Opinion ID: 2508644
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Where the Jury Instructions Defining Aggravated Robbery Omitted the Element of Bodily Harm and Failed to Define Bodily Harm, Were the Instructions Clearly Erroneous?

Text: Daniels' first and second arguments are based upon the trial court's failure to properly instruct the jury on the elements of the underlying crime of aggravated robbery. The jury instruction omitted the element of bodily harm which distinguishes a simple robbery from an aggravated robbery. Robbery is defined as the taking of property from the person or presence of another by force or by threat of bodily harm to any person. K.S.A. 21-3426. Aggravated robbery is defined as a robbery committed by a person who is armed with a dangerous weapon or who inflicts bodily harm upon any person in the course of such robbery. K.S.A. 21-3427. Neither party objected to the jury instruction as given. It appears that the omission of the bodily harm element was inadvertent as the State argued in closing that the abrasion to the back of the victim's head constituted the bodily harm element of aggravated robbery. On appeal, Daniels argues that the omission of the bodily harm element violated her right to jury trial and due process and that, because of the omission, the jury instructions were clearly erroneous. Considering the issues in the reverse order submitted by the parties, we first discuss whether the omission of the bodily harm element render the jury instructions clearly erroneous. This issue, which incorporates the clearly erroneous standard, states our standard of review since Daniels did not object to the instructions as given and did not request that the instructions define bodily harm. K.S.A. 2003 Supp. 22-3414(3). Instructions are clearly erroneous only if the reviewing court is firmly convinced there is a real possibility that the jury would have rendered a different verdict if the error had not occurred. [Citations omitted.] State v. Davis, 275 Kan. 107, 115, 61 P.3d 701 (2003). The Court of Appeals applied State v. Bryant, 22 Kan. App. 2d 732, 734-35, 922 P.2d 1118, rev. denied 260 Kan. 996 (1996), which held that the definition of bodily harm used in aggravated kidnapping cases is also applicable to aggravated robbery cases. In the context of aggravated kidnapping, bodily harm includes any act of physical violence even though no permanent injury results. Trivial or insignificant bruises or impressions resulting from the act itself are not considered to be bodily harm, but unnecessary acts of violence, including those occurring after the initial abduction of the victim, do constitute bodily harm. Bryant, 22 Kan. App. 2d at 734-35 (citing State v. Sanders, 225 Kan. 156, 587 P.2d 906 [1978]). Based upon the above definition, the Court of Appeals in this case concluded that the jury could have found that the victim's head injury, which occurred when the robbers intentionally struck the victim, causing him to fall and hit his head on a drain pipe, constituted bodily harm. The court also found that the force used was excessive in light of what was necessary to accomplish the robbery. Slip op. at 10-11. In support of its conclusion, the Court of Appeals cited State v. Redford, 242 Kan. 658, 671, 750 P.2d 1013 (1988). Slip op. at 11. The jury instructions in Redford defined rape as nonconsensual sexual intercourse but omitted the element that the victim was overcome by force or fear. The Redford court noted there was no evidence of nonconsensual intercourse in any circumstance other than fear, and that Redford's defense was to present a completely different version of events and to deny nonconsensual intercourse. In essence, the jury could choose to believe either the victim or Redford. Under these facts, the Redford court found the erroneous jury instruction to be harmless because the jury's verdict would have been no different had the jury been properly instructed. 242 Kan. at 671-72. In her brief, Daniels essentially argues that a jury instruction which omits an essential element of the crime must always be clearly erroneous. That is clearly not the case. In addition to Redford, the following cases have found the omission of an element of the crime in a jury instruction to be harmless error: State v. Duke, 256 Kan. 703, 712-14, 887 P.2d 110 (1994) (omission of element of aggravated arson that fire damaged property in which another person has an interest was harmless error because missing element in the instruction would not have altered the outcome of the trial); and State v. Peltier, 249 Kan. 415, 423-28, 819 P.2d 628 (1991), cert. denied 505 U.S. 1207 (1992) (error in instructing the jury that, as a matter of law, indecent liberties with a child constituted the bodily harm necessary to establish element of aggravated kidnapping was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt). In addition, the United States Supreme Court has also ruled that the failure to submit an element of the crime to the jury was not structural error and was, therefore, subject to harmless error review. Neder v. United States, 527 U.S. 1, 144 L. Ed. 2d 35, 119 S. Ct. 1827 (1999). Neder was convicted of filing false federal income tax returns, mail fraud, wire fraud, and bank fraud. The trial court determined that materiality was not a question for the jury and found that the evidence established the element of materiality with regard to the tax and bank fraud charges. The court also omitted the element of materiality from the instructions on mail fraud and wire fraud. The Eleventh Circuit affirmed, holding that the trial court erred in failing to submit the materiality element of the tax offense to the jury under United States v. Gaudin, 515 U.S. 506, 132 L. Ed. 2d 444, 115 S. Ct. 2310 (1995), but that the error was harmless. The Eleventh Circuit also ruled that the trial court did not err in failing to submit materiality to the jury on the remaining charges because materiality was not an element of mail fraud, wire fraud, or bank fraud. The United States Supreme Court affirmed the first portion of the Eleventh Circuit's ruling. Citing Gaudin, the Court concluded that refusing to instruct on the element of materiality on the fraud charges was erroneous. 