Opinion ID: 1171916
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: aggravating circumstances regarding the deliberate homicide charge.

Text: Keith alleges the District Court improperly found the existence of an aggravating circumstance in regard to the deliberate homicide charge. As noted in the preceding issue, without the finding of a statutory aggravating circumstance, the death penalty is inappropriate. Section 46-18-303, MCA, provides that an aggravating circumstance exists if: (1) The offense was deliberate homicide and was committed by a person serving a sentence of imprisonment in the state prison. ..... At the sentencing hearing on April 10, 1985, the District Court Judge stated the following to Keith in explaining the death penalty for deliberate homicide: [T]he Court has considered Section 46-18-303 of the Revised Codes of Montana and I specifically find that involved was the offense of deliberate homicide which was committed while you were on parole and serving on parole from a sentence out of the State of Washington. The statute expressly applies to a person serving a sentence of imprisonment in the state prison.  (Emphasis added.) The plain wording of the statute does not allow an interpretation which would include an individual on parole. The general rule of statutory construction is set out in § 1-2-101, MCA, which provides in pertinent part as follows: In the construction of a statute, the office of the judge is simply to ascertain and declare what is in terms or in substance contained therein, not to insert what has been omitted or to omit what has been inserted. The District Court found that Keith was on parole from the state of Washington at the time of the offense. He committed the offense while in Flathead County. Our statute fails to address the issue whether deliberate homicide committed by a parolee from this or any other state constitutes an aggravating circumstance for purposes of the death penalty. Section 46-18-303(1), MCA, allows the death penalty only where the offense is committed by a person serving a sentence of imprisonment in the state prison. Keith does not meet this statutory requirement. We conclude that the statutory aggravating circumstance of § 46-18-303(1), MCA, did not exist. We therefore reverse the judgment of the District Court which imposed the death penalty for the offense of deliberate homicide. We must note that the result on this particular issue is troubling. We have researched the capital punishment statutes of every jurisdiction in the United States retaining capital punishment as a sentence and failed to locate any aggravating circumstances drafted as narrowly as § 46-18-303(1), MCA. Statutes providing for aggravating circumstances in certain other states tend to address all situations where an assailant was in custody, incarcerated, or under sentence of imprisonment. See e.g., Ariz. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 13-703(F)(7) (1987); Fla. Stat. Ann. § 921.141(5)(a) (1987); and Tenn. Code Ann. § 39-2-203(i)(8) (1987). We invite the legislature to consider amending § 46-18-303(1) so that it addresses all incarceration situations, as well as parole. However, until such a change is made, this aggravating circumstance does not apply unless the assailant is serving a sentence of imprisonment in the state prison.