Opinion ID: 2315948
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 14

Heading: Aggravating Factor c(4)(c) (depravity of mind)

Text: Defendant contends that application of that portion of c(4)(c) relating to depravity of mind, as construed by this Court in State v. Ramseur, supra, 106 N.J. at 197-211, 524 A. 2d 188, violates the due-process clause of the fourteenth amendment of the United States Constitution. Cf. Bouie v. City of Columbia, 378 U.S. 347, 353-54, 84 S.Ct. 1697, 1702-03, 12 L.Ed. 2d 894, 900 (1964) (If a state legislature is barred by the Ex Post Facto Clause from passing such a law, it must follow that a State Supreme Court is barred by the Due Process Clause from achieving precisely the same result by judicial construction.). Defendant argues that based on the decision in Godfrey v. Georgia, 446 U.S. 420, 100 S.Ct. 1759, 64 L.Ed. 2d 398 (1980) (Georgia provision on which c(4)(c) is modeled held unconstitutionally vague in absence of limiting construction), Biegenwald could have reasonably believed that this factor did not apply to his case because the victim's death was instantaneous; there was no serious physical abuse prior to death as required by the Georgia limiting construction. According to defendant, application of c(4)(c) as construed in Ramseur, supra, 106 N.J. at 208-11, 524 A. 2d 188, violates the principle underlying the ex post facto clause that persons have a right to fair warning of that conduct which will give rise to criminal penalties. Marks v. United States, 430 U.S. 188, 191, 97 S.Ct. 990, 992, 51 L.Ed. 2d 260, 265 (1977). Were the depravity of mind portion of c(4)(c) the only aggravating factor on which the State relied in seeking imposition of the death penalty at the resentencing proceeding, defendant's claim might present a more difficult question. However, any requirement of notice to this defendant that his conduct could produce a capital verdict was clearly fulfilled by other provisions of the murder statute, specifically the other-murder-conviction aggravating factor. See N.J.S.A. 2C:11-3c(4)(a). Consequently, even though we acknowledge that the construction of c(4)(c) adopted by this Court in Ramseur, supra, 106 N.J. at 208-11, 524 A. 2d 188, is a broader interpretation, id. at 205, 524 A. 2d 188, than that approved in Godfrey, its application to defendant did not violate the due-process clause because it neither punishes as a crime an act lawful when committed, makes more burdensome punishment for a crime after its commission, [nor] deprives one charged with crime of any defense available according to law at the time when the act was committed. Beazell v. Ohio, 269 U.S. 167, 169, 46 S.Ct. 68, 69, 70 L.Ed. 216, 217 (1925); see also Dobbert v. Florida, 432 U.S. 282, 292, 97 S.Ct. 2290, 2297, 53 L.Ed. 2d 344, 356 (1977) (quoting Beazell ).