Opinion ID: 1548296
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Motion to Set Aside the Verdicts

Text: The defendant argues that the trial court erred in denying his motion to set aside the verdict because the jury reached an impermissible compromise verdict. Following the defendant's conviction, a juror contacted the county attorney's office in response to the prosecutor's public comments that she was confused by the jury's verdicts. The juror's email stated in pertinent part: I was juror # 4 on this case. The news media has said you may be a little baffled as to our decision.... Do not look at the verdict as anything but a win. Mr. Fandozzi will be going away for many years. I would be very willing to discuss our rationale for the verdict as we were very concerned about the message our verdict may sen[d]. After waiting the required thirty days from the verdict, an investigator from the county attorney's office called the juror, requesting clarification of his comments. The investigator reported, in pertinent part, as follows: [Juror # 4] said that they were having a problem with the fact that this was a circumstantial case and that they were struggling with the fact that Mrs. Fandozzi might have done this. He went on to say that there was nothing that was presented to them that would indicate she didn't do it.... [H]e said that there were questions in their minds as to who actually did this and they were not convinced 100% that he did it. He told me that the jury felt that the parents were in cahoots, and that whoever did this, the other one was covering up.... He said that there was some discussion by some members of the jury that there was no way they were going to find this guy guilty of all the charges and force him to spend the rest of his life in prison on a circumstantial case. [The juror] said that in the end, they compromised and found him guilty of a few of the charges, leaving the other charges on the table in the event [the State] wanted to prosecute the wife. He then told me that if he didn't do it, then he's covering up for her and that at least they got one of them. The investigator also questioned five other jurors. The first juror explained that during initial deliberations, the jury considered all twenty-six charges together to determine the defendant's guilt or innocence. Because they were unable to reach an early consensus, the jury decided to review and consider each charge separately. Applying this method, the jury unanimously decided that the defendant caused seven of the charged injuries. The juror told the investigator that while some of the jurors believed that the defendant's wife could have caused some of the injuries, they all agreed that only the defendant could have caused the seven injuries for which he was found guilty. The second juror similarly told the investigator that the jury focused on one indictment at a time, discussed each individual bone, and agreed that the defendant was responsible for fracturing seven specific bones. Applying this process, the jury reached a compromise and agreed on the seven findings of guilty. When the investigator asked a third juror whether the jury compromised in reaching its verdict, the juror explained that [t]he compromise was excluding the injuries that were not isolated to the father. A fourth juror stated that the jury was unanimous in concluding that the defendant's wife was not responsible for any of the injuries reflected in the seven guilty verdicts rendered against the defendant. The fifth juror explained that the jury exclud[ed] some of the injuries that could have been caused by either the husband or the wife, and ultimately all agreed that the husband was the only one who could have caused the injuries he was found guilty of. The investigator's reports of these juror communications were brought to the attention of the trial court, who ordered they be disclosed to the defendant. As a result, the defendant filed a motion to set aside the verdicts, alleging juror misconduct. The trial court considered the investigator's reports and the parties' post-trial pleadings, reconvened the jury, and interviewed each juror on the record, with the defendant and counsel present. The trial court ultimately found no juror misconduct, and denied the motion. In asserting that denial of the motion was error, the defendant points to juror # 4's comments that [the jury] compromised and found him guilty of a few of the charges, leaving other charges on the table in the event [the State] wanted to prosecute the wife. He argues that the comments demonstrate that the State failed to meet its constitutional burden of proof beyond a reasonable doubt. We will uphold a trial court's denial of a motion to set aside the verdict unless the ruling constitutes an unsustainable exercise of discretion. State v. Spinale, 156 N.H. 456, 466, 937 A.2d 938 (2007). It is a fundamental precept of our system of justice that a defendant has the right to be tried by a fair and impartial jury. State v. Goupil, 154 N.H. 208, 218, 908 A.2d 1256 (2006) (quotations omitted). When a trial court invokes its duty to investigate allegations of juror misconduct, the inquiry is a fact-specific determination, which we will not reverse absent an unsustainable exercise of discretion or a finding that the decision is against the weight of the evidence. Id. It is axiomatic that jurors are not to reach compromise verdicts based on sympathy for the defendant or to appease holdouts. State v. Taylor, 141 N.H. 89, 95, 677 A.2d 1093 (1996) (quotation omitted). As the trial court noted, however, [t]he use of the word `compromise' to describe the manner in which the jurors resolved the case[] does not mean the court should ascribe the technical, legal definition of `compromise' in evaluating the appropriateness of the verdicts. The fact that jurors describe the deliberative process as one of compromise does not necessarily render the verdicts unjust. Here, the trial court reconvened the jury and conducted individual voir dire. Based upon the juror's testimony during voir dire, the court concluded that there had been no misconduct: At that time, juror # 4 stated unequivocally that he followed the court's instructions, based his verdict only on the evidence presented and the law provided, understood that the verdicts must be unanimous, and determined that the defendant alone committed the 7 offenses for which he was found guilty. In addition, when questioned by the investigator, five other jurors explained that no compromise verdict occurred. Finally, the remaining 11 jurors all testified that the verdicts were a result of the proper application of the law and evidence, and not the result of a compromise in which they abandoned their beliefs about the defendant's guilt or innocence. As the trial court explained, jurors' common use of the word compromise may appropriately describe the give and take which customarily occurs in jury deliberations. Having satisfied itself that the jury did not engage in misconduct, the trial court reasonably exercised its discretion in denying the defendant's motion to set aside the verdict.