Opinion ID: 2353269
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Instructions Regarding Possession of a Prohibited Weapon

Text: Without objection, the trial court instructed the jury on the essential elements of the offense of possession of a prohibited weapon as follows: The essential elements of this offense, the possessing of a prohibited weapon, each of which the government must prove beyond a reasonable doubt, are: First. That the defendant possessed a semi-automatic handgun; Second. That he or she did so knowingly and intentionally. This means consciously, voluntarily, on purpose, not mistakenly, accidentally or inadvertently. As Moore argues, this instruction was deficient in two respects. First, possession of a semi-automatic handgun is not a violation of § 22-3214(a) unless the weapon is a machine gun, but the instruction omitted the statutory definition of a machine gun and did not require the jury to find that the defendants possessed such a weapon. Second, possession of a machine gun is not a violation of § 22-3214(a) unless the weapon is operable, see footnote 16, supra, but the instruction failed to inform the jury that operability is an essential element of the offense. [23] Moore correctly claims that the omission of appropriate instructions on the machine gun and operability elements of the offense infringed his Fifth Amendment right to due process and his Sixth Amendment right to trial by jury. See United States v. Gaudin, 515 U.S. 506, 510, 115 S.Ct. 2310, 132 L.Ed.2d 444 (1995) ([T]hese provisions require criminal convictions to rest upon a jury determination that the defendant is guilty of every element of the crime with which he is charged, beyond a reasonable doubt.). Where such a Constitutional error has been preserved by a timely objection at trial, the defendant is entitled to a new trial unless the error is shown to have been harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. See Neder v. United States, 527 U.S. 1, 15, 119 S.Ct. 1827, 144 L.Ed.2d 35 (1999). In the present case, however, because there was no contemporaneous objection at trial to the erroneous instruction, the objection was forfeited. See Super. Ct.Crim. R. 30; Curington v. United States, 621 A.2d 819, 821 (D.C.1993). Moore's claim therefore is subject to the strictures of `plain error' review. Thomas v. United States, 914 A.2d 1, 8 (D.C.2006); see Johnson v. United States, 520 U.S. 461, 466-67, 117 S.Ct. 1544, 137 L.Ed.2d 718 (1997) (upholding conviction on ground that failure to submit element of offense to jury did not constitute plain error). Under the established test for plain error, an appellant must show (1) an error that is (2) plain and that (3) adversely affected the appellant's substantial rights. Johnson, 520 U.S. at 467, 117 S.Ct. 1544. If all three [of those] conditions are met, an appellate court may then exercise its discretion to notice a forfeited error, but only if (4) the error seriously affects the fairness, integrity, or public reputation of judicial proceedings. Id. In this case, it suffices to say that the third condition is not satisfied. The instructional errors in this case were not structural. See Neder, supra . To show that a nonstructural error affected his substantial rights, an appellant must show a reasonable probability that the error had a prejudicial effect on the outcome of his trial. Thomas, 914 A.2d at 21 (citations omitted). We do not find that either appellant has made that showing here. The testimony at trial, that the semi-automatic Beretta handgun recovered on Holbrook Street had fifteen rounds of ammunition in its clip and test-fired more than twelve shots without reloading, established that the weapon was an operable machine gun. As there was no evidence or argument to the contrary, we see no reasonable probability that a properly instructed jury would have found otherwise.