Opinion ID: 1109659
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Sufficiency of Evidence (Assignment 12)

Text: Defendant alleges that the evidence was insufficient to support the guilty verdicts. The constitutional standard for testing the sufficiency of the evidence requires that a conviction be based on proof sufficient for any rational trier of fact, viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution, to find the essential elements of the crime charged beyond a reasonable doubt. Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 99 S.Ct. 2781, 61 L.Ed. 2d 560 (1979); State v. Rosiere, 488 So.2d 965, 968 (La.1986). In order to establish that the defendant was the perpetrator, the state presented three witnesses who testified that he told them that he had killed the victims. The state also linked the defendant to the crimes through the jewelry belonging to the victims which was found in his car. This evidence was sufficient for a rational juror to conclude beyond a reasonable doubt that defendant was the person who killed both women. Similarly, the gun shot wounds to the heads of both women, inflicted at close range, demonstrate that the killer acted with specific intent to kill or inflict great bodily harm. Thus the evidence was sufficient to establish that defendant committed both murders and acted with specific intent. The remaining question is whether the state presented sufficient evidence to establish that both of these specific intent homicides constitute first degree murder as defined by La.R.S. 14:30. The evidence was also sufficient to establish that defendant murdered Sue Windham while he was engaged in the perpetration of an aggravated rape. La.R.S. 14:30(A)(1). Thus the evidence was constitutionally sufficient to support the first degree murder conviction for the Windham homicide. With respect to the Earline Nunn homicide, the state sought to prove at trial that Nunn was the victim of first-degree murder because she was killed while the offender was engaged in the perpetration of aggravated kidnapping. La.R.S. 14:30(A)(1). The aggravating kidnapping claim was the only basis on which the state relied to establish that this homicide was first-degree murder. The state did not argue that the homicide qualified as first-degree murder under any of the other circumstances enumerated under La.R.S. 14:30(A)(2)-(5). Nor did the judge instruct the jury on any possible basis other than aggravated kidnapping for finding that this homicide qualified as first-degree murder. La.R.S. 14:44 defines aggravated kidnapping as follows: Aggravated kidnapping is the doing of any of the following acts with the intent thereby to force the victim, or some other person, to give up anything of apparent present or prospective value, or to grant any advantage or immunity, in order to secure a release of the person under the offender's actual or apparent control: (1) The forcible seizing and carrying of any person from one place to another; or (2) The enticing or persuading of any person to go from one place to another; or (3) The imprisoning or forcible secreting of any person. (Emphasis added) The jury could have found, based on Foster's testimony, that defendant's conduct satisfied part of the definition of aggravated kidnapping, i.e., forcible seizing and carrying of any person from one place to another. According to Foster, defendant admitted to tying up Earline and forcibly taking her to the area where the bodies were found. However, there was no evidence in support of a critical element of aggravated kidnapping: that the perpetrator seized the victim with the intent of forcing the victim or some other person to give up anything of value in order to secure the victim's release. The state argued at trial that something of value which the defendant sought to force Earline to relinquish was her plan to testify against him in judicial proceedings (the peace bond proceeding, and as a witness against him with respect to Sue's death). We find this argument unpersuasive. It may be that defendant's desire to prevent Earline from testifying against him in future judicial proceedings was a motive for the murder of this victim. Even if that were so, however, forcing the victim to relinquish her plan to testify by taking her life can hardly be construed as seeking something of value from the victim or another person in order to secure the victim's release. Without such evidence, there is no aggravated kidnapping. At trial the State did not argue that any other circumstance qualified the Nunn homicide as first-degree murder. In his instructions on the charge involving Earline, the trial judge informed the jury that first-degree murder is a murder committed when the offender is engaged in the perpetration of aggravated kidnapping. Thus the jury's first degree murder conviction on this charge had to be based on an implicit finding that the offender was engaged in the perpetration of an aggravated kidnapping. [3] The jury's verdict on this charge is not supported by the evidence and must be set aside. Perhaps the state could have attempted to prove at trial that this homicide was a first-degree murder because it was committed under circumstances where the offender has a specific intent to kill or to inflict great bodily harm upon more than one person. La.R.S. 14:30(A)(3). We have held that this statutory definition of first-degree murder is satisfied when the murderer specifically intended to kill more than one person and actually caused the death of one person and the risk of death or great bodily harm to at least one other person, all by a single act or by a series of acts in a single consecutive course of conduct. State v. Williams, 480 So.2d 721, 726 (La.1985). The state did not rely on La.R.S. 14:30(A)(3) at trial and the jury was never informed of this statutory basis for first degree murder. However, in the penalty phase of the trial, one of the statutory aggravating circumstances which the jury found applicable to each homicide was that defendant knowingly created a risk of death or great bodily harm to more than one person. La.C.Cr.P. art. 905.4(A)(4). In Williams, 480 So.2d at 726, we held (and logic supports the proposition) that the same conduct which satisfies La.R.S. 14:30(A)(3)'s definition of first degree murder (specific intent to kill or inflict bodily harm on more than one person) also satisfies the aggravating circumstance set forth in Art. 905.4(A)(4) (knowingly creating a risk of death or great bodily harm to more than one person). Note, however, that the reverse is not necessarily true. Although the two statutory provisions are somewhat similar, conduct by which the defendant knowingly creates a risk of great bodily harm to more than one person [Art. 905.4(d)] need not always be under circumstances where there is specific intent to kill or inflict bodily harm on more than one person [La. R.S. 14:30(A)(3) ]. The aggravating circumstance set forth in Art. 905.4(A)(4) encompasses a broader range of conduct than the first degree murder definition set forth