Opinion ID: 505930
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: The Sandstrom/Franklin Claim

Text: 88 Appellant's fifth contention is that his constitutional rights were violated during the guilt phase of the trial is that the trial court's charge to the jury impermissibly shifted to appellant the burden of proof on malice and intent in a manner that cannot be considered harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. The challenged portion of the trial court's charge to the jury reads as follows: 89 Members of the Jury, I charge you that a person commits murder when he unlawfully and with malice aforethought, either express or implied, caused the death of another human being. Express malice is that deliberate intention unlawfully to take away the life of a fellow creature which is manifested by external circumstances capable of proof. Malice shall be implied where no considerable provocation appears and where all the circumstances of the killing show an abandoned and malignant heart. Before you would be authorized to find the defendant guilty of the offense of murder, you must find and believe beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant did with malice aforethought, either express or implied, cause the death of Larry W. Stevens, Sr. 90 I charge you that if you find and believe that at any time prior to the date this indictment was returned into this court that the defendant did in the County of Richmond, State of Georgia, with malice aforethought kill and murder Larry W. Stevens, Sr., in the way and manner set forth in the indictment, then you would be authorized to find the defendant guilty of murder. Members of the Jury, I further charge you in that regard that malice in its legal sense is not necessarily ill will or hatred. It is the unlawful, deliberate intention to kill a human being without justification or mitigation or excuse, which intention must exist at the time of the killing. It is not necessary, however, that this unlawful, deliberate intention should exist for any particular length of time before the killing. If it enters the mind of the slayer the moment before he fires the fatal shot, or strikes the fatal blow, or inflicts the fatal wound, that is sufficient. 91 Members of the Jury, the law presumes that a person intends to accomplish the natural and probable consequences of his acts. If a persons uses a deadly weapon or instrumentality in the manner in which such weapon or instrumentality is ordinarily employed to produce death and thereby causes the death of a human being, the law presumes the intent to kill. This is and always shall be in a trial of this case a rebuttable presumption; the presumption may be rebutted. I further charge you that a person shall not be presumed to act with criminal intention, but the triers of the facts may find such intention upon consideration of the words, conduct, demeanor, and all other circumstances connected with the acts for which the accused has been prosecuted. The burden has always, it has always rested, and continues to rest upon the State to prove the act alleged to be criminal is in fact a criminal act beyond a reasonable doubt. 92 In Sandstrom v. Montana, 442 U.S. 510, 99 S.Ct. 2450, 61 L.Ed.2d 39 (1979), the Supreme Court held that the jury instructions in that case deprived a criminal defendant of due process because they were reasonably susceptible of an interpretation that removed from the prosecution the burden of proving every element of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt. Having undergone considerable development (and some extension, see e.g., Francis v. Franklin, 471 U.S. 307, 105 S.Ct. 1965, 85 L.Ed.2d 344 (1985)) since Sandstrom was decided, the law we apply to determine the constitutionality of the charge at issue in this case is now clear. See Brooks v. Kemp, 762 F.2d 1383 (11th Cir.1985) (en banc); Drake v. Kemp, 762 F.2d 1449 (11th Cir.1985) (en banc); Tucker v. Kemp, 762 F.2d 1496 (11th Cir.1985) (en banc). We have recently described the test to be applied in this circuit as follows: 93 To determine whether the judge's instructions in this case thus infringed the constitutional rights of the petitioner, we must consider first, whether the instructions concerned an essential element of the offense with which the petitioner was charged; second, whether the instructions operated to shift the burden of proof; and third, whether any error which might have arisen from the shifting of the burden was harmless in the context of this case. 94 Davis v. Kemp, 752 F.2d 1515, 1517 (11th Cir.) (en banc), cert. denied, 471 U.S. 1143, 105 S.Ct. 2689, 86 L.Ed.2d 707 (1985). See also Francis v. Franklin, 105 S.Ct. 1965 (employing similar analysis). 