Opinion ID: 2569354
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Asportation Element of Second Degree Kidnapping

Text: The defendant also claims that the trial court committed reversible error by failing to instruct the jury properly as to the essential elements of second degree kidnapping. Harlan asserts that the asportation element of this offense is that the victim was moved and that the movement substantially increased the risk of harm to the victim. The trial court did not instruct the jury that the prosecution must prove that Harlan's movement of his victim substantially increased her risk of harm. Thus, according to the defendant, an essential element of the offense was not submitted to the jury, in violation of his rights to due process and to trial by jury. Moreover, because second degree kidnapping is the felony underlying Harlan's conviction for felony murder, he claims that the trial court's instructional error requires overturning the felony murder conviction. Finally, Harlan contends that the unconstitutionally obtained kidnapping conviction was the basis for the jury's finding of two statutory aggravating factors. Therefore, he argues, the death sentence must be reversed.
We do not accept the defendant's proposition that substantially increasing a risk of harm to the victim is part of the asportation element of second degree kidnapping. The asportation element of this offense is simply that a person seized and carried another person from one place to another. That the defendant's conduct substantially increased a risk of harm to the victim is not a material element of second degree kidnapping. It is instead a factual circumstance reviewing courts consider in some cases to determine whether there is sufficient evidence to prove that the defendant moved the victim from one place to another. Therefore, the trial court correctly instructed the jury as to the elements of second degree kidnapping. According to section 18-3-302(1), 6 C.R.S. (1999): Any person who knowingly seizes and carries any person from one place to another, without his consent and without lawful justification, commits second degree kidnapping. [18] Harlan claims that this definition of second degree kidnapping, standing alone, is unconstitutionally overbroad and violates equal protection guarantees. To save the statute, his argument proceeds, this court held in People v. Fuller, 791 P.2d 702, 706 (Colo. 1990), that the asportation element is that the victim was moved and that the movement substantially increased the risk of harm to the victim. Because the trial court did not instruct the jury to that effect, he concludes, an essential element of the offense was not submitted to the jury. The defendant misreads our prior decisions. [19] We have consistently held that the asportation element of second degree kidnapping is that the defendant moved the victim from one place to another. See, e.g., Apodaca v. People, 712 P.2d 467, 475 (Colo.1985) (The statutory definition of second degree kidnapping merely requires movement of the victim from one place to another ....) (internal quotation marks and citation omitted); People v. Abbott, 690 P.2d 1263, 1270 (Colo. 1984) (The defendant in the present case was charged with second degree kidnapping, and thus, `only movement of the victim from one place to another was required.') (quoting People v. Bridges, 199 Colo. 520, 528 n. 18, 612 P.2d 1110, 1116 n. 18 (1980)); see also Yescas v. People, 197 Colo. 379, 381, 593 P.2d 358, 360 (1979). In no prior decision have we said that asportation must include substantially increasing a risk of harm to the victim, and we decline to do so in this case. Otherwise, we would impermissibly encroach upon the prerogative of the General Assembly to define the elements of an offense. See Rowe v. People, 856 P.2d 486, 490 (Colo.1993) (The power to define criminal conduct and to establish the legal components of criminal liability is vested with the General Assembly.).
At times we have considered whether the prosecution has adduced evidence that the defendant's conduct substantially increased a risk of harm to the victim when determining whether the asportation element of second degree kidnapping was proved. However, this analysis does not mean that creating a greater risk of harm is an element of the offense. In some cases, the factual circumstances presented at trial do not make it clear whether the defendant moved the victim from one place to another. For example, in Yescas, 197 Colo. at 380-81, 593 P.2d at 359, the defendant forcefully pulled his victim from a lighted area outside a building to a nearby unlighted area behind a hedge and some trees. We declined to determine whether that movement was substantial or incidental. See id. at 381, 593 P.2d at 360. Instead, we held that the asportation element was sufficiently proved if the prosecution proved that the defendant's actions substantially increased the risk of harm to the victim. See id. at 382, 593 P.2d at 360; see also Apodaca, 712 P.2d at 475 ([The asportation element] is clearly satisfied when the movement itself, although short in distance, results in a demonstrable increase in risk of harm to the victim.). That is, evidence that the defendant's conduct substantially increased a risk of harm to the victim also may constitute evidence or permit an inference that the defendant moved the victim from one place to another. The functional relevance of this evidence does not, however, entail that the proposition it proves is itself an element of the offense. [20]
Therefore, we affirm here our holding in prior cases that the asportation element of second degree kidnapping is the movement by the defendant of the victim from one place to another. Evidence that the defendant's actions substantially increased a risk of harm to the victim may be relevant to whether asportation was proved in some cases, but creating such a risk is not an essential element of the offense. Consequently, we hold that the trial court correctly instructed the jury as to the elements of second degree kidnapping.