Opinion ID: 1935115
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Improper Instructions on Accomplice and Co-conspirator Liability

Text: Defendant alleges that the trial court erred in failing properly to instruct the jury on accomplice and co-conspirator liability. In its original charge, the trial court properly instructed the jury, consistent with the indictment, that defendant could be guilty of murder if he committed the homicides by his own conduct, or if he was an accomplice of the person who committed the homicides. See N.J.S.A. 2C:2-6a, b(3). However, contrary to the indictment, the trial court failed to instruct the jury that defendant also could be guilty of murder if he had been engaged in a conspiracy to commit the homicides, whether or not he had committed the murder by his own conduct or had been an accomplice of the person who committed the homicides. See N.J.S.A. 2C:2-6b(4); see also State v. Bridges, 133 N.J. 447, 468, 628 A. 2d 270 (1993) ([A] conspirator can be held liable for the acts of others that constitute a reasonably foreseeable risk arising out of the criminal conduct undertaken to effectuate the conspiracy, and occurring as the necessary or natural consequences of the conspiracy.). The trial court apparently intended to instruct the jury on defendant's exposure to a murder conviction on the basis that he had engaged in a conspiracy to commit the homicides, as alleged in counts three and four of the indictment. However, the trial court's original charge instead instructed the jury on the substantive crime of conspiracy, N.J.S.A. 2C:5-2, for which defendant had also been indicted. The commission of that crime, however, can occur without completion of the substantive offense contemplated by the conspiracy, and if the substantive offense, as here, is a crime of the first degree, the conspiracy offense is graded as a second-degree crime. N.J.S.A. 2C:5-4. During deliberations, the jury requested an instruction clarifying the difference between own-conduct liability and accomplice or co-conspirator liability. The court responded by defining own-conduct liability, repeating its instruction on the substantive offense of conspiracy but omitting again to instruct the jury that defendant could be convicted of murder solely on the basis that he had conspired with another person to commit the homicides. Neither accomplice nor co-conspirator liability for murder was explained in the court's supplemental instruction. Given our reversal of defendant's death sentence on other grounds, see supra at 509-28, 651 A. 2d at 32-41, we need not undertake a detailed analysis of whether the court's flawed instructions prejudiced defendant in respect of the own-conduct determination that triggered the penalty phase. In one respect, the trial court's failure to instruct the jury that defendant could be convicted of murder if he conspired to commit the homicides benefitted defendant by limiting the grounds on which the jury could return a guilty verdict on the murder charges. Nevertheless, we also note the potential for prejudice. The court's instructions and verdict sheet emphasized that the jury's decision on the own-conduct requirement was a choice between alternative theories of liability  own-conduct liability, on the one hand, or accomplice or co-conspirator liability on the other. Clearly, the jury's request for a supplemental charge on own-conduct liability and accomplice or co-conspirator liability suggests that the jury was uncertain about those theories or the distinction between them. The court increased that uncertainty when it responded to the jury's request with an explanation only of own-conduct liability, and no explanation of either accomplice or co-conspirator liability for murder. Because the own-conduct interrogatory required the jury to make a determination on the precise issue about which it later expressed confusion, the court's failure to resolve that confusion makes the own-conduct determination less reliable.