527 U.S. at 4. This court recently relied upon Gaudin in holding that a trial court erred in instructing the jury that, as a matter of law, an element of the crime had been established by the evidence. State v. Brice, 276 Kan. 758, 80 P.3d 1113 (2003). The Brice court described the Gaudin decision as follows:  Gaudin, 515 U.S. 507, is a unanimous decision of the United States Supreme Court, holding that it was unconstitutional for the trial judge to refuse to submit to the jury the question of materiality of defendant's statements in a prosecution for making false statements on Federal Housing Administration (FHA)/Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) loan documents. Gaudin was charged with knowingly inflating the appraised value of the mortgaged property and misrepresenting which party was to pay closing costs. The government called several FHA/HUD program administrators as witnesses to explain why the information Gaudin allegedly falsified was important. The trial judge instructed the jury that one of the elements the government was required to prove in order to convict Gaudin was that the alleged false statements were material to the activities and decisions of HUD. `But, the court further instructed, [t]he issue of materiality... is not submitted to you for your decision but rather is a matter for the decision of the court. You are instructed that the statements charged in the indictment are material statements.' 515 U.S. at 508. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed Gaudin's convictions, holding that `taking the question of materiality from the jury denied respondent a right guaranteed by' the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment and the Sixth Amendment right of criminal defendants to a trial by an impartial jury. 515 U.S. at 509. On certiorari, the government argued that the principle of requiring the jury to decide all the elements of a criminal offense was inapplicable because the question of materiality was a question of law. The Supreme Court rejected the argument on the grounds that materiality is a mixed question of law and fact and that mixed questions historically have been determined by juries in reaching criminal verdicts. 515 U.S. at 512-15. The Supreme Court stated: `The Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution guarantees that no one will be deprived of liberty without due process of law; and the Sixth, that [i]n all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury. We have held that these 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. Sullivan v. Louisiana, 508 U.S. 275, 277-278[, 124 L. Ed. 2d 182, 113 S. Ct. 2078] (1993).' 515 U.S. at 509-10. In affirming the judgment of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, the Supreme Court concluded: `The Constitution gives a criminal defendant the right to have a jury determine, beyond a reasonable doubt, his guilt of every element of the crime with which he is charged. The trial judge's refusal to allow the jury to pass on the materiality of Gaudin's false statements infringed that right.' 515 U.S. at 522-23. Brice, 276 Kan. at 766-67. In Brice, the defendant was convicted of aggravated battery based upon his shooting the victim in the leg. The trial court instructed the jury that great bodily harm as an element of aggravated battery means a through and through bullet wound. The Brice court held that the instruction invades the province of the jury as factfinder and violated Brice's Fifth and Sixth Amendment rights to have the jury determine his guilt or innocence. 276 Kan. at 772. The Brice court reversed and remanded for a new trial without engaging in a harmless error analysis. Nor did the Gaudin court analyze whether the error in that case could be harmless. As noted by Chief Justice Rehnquist in his concurring opinion, the government had not argued that the error was harmless or not plain, 515 U.S. at 526, thus the Court had no occasion to review the Court of Appeals' conclusion that the constitutional error here `cannot be harmless.' [Citation omitted.] However, in Neder, immediately after noting that Gaudin established that it was error not to include the element of materiality in the instructions relating to the fraud charges, the Court stated: We hold that the harmless-error analysis of Chapman v. California, 386 U.S. 18, [17 L. Ed. 2d 705, 87 S. Ct. 824] (1967), applies to this error. Neder, 527 U.S. at 4. The Court considered whether a jury instruction that omits an element of the offense falls within that category of fundamental constitutional errors which are so intrinsically harmful as to require automatic reversal. The Court noted that it had found structural error requiring automatic reversal in only a few limited cases such as cases involving the complete denial of counsel, a biased trial judge, racial discrimination in grand jury selection, denial of self-representation at trial, denial of a public trial, and a defective reasonable doubt instruction. 