Opinion ID: 2352091
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: first degree criminal trespass

Text: We find no merit to Appellant's suggestion that the trial court should have instructed the jury regarding First-Degree Criminal Trespass as a lesser-included offense to First-Degree Burglary. While First-Degree Criminal Trespass can be a lesser-included offense of First or Second-Degree Burglary, [50] such an instruction is proper only where the jury could reasonably conclude that Appellant unlawfully entered a home without the intent to commit a crime. Here, Appellant's statement is clear that the group went to Buchter's home for an exclusively criminal purposei.e., to commit a robberyand thus Appellant's statement provides no basis for a First-Degree Criminal Trespass instruction. [51] Nor do we believe that a proper voluntary intoxication instruction affects this analysis because, under the evidence in this case, we see no basis upon which a reasonable juror could conclude that Appellant was sober enough to knowingly enter[] or remain[] unlawfully [52] in Buchter's house, but was too intoxicated to form the intent to commit a crime. Although voluntary intoxication cannot negate the mental states of wantonness or recklessness, [53] such intoxication may negate the KRS 501.030(2) knowingly mental state. [54] The trial court properly denied Appellant's request for a First-Degree Criminal Trespass instruction.