Opinion ID: 1919806
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: whether the lower court committed error as a matter of law in failing to grant may's requested self-defense instruction m-4?

Text: The lower court denied Mars request for the following self-defense jury instruction: INSTRUCTION D-M-4 The Court instructs the jury that the Defendant, Eric Owayne May, was entitled to act upon appearances, and if the conduct of the deceased was such as to induce in the mind of a reasonable person, situated as he was, under the circumstances then existing, and viewed from the standpoint of the Defendant, Eric Owayne May, a fear that death or great bodily harm was about to be inflicted by the deceased on him, it does not matter if there was no such danger provided that the jury believes that the Defendant, Eric Owayne May, acted in self-defense from real and honest convictions; then the jury should find the Defendant, Eric Owayne May, not guilty, even though they may believe that at the time he was mistaken and that he was not in any great danger. The trial judge refused to grant this instruction stating that it was an incorrect statement of the law not supported by the evidence. The court instead granted the following self-defense jury instruction: INSTRUCTION NO. S-4 The Court instructs the jury that to make a killing justifiable on the grounds of self-defense, the danger to the defendant must be either actual, present and urgent, or the defendant must have had reasonable grounds to apprehend a design on the part of the victim to kill him or to do him some great bodily harm, and in addition to this he must have reasonable grounds to apprehend that there is imminent danger of such design being accomplished. It is for the jury to determine the reasonableness of the defendant's acts. The evidence produced at trial indicated that Gossett fired at the victim first ending the scuffle between the victim and May. May contends in his brief that he shot the victim believing that it was the victim firing shots at him. He claims that this fact required the trial court to grant his requested self-defense instruction D-M regarding a mistaken belief as to imminent danger. The trial court did not deny a self-defense instruction altogether, but instead granted the self-defense instruction presented by the State. Where one jury instruction adequately covers the defendant's theory of self-defense, the trial court may properly refuse to grant a second instruction on the grounds that it is redundant or cumulative. Cook v. State, 467 So.2d 203, 210 (Miss. 1986); Evans v. State, 467 So.2d 957, 959 (Miss. 1984). The State's self-defense instruction S-4, like instruction D-M-4, instructed the jury that May was entitled to the defense of self-defense if he had a reasonable apprehension of imminent danger. While the State's granted instruction did not explicitly explain that May could have mistakenly believed to be in imminent danger and still have been entitled to have acted in self-defense, the instruction did make self-defense applicable in the situation where May possessed a reasonable apprehension of imminent danger and the victim had the apparent ability to inflict harm. May argues that the granted instruction was not cumulative in that it did not properly instruct the jury to consider the circumstances existing at the time of the incident from his viewpoint as the defendant. See Windham v. State, 91 Miss. 845, 852, 45 So. 861, 862 (1908) (stating that defendant was erroneously denied instruction stating that jury should not expect from the defendant the same cool and calm judgment they would presently possess, but instead they should judge the defendant's acts by the facts and circumstances existing at the time of the incident); Johnson v. State, 42 So. 166 (Miss. 1906) (same). While instruction S-4 may not have specifically addressed this point, the instruction was nevertheless a correct statement of the law on self-defense. This Court has expressly approved the instruction submitted to the jury in the case sub judice, and additionally, we have urged prosecutors to employ this same self-defense jury instruction in the future. Robinson v. State, 434 So.2d 206, 207 (Miss. 1983); see Flowers v. State, 473 So.2d 164, 166 (Miss. 1985) (overruling Robinson to extent that it merely criticized instead of condemned instruction which it replaced). Thus, instruction S-4, as a whole, accurately guided the jury on the law of self-defense.