Opinion ID: 867431
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Burden of Persuasion Instruction

Text: ¶ 9 The death penalty sentencing statutes provide, and the trial judge instructed the jury, that the defendant bears the burden of proving, by a preponderance of the evidence, the existence of mitigating circumstances. See A.R.S. § 13-703(C). Neither Baldwin nor the State questions that instruction. The State requests, however, that we now approve an instruction specifying that the defendant also bears the burden of proving, by a preponderance of the evidence, that the mitigation is sufficiently substantial to call for leniency. ¶ 10 To justify imposing this burden, the State relies on A.R.S. § 13-703(E), which provides that, [i]n determining whether to impose a sentence of death or life imprisonment, the trier of fact shall take into account the aggravating and mitigating circumstances that have been proven. The trier of fact shall impose a sentence of death if the trier of fact finds one or more of the aggravating circumstances enumerated in subsection F of this section and then determines that there are no mitigating circumstances sufficiently substantial to call for leniency. (Emphasis added.) ¶ 11 From this statutory language, the State reasons that the defendant must bear the burden of proving that the mitigation is sufficiently substantial to call for leniency; otherwise, the trier of fact shall impose a sentence of death. See id. Moreover, the State observes that this court has rejected the notion that the prosecution bears the burden of proving that the death penalty is the appropriate sentence. State v. Gulbrandson, 184 Ariz. 46, 72, 906 P.2d 579, 605 (1995). The State thus infers that if the burden is not on the State, it must lie with the defendant. ¶ 12 The State concedes that A.R.S. § 13-703(E) has been interpreted as not creating a presumption of death and acknowledges that a jury may return a verdict of life in prison even if the defendant decides to present no mitigation evidence at all. See, e.g., Glassel, 211 Ariz. at 52, ¶ 72, 116 P.3d at 1212 (rejecting presumption of death argument); State v. Van Adams, 194 Ariz. 408, 422, ¶ 55, 984 P.2d 16, 30 (1999) (to same effect). [3] In the absence of such a presumption, there can be no burden on the defendant to rebut a presumed sentence. Thus the language of A.R.S. § 13-703(E) does not impose an affirmative duty on the defendant to prove that mitigation is sufficiently substantial to call for leniency. ¶ 13 Nor does the statutory scheme as a whole impose a burden on the defendant to prove that mitigation evidence is sufficiently substantial to call for leniency. Section 13-703(B) requires the State to prove beyond a reasonable doubt not only every element of the crime, but also any aggravating circumstances. Id.; see also State v. Jordan, 126 Ariz. 283, 286, 614 P.2d 825, 828 (1980). If the jury finds any aggravating factors to exist, the burden then moves to the defendant, if he wishes, to establish any mitigating circumstances. A.R.S. § 13-703(C). The statute further instructs that the jurors do not have to agree unanimously that a mitigating circumstance has been proven to exist. Each juror may consider any mitigating circumstance found by that juror in determining the appropriate penalty. Id. ¶ 14 Although § 13-703(C) requires the defendant to prove mitigating circumstances by a preponderance of the evidence, the statutory scheme does not place any burden of proof on the defendant in connection with establishing that the mitigation evidence is sufficiently substantial to call for leniency. Indeed, the sufficiently substantial language does not appear until two subsections later. See A.R.S. § 13-703(E). Thus nothing in § 13-703 dictates that the defendant must bear the burden of proving that mitigation is sufficiently substantial to call for leniency. While the statutory scheme describes the parties' burdens of proof as to the existence of aggravating and mitigating circumstances, it is silent as to the burden of persuasion. ¶ 15 The State also bases its argument that the defendant bears the burden of proving that mitigation is sufficiently substantial to call for leniency on this court's opinion in State v. Watson, 120 Ariz. 441, 447, 586 P.2d 1253, 1259 (1978), and the United States Supreme Court's opinion in Walton v. Arizona, 497 U.S. 639, 649, 110 S.Ct. 3047, 111 L.Ed.2d 511 (1990), overruled in part on other grounds by Ring v. Arizona, 536 U.S. 584, 122 S.Ct. 2428, 153 L.Ed.2d 556 (2002). In Walton and Watson, the Supreme Court and this court recognized that the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments are not offended by requiring a guilty defendant to establish by a preponderance of the evidence, the existence of mitigating circumstances sufficiently substantial to call for leniency. Walton, 497 U.S. at 649, 110 S.Ct. 3047. Despite this language, Walton