Opinion ID: 2520895
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Failure to Act Proximate Cause Jury Instruction 10

Text: Jury instruction 10 given in Berube and Nielsen's trial states: To constitute homicide by abuse, there must be a causal connection between the death of a human being and the criminal conduct of a defendant so that the act done or omitted was a proximate cause of the resulting death. The term proximate cause means a cause which, in a direct sequence, unbroken by any new independent cause, produces the death, and without which the death would not have happened. BCP at 45; NCP at 139 (emphasis added). Berube and Nielsen claim that this jury instruction allowed each of them to be convicted as an accomplice based on a failure to act rather than requiring an affirmative act. For support, they cite to State v. Jackson, 137 Wash.2d 712, 976 P.2d 1229 (1999). In Jackson, foster parent defendants were convicted of second degree felony murder of their foster child. 137 Wash.2d at 715, 976 P.2d 1229. Each defendant appealed to the Court of Appeals claiming that the trial court committed reversible error by including a `duty exists for a parent to come to the aid of their small children' element in its jury instruction regarding accomplice liability. Id. (quoting State v. Jackson, 87 Wash.App. 801, 810, 944 P.2d 403 (1997)). The Court of Appeals agreed with the defendants, reversing the conviction and remanding for a new trial. Id. This court agreed with the Court of Appeals and held that accomplice liability does not attach to instances where a person fails to come to the aid of another. Id. at 722-23, 976 P.2d 1229. The Court of Appeals in this case was correct in distinguishing Jackson from the facts in this case. Jury instruction 10 does not state nor intimate that the defendant had a legal duty to act. Also, jury instruction 10 relates to homicide by abuse, whereas the flawed instruction in Jackson related to accomplice liability. The jury instruction in this case correctly recites that proximate cause is an element of the crime of homicide by abuse. There is no error.