Opinion ID: 1690710
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: anthony doss was entitled to a lesser included offense instruction under the federal and state constitutions and mississippi law.

Text: ś 16. This Court has repeatedly held that the accused is entitled to have the jury instructed that it may consider convicting him of a lesser offense only where there is in the record an evidentiary basis therefor. McGowan v. State, 541 So.2d 1027, 1028 (Miss. 1989); Lee v. State, 469 So.2d 1225, 1230 (Miss. 1985). However, [s]uch instructions should not be granted indiscriminately, nor on the basis of pure speculation. McGowan v. State, 541 So.2d 1027, 1028 (Miss. 1989); Mease v. State, 539 So.2d 1324, 1329 (Miss. 1989). Also, the accused is not entitled to the lesser offense instruction where the evidence that proves the guilt of the lesser offense necessarily proves his guilt of the principal charge. McGowan v. State, 541 So.2d 1027, 1029 (Miss. 1989); Rowland v. State, 531 So.2d 627, 631-32 (Miss. 1988). ś 17. As for this case however, the question under this issue is whether or not robbery is a lesser-included offense to capital murder while using robbery as the underlying felony. Doss alleges that the trial court erred because the jury was only given the choice of either convicting Doss of capital murder for unlawfully, willfully and feloniously killing Bert Bell ... . while Doss was engaged in the crime of armed robbery or acquittal. [14] Doss maintains that this Court in Abram v. State, 606 So.2d 1015, 1035 (Miss. 1992) set forth that there should be three plausible evidentiary theories for the jury to choose among. The additional theory, stated in dicta in Abram and omitted from Instruction S-1, was that the jury also had the option to only convict Doss of armed robbery should they find that he was completely unknowing as to any contemplated killings or completely unknowing that lethal force would be used in the robbery. ś 18. Abram did not involve a question of whether it was improper to exclude a mere armed robbery instruction as one was given in Abram, but rather whether it was proper for the trial court to deny Abram a simple malice aforethought murder instruction. Id. at 1035. The trial court, as did this Court, found that the evidence did not warrant a simple malice aforethought murder instruction because there was no evidence that Abram had the requisite specific intent to support the instruction. Id. Therefore, this Court held that it was proper for the trial court to have refused the defense's requested simple murder instruction. Id. ś 19. The State maintains that robbery is neither a lesser included offense nor a component to capital murder, making this assignment of error without merit. Accordingly, the State contends that robbery is not a lesser included offense as it is not a component of murder. Therefore, the denial of an instruction regarding such does not constitute an error by the trial judge according to the State. Based upon our case law, we agree. ś 20. This Court recently addressed essentially the identical argument in Ballenger v. State, 667 So.2d 1242 (Miss. 1995). Ballenger Stated that the language from Abram, which is quoted by Doss in support of his argument that he was entitled to a pure robbery instruction alone in conjunction with the other instructions, was mere dicta. Id. at 1254. The Ballenger court went further to state that the principal in Cannaday v. State, 455 So.2d 713, 724-25 (Miss. 1984), that the underlying felony in a felony-murder case is not a lesser included offense, was not overruled by Abram. Ballenger at 1254; Cf. Ross v. State, 603 So.2d 857, 866 (Miss. 1992) and Hailey v. State, 537 So.2d 411, 414 (Miss. 1988). Accordingly, the most recent restatement of the law in this State, regarding whether or not the underlying felony in a felony-murder case is a lesser-included offense entitling the defendant to a separate instruction, clearly states that a defendant is not entitled to such an instruction as the language from previous cases used as the basis for such an argument has been held to be mere dicta. Ballenger v. State, 667 So.2d 1242, 1254 (Miss. 1995). Therefore, this issue is without merit.