95 We need not engage in a detailed inquiry into whether the charge quoted above reveals a Sandstrom violation, as binding precedent supplies the answer. Both intent and malice are essential elements of the crime of murder in Georgia, so that a Sandstrom error may be found with respect to either one. 12 See Lamb v. Jernigan, 683 F.2d 1332 (11th Cir.1982), cert. denied, 460 U.S. 1024, 103 S.Ct. 1276, 75 S.Ct. 496 (1983); Mason v. Balkcom, 669 F.2d 222 (5th Cir. Unit B 1982), cert. denied, 460 U.S. 1016, 103 S.Ct. 1260, 75 L.Ed.2d 487 (1983); Holloway v. McElroy, 632 F.2d 605 (5th Cir.1980), cert. denied, 451 U.S. 1028, 101 S.Ct. 3019, 69 L.Ed.2d 398 (1981). Our cases establish clearly that the charge given in this case did not impermissibly shift the burden of proof on malice. The charge is no more suggestive of a mandatory presumption of malice than the charge given in Collins v. Francis, 728 F.2d 1322 (11th Cir.1984), cert. denied, 469 U.S. 963, 105 S.Ct. 361, 83 L.Ed.2d 297 (1984). In that case we held that the charge did not shift the burden of proof on malice. See also Lamb v. Jernigan, 683 F.2d at 1340. Just as clearly, however, the instruction given in this case must be held to have impermissibly shifted the burden of proof on the essential element of intent to kill. The rebuttable mandatory presumption of intent established in the final paragraph of the instruction quoted above, even when read in conjunction with the remainder of the charge, is no less burden-shifting than the presumptions condemned in Francis v. Franklin, 105 S.Ct. at 1972-77, and Davis v. Kemp, 752 F.2d at 1517-19. See also Drake v. Kemp, 762 F.2d at 1453. 96 We thus proceed to a consideration of whether the Sandstrom error found in the charge to the jury constitutes harmless error under the particular circumstances of this case. Rose v. Clark, 478 U.S. 570, 106 S.Ct. 3101, 92 L.Ed.2d 400 (1986). Our cases have established that a Sandstrom error may be held harmless in either of two situations: (1) where the evidence of the defendant's guilt, or the satisfaction of the burden the prosecution should have borne on the element of the crime on which the burden was improperly shifted, is overwhelming; or, (2) where the instruction concerns an element of the crime not at issue in the trial. See generally Davis, 752 F.2d at 1520-21; Brooks, 762 F.2d at 1390-94; Drake, 762 F.2d at 1453-57; Tucker, 762 F.2d at 1501-03. As our recent en banc cases make clear, where the burden of proof has been improperly shifted on intent, the inquiry under the first prong of the harmless error test should ordinarily focus on whether there exists overwhelming evidence of intent, rather than the more inclusive question of guilt. Under the second prong of the test, a Sandstrom error on intent may be held harmless where intent to kill is conceded by the defendant or is not at issue in the trial as a matter of state criminal law. 97 In this circuit, failure to dispute an essential element of the crime does not operate automatically to remove the issue entirely from the jury's consideration at trial and render a Sandstrom error on the element harmless under the second prong of the test described above. See Davis, 752 F.2d at 1521; Tucker, 762 F.2d at 1501-02. Further, defending on the grounds of self-defense does not alone necessarily constitute a concession of intent to kill. See Mason v. Balkcom, 669 F.2d 222. 13 But the defendant's defensive posture in a particular case may remain an important factor in the harmless error analysis even if the defense does not as a matter of law concede or remove from the jury's consideration the element on which the burden has been impermissibly shifted. We have previously noted, for example, that where an issue is not disputed by the defendant at trial as part of his defense, the evidence on that issue may be more easily found to be overwhelming under the first prong of the harmless error test set forth above. Davis, 752 F.2d at 1521; Tucker, 762 F.2d at 1501-02. 14 98 The defense offered at trial, when considered in conjunction with the jury's verdict, may affect the harmless error inquiry in other respects as well. Turning to the particular defense raised in this case, the jury's rejection of appellant's claim of self-defense, under instructions that were adequate insofar as that defense was concerned, 15 necessarily narrows the inquiry that we must conduct into whether the erroneous instruction on intent may have contributed to the jury's verdict of guilt. The charge given the jury in this case made clear that they could not find the defendant guilty unless they found malice, consisting of both unlawful intent and the absence of any justification for the shooting. Although we have found the instructions