and Watson did not address whether the defendant in a capital case bears the burden of persuading the jurors that mitigation is sufficiently substantial to warrant leniency. Instead they addressed the constitutionality of imposing on a convicted defendant the burden of proving the existence of mitigating facts. The precise question before us apparently has not been addressed by our courts. ¶ 16 The State nonetheless contends that by informing the jurors only that the defendant bears the burden of proving the existence of mitigating circumstances by a preponderance of the evidence, the trial judge instructs the jury on only half of Defendant's burden. The State claims that such an instruction fails to explain to the jury who bears the burden of persuading the jury that the defendant should receive a life sentence rather than a sentence of death or, in statutory terms, whether the mitigating circumstances are sufficiently substantial to call for leniency. ¶ 17 As set forth above, however, neither party bears the burden on this issue. We therefore disagree that the instructions were incomplete or inadequate to properly advise the jury of its role in the sentencing process. The plan is carefully laid out in the statutes: Once a defendant is death eligible  that is, once a jury has found beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant is guilty of a capital offense and that at least one statutory aggravating factor exists  the jurors must assess whether to impose the death penalty based upon each juror's individual, qualitative evaluation of the facts of the case, the severity of the aggravating factors, and the quality of any mitigating evidence. A.R.S. §§ 13-703, -703.01. This assessment is not mathematical, but instead must be made in light of the facts of each case. State v. Gretzler, 135 Ariz. 42, 54, 659 P.2d 1, 13 (1983). ¶ 18 The phrase sufficiently substantial to call for leniency is the standard that guides and channels the jurors' discretion as they evaluate and consider the mitigating circumstances, whether proved by the defendant or present in the record, in determining whether death is the appropriate sentence for that particular defendant in light of the facts of that particular case. See A.R.S. §§ 13-703(E), -703.01(G) & (H). It means that the mitigation must be of such quality or value that it is adequate, in the opinion of an individual juror, to persuade that juror to vote for a sentence of life in prison. A mitigating factor that motivates one juror to vote for a sentence of life in prison may be evaluated by another juror as not having been proved or, if proved, as not significant to the assessment of the appropriate penalty. Each juror must determine whether, in that juror's individual assessment, the mitigation is of such quality or value that it warrants leniency in a particular case. ¶ 19 The jurors in this case were instructed accordingly by the trial judge: Each of you, individually, must decide whether the mitigation that each of you, individually, believes has been proven, is sufficiently substantial to call for a life sentence. The State has not argued that the jurors did not understand their task. ¶ 20 Our cases have on occasion discussed the evaluation and assessment of mitigating circumstances as a weighing process, see, e.g., State v. Hinchey, 181 Ariz. 307, 313-14, 890 P.2d 602, 608-09 (1995); Gretzler, 135 Ariz. at 54, 659 P.2d at 13, which has led to the implication that mitigating circumstances must outweigh aggravating factors for life to be the appropriate sentence. These cases and A.R.S. §§ 13-703 and -703.01 do not, however, indicate that the decision on the appropriate sentence is itself a factual determination. ¶ 21 We therefore now clarify that the determination whether mitigation is sufficiently substantial to warrant leniency is not a fact question to be decided based on the weight of the evidence, but rather is a sentencing decision to be made by each juror based upon the juror's assessment of the quality and significance of the mitigating evidence that the juror has found to exist. We conclude that the use of outweighing language in jury instructions explaining the evaluation of mitigating circumstances, while technically correct, might confuse or mislead jurors. We thus discourage the use of instructions that inform jurors that they must find that mitigating circumstances outweigh aggravating factors before they can impose a sentence other than death. Instead, jury instructions should focus on the statutory requirement that a juror may not vote to impose the death penalty unless he or she finds, in the juror's individual opinion, that there are no mitigating circumstances sufficiently substantial to call for leniency. A.R.S. § 13-703(E). In other words, each juror must determine whether, in that juror's individual assessment, the mitigation is of such quality or value that it warrants leniency.