissibly shifted the burden as to Issue Three to defendant by creating a presumption of an affirmative answer. All of the elements required for a jury to make a binding recommendation of death must be proved by the State beyond a reasonable doubt. See generally Ring v. Arizona, 536 U.S. 584, 609, 122 S.Ct. 2428, 153 L.Ed.2d 556 (aggravating circumstances must be found by jury beyond a reasonable doubt); Apprendi v. New Jersey, 530 U.S. 466, 490, 120 S.Ct. 2348, 147 L.Ed.2d 435 (2000) (any fact, other than the fact of a prior conviction, that increases penalty for crime beyond prescribed statutory maximum must be submitted to the jury and proved beyond a reasonable doubt). The instructions given by the trial court did not shift the burden of proof or persuasion on Issue Three to defendant. Specifically, the trial court instructed the jury: For you to recommend that the defendant be sentenced to death, the State must prove three things beyond a reasonable doubt. . . . Second, that the mitigating circumstances are insufficient to outweigh any aggravating circumstances you have found. The jury was properly instructed.