to the jury concerning intent to have been erroneous, the remainder of the charge required the jury to find beyond a reasonable doubt that appellant's shooting of the investigator was not justified before they returned a guilty verdict on the murder charge. The jury's verdict of guilt thus necessarily rejected appellant's claim that his actions were justified in self defense, and that finding could have been in no respect tainted by the erroneous instruction on intent. As a result, the inquiry we must conduct into whether there exists such overwhelming evidence of intent as to render the Sandstrom error harmless beyond a reasonable doubt consists of an inquiry into whether the jury could have entertained a reasonable doubt concerning appellant's intent to kill, given its rejection of his claim of self defense. 99 The evidence conclusively shows that appellant fired three shots from a high powered rifle into the stationary vehicle in which the police investigator was sitting when appellant approached. Appellant fired the first shot from a position near the left front fender of the vehicle. That shot penetrated the windshield and shattered a flashing blue light on the dashboard before fragmenting as it ricocheted. According to expert testimony presented by the state, this shot struck the investigator in the lower right forearm, fracturing both bones and thereby inflicting the first of three wounds suffered by the decedent. The defense argued that the physical evidence suggested instead that the first shot did not strike the investigator, and that the injury to his forearm was caused by the second shot. The evidence indicates clearly that appellant fired a second shot into the vehicle through the left rear side window at a slightly downward angle, wounding the investigator quite seriously in the chest and, according to the defense, the forearm. Appellant fired a third and final shot from a standing position behind the vehicle. That bullet travelled through the rear window and the front seat of the automobile before entering the chest region of the investigator's body and causing extensive and almost immediately fatal injuries. In the course of the incident, the investigator fired six shots from his service revolver, not one of which struck appellant. Appellant claimed that the shooting was over within a few seconds of when it began, but the state presented the testimony of a letter carrier, who heard appellant's first two shots and witnessed the third, to the effect that approximately a minute passed from appellant's first shot to his last. The letter carrier testified that, as he was making his rounds, he heard a shot, and about five seconds later heard a second one. 16 He then walked to a position from which he could see what was occurring. The eyewitness testified that he then saw appellant standing calmly beside the investigator's vehicle, pointing the rifle he was carrying at the car. According to the witness, appellant stood there for ten to fifteen seconds and then walked slowly to the rear of the car, brought the weapon up to shoulder height, and fired a shot through the rear window of the vehicle. 100 Regardless of which version of the sequence of events we accept, it is clear beyond any reasonable doubt that appellant intended to kill the police investigator. Appellant's first two shots, fired into the investigator's vehicle from close range, without question left the shooting victim almost totally disabled. Even if petitioner was firing in an unreasonable or unjustified belief that force was necessary to prevent the investigator from causing him harm, petitioner's third and final shot belies any suggestion that he was firing only to prevent injury to himself and did not intend to kill. Each of the three shots was fired from a high powered rifle from such a position and in such a direction as to have killed the investigator. Our review of the record convinces us that no reasonable juror could have believed that petitioner did not intend that result. 101 VI. The Trial Court Judge's Conduct of the Trial 102 Appellant also claims the trial court judge improperly interjected himself into the proceedings in violation of appellant's fifth and fourteenth amendment rights. Appellant has cited no plausible instances of misconduct in support of his claim. After reviewing the state trial court transcript, the district court concluded that the trial court judge's comments did not deprive appellant of a fair trial. Our own independent evaluation of the transcript, including in particular those instances of alleged misconduct cited in appellant's brief, leads us to reach the same conclusion as the district court. Appellant is not entitled to habeas corpus relief on this ground. 103