527 U.S. at 8. The Neder Court found that an erroneous jury instruction which omits an element of the offense differs markedly from the types of constitutional violations listed above. 527 U.S. at 8. Whereas structural errors render a trial fundamentally unfair, an instruction that omits an element of the offense does not necessarily render a criminal trial fundamentally unfair or an unreliable vehicle for determining guilt or innocence. 527 U.S. at 9. In support, the Court cited Johnson v. United States, 520 U.S. 461, 137 L. Ed. 2d 718, 117 S. Ct. 1544 (1997), a perjury case where the element of the materiality of the false statement was decided by the trial judge rather than the jury. Because Johnson failed to object at trial, the Court had reviewed her claim under the plain error standard, finding that the error did not require reversal based upon the overwhelming and essentially uncontroverted evidence supporting materiality. 520 U.S. at 470. According to the Neder Court, its opinion in Johnson cut against the argument that the omission of an element will always render a trial unfair. 527 U.S. at 9. The Court noted that improperly omitting an element of the offense is analogous to improperly instructing a jury on an element and improperly instructing the jury that an element is conclusively presumed because all three types of errors preclude the jury from making a finding on the actual element of the offense. In deciding that the erroneous omission of an element from a jury instruction was subject to a harmless error analysis, the Court rejected the more restrictive approach suggested by Neder that such errors be deemed harmless only in certain rare circumstances. Instead, the Court applied the constitutional harmless error test set out in Chapman. 527 U.S. at 15. The Court found that the error was harmless because the evidence supporting materiality was so overwhelming that Neder had never argued that his false statements about his income were immaterial. The Court stated: In this situation, where a reviewing court concludes beyond a reasonable doubt that the omitted element was uncontested and supported by overwhelming evidence, such that the jury verdict would have been the same absent the error, the erroneous instruction is properly found to be harmless. We think it beyond cavil here that the error `did not contribute to the verdict obtained.' 527 U.S. at 17 (quoting Chapman ). With regard to the reviewing court's inquiry, the Court explained that a reviewing court asks whether the record contains evidence that could rationally lead to a contrary finding with respect to the omitted element. If the answer to that question is `no,' holding the error harmless does not `reflec[t] a denigration of the constitutional rights involved.' [Citation omitted.] 527 U.S. at 19. As to the second portion of the Eleventh Circuit's ruling, the Neder Court ruled that materiality was an element of mail fraud, bank fraud, and wire fraud and remanded the case to the Eleventh Circuit for a determination of whether the trial court's failure to instruct on the element of materiality as to these offenses was harmless error. 527 U.S. at 25. Thus, we must determine if the omission of the element of bodily harm was harmless error or not. Under the Neder test, where a reviewing court concludes beyond a reasonable doubt that the omitted element was uncontested and supported by overwhelming evidence, such that the jury verdict would have been the same absent the error, the erroneous instruction is properly found to be harmless. 527 U.S. at 17. Stated another way, the reviewing court asks whether the record contains evidence that could rationally lead to a contrary finding with respect to the omitted element. 527 U.S. at 19. If the answer to that question is no, the error may be held harmless. Under the facts of this case, the element of bodily harm was not contested and was supported by overwhelming evidence. The evidence established that the robbers hit the victim in the chest, causing him to fall and cut his head on a drain pipe. The record on appeal includes a photograph showing the victim's injury. Although there was little evidence regarding the injury, there was testimony about the flow of blood and the assistance provided by bystanders to stop the bleeding. Furthermore, we agree with the State and with the Court of Appeals that it was unnecessarily violent to push a 78-year-old man to the ground in order to accomplish a robbery. As we stated in State v. Young, 277 Kan. 588, 594, 87 P.3d 308, 314 (2004), the omission of the element of bodily harm from the jury instruction on aggravated battery was literally but not legally `clearly erroneous.' We are convinced beyond a reasonable doubt that the jury's verdict would have been the same even if it had been correctly instructed, thus we hold that the error was harmless. We also reject Daniels' argument that, had the jury been properly instructed as to the definition of bodily harm, it could easily have found that the victim's injury was merely trivial or insignificant. As discussed above, the evidence of bodily harm was essentially uncontested and, as a result, overwhelming. We find that the trial court did not err in failing to instruct the jury on the definition of bodily harm. See State v. Royal, 234 Kan. 218, 222, 670 P.2d 1337 (1983).