in La.R.S. 14:30(A)(3). It can be be argued that the jury's finding in the penalty phase that defendant knowingly created the risk of death or great bodily harm to more than one person under art. 905.4(A)(4) indicates that it might have found the evidence to support specific intent to kill or inflict bodily harm on more than one person, and it would have relied upon La.R.S. 14:30(A)(3) to support the first degree murder conviction if it had been aware of that particular definition of first degree murder. [4] We conclude, however, that where the evidence is insufficient to establish first-degree murder under the only definition of that crime which was argued or provided to the jury, the conviction cannot be upheld based on speculation about what verdict the jury would have returned if it had been informed of a different statutory basis for concluding that the defendant's crime constituted first degree murder. And, more importantly, even if we were to somehow borrow the jury's finding in the penalty phase and make it that of the jury in the guilt phase, there would still be a deficiency, inasmuch as knowingly creating a risk of death or great bodily harm to more than one person (which the jury found in the second phase of the trial) does not of necessity encompass specific intent to kill or inflict bodily harm on more than one person (the requisite finding in the guilt phase to qualify the crime as first degree murder). In every homicide case, the prosecutor is free to attempt to establish that the defendant's conduct satisfied any or all of the definitions of first degree murder contained in La.R.S. 14:30(A)(1)-(5). Here the prosecution chose to seek a first-degree murder conviction on this charge based only on an aggravated kidnapping theory, one which was wholly unsupported by the evidence. When the prosecution chooses to limit its case in this fashion, a defendant cannot be convicted of first degree murder based on assumptions about what the jury would have found if the prosecution had presented its case differently. [5] Even if the jury had been given the opportunity to determine in the guilt phase that defendant acted with specific intent to kill more than one person, we would still have to resolve whether the evidence was sufficient to support a finding that the defendant committed both murders by a series of acts in a single consecutive course of conduct. That inquiry would present a close issue in this case, one which we would perhaps decide in favor of the state. [6] But we need not resolve that question here. The fact is that the jury was never given the opportunity to make a determination of whether the defendant's conduct satisfied La.R.S. 14:30(A)(3), and, as discussed above, the jury's penalty phase finding that defendant knowingly created a risk of death or great bodily injury to two or more persons cannot be borrowed and applied to the guilt phase. [7] In Baldwin v. Blackburn, 653 F.2d 942 (5th Cir.1981), the United States Court of Appeal for the Fifth Circuit relied upon a jury finding in the penalty phase that the defendant committed the murder while engaged in the perpetration of an armed robbery as a basis for upholding the defendant's first degree murder conviction. At the time that defendant Baldwin was tried, La.R.S. 14:30 defined first-degree murder as a specific intent homicide, punishable by death or life imprisonment. The statutory factors which now distinguish first degree murder from all other homicides, La.R.S. 14:30(A)(1)-(5), were not set forth in the first-degree murder statute. Second-degree murder, punishable by life imprisonment, was defined in pertinent part as a specific intent homicide under circumstances that would be first degree murder under Article 30, but the killing is accomplished without any of the aggravating circumstances listed in Article 905.4 of the Louisiana Code of Criminal Procedure. La.R.S. 14:30.1(B) (prior to 1978 amendment). One of the aggravating circumstances under Art. 905.4 was that the offender was engaged in the perpetration of an armed robbery. In Baldwin, the prosecution presented evidence during the guilt phase of the trial which demonstrated that the murder occurred while the offender was engaged in the perpetration of an armed robbery. At the close of the guilt phase, the trial court instructed the jury that first-degree murder was the killing of a human being where the perpetrator acted with specific intent. The trial judge also instructed the jury that second degree murder was a specific intent homicide which would be first-degree murder but for the fact that none of the aggravating circumstances listed in L.C.Cr.P. art. 905.4 were present. The trial judge, however, did not tell the jury, prior to its guilt determination, what the aggravating circumstances under La.C.Cr.P. art. 905.4 were which qualified a homicide as first degree murder. In the guilt phase of the trial, then, the jury arguably was not given a sufficient explanation of the difference between first and second degree murder. At the conclusion of the guilt phase of the trial, the jury convicted the defendant of first degree murder. At the conclusion of the penalty phase of the trial, the jury found that the murder was committed while the offender was engaged in the perpetration of an armed robbery, and recommended the imposition of the death penalty. In upholding the defendant's conviction and sentence, the federal appellate court stated that: The jury's combined findings in the guilt and sentencing portions of the trial permitted the imposition of the death penalty on appellant. The aggravating circumstance that led them to the imposition of this punishment existed regardless of when the jury was instructed to consider it, and it was necessarily a part of their determination of guilt. 653 F.2d at 952. Baldwin is distinguishable from this case because the aggravating circumstance found in the penalty phase (offender engaged in the perpetration of an armed robbery) was identical to the statutory definition which qualified the homicide as first degree murder. Art. 905.4 served two functions. It set forth the circumstances which distinguished first degree murder from second degree murder, and, simultaneously, it recited the necessary aggravating circumstances for the purpose of the sentencing inquiry. The Fifth Circuit concluded that, under this statutory scheme, the defendant's conviction and sentence should be upheld as long as the jury was instructed at some point in the proceedings to consider whether the offender was engaged in the perpetration of an armed robbery. In this case, of course, the jury was never instructed to consider whether the defendant acted with specific intent to kill or inflict great bodily harm upon more than one person. As we have already noted, the aggravating circumstance of knowingly creating the risk of death or great bodily injury to more than one person [Art. 905.4], which was a jury finding in the second phase of the trial after instructions thereon, is similar, but not the same as La.R.S. 14:30(A)(3).