Opinion ID: 2587776
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Plain and Reversible Error in This Case

Text: Our decisions in Hoehl and Schwartz control our decision here. In Hoehl, we pointed out that the words may endanger introduced a broad and vague spectrum of speculative causal possibilities: Normally, may means be in some degree likely, Merriam-Webster's New International Dictionary (Third Edition) p. 1396, expressing ability, competency, liberty, permission, possibility, probability or contingency. Black's Law Dictionary 1131 (4th rev. ed.1968). So construed, we seriously doubt whether may in a criminal statute provides a fair description of the prohibited conduct, since virtually any conduct directed toward a child has the possibility, however slim, of endangering the child's life or health. Hoehl, 193 Colo. at 560, 568 P.2d at 486 (citations omitted). To render the statute constitutional, we interpreted the offense to provide that there is a reasonable probability that the child's life or health will be endangered from the situation in which the child is placed. Id. at 560, 568 P.2d at 485 (emphasis added). We reversed Hoehl's conviction because an instruction corresponding with this construction of the statute had not been given to the jury. Id. at 561, 568 P.2d at 487. In Schwartz, based on the General Assembly's intent in reformulating the statute subsequent to Hoehl and prior to its yet-again reformulation in 1985, we held that the may endanger language applied only to situations where an injury did not actually occur, rendering the offense a class 3 misdemeanor. 678 P.2d at 1007. In the case now before us, the trial court's jury instruction erroneously re-introduced into Weinreich's trial the same may endanger language which we disapproved in Hoehl, and limited to a misdemeanor offense in Schwartz based on the General Assembly's intent. The trial court did not instruct Weinreich's jury using an instruction that conformed to the statute in effect at the time of the offense under which the prosecution charged him. However, a correct jury instruction was readily available. See CJI Crim. 22:04 (Pocket Part 1993). In light of Hoehl and Schwartz and the General Assembly's choice to do away entirely with the may endanger language, the trial court committed plain error in giving an instruction for an offense that no longer existed and that materially deviated from the prosecution's charging document. To constitute plain error, the trial court's error must be obvious and substantial and so undermine the fundamental fairness of the trial itself as to cast serious doubt on the reliability of the judgment of conviction. See People v. Miller, 113 P.3d 743, 750 (Colo.2005). Weinreich must demonstrate not only that the instruction affected a substantial right, but also that the record reveals a reasonable possibility that the error contributed to his conviction. See id. Here, as in Hoehl, the jury was presented with the may have endangered language that permitted it to convict Weinreich for actions creating any possibility of risk to the child that the jury might select, however remote such action might be to the injury. The General Assembly enacted the current statute to eliminate this phraseology as an offense in favor of defining the offense as causing an injury to the child's life or health or unreasonably posing a threat of injury to the child's life or health or engaging in a pattern of conduct amounting to medical neglect or mistreatment. See Lybarger v. People, 807 P.2d 570, 578 (Colo.1991) (The criminal proscriptions against child abuse are to protect children, who frequently are unable to care for themselves, from the risk of injury or death associated with conduct that places a child in a situation that poses a threat to the child's well-being.). The instruction the trial court gave in this case deviated materially from the current statute and permitted the jury to convict Weinreich of a non-existent offense. Under the may have endangered phraseology of the instruction, there is a reasonable possibility that the jury convicted Weinreich for behavior that was not causally connected to his daughter's death as contemplated by the information and section 18-6-401(1)(a) and (7)(a), C.R.S. (2004). The offense stated in the instruction is plainly not within one of the alternative ways of committing the crime currently proscribed by section 18-6-401(1)(a). Accordingly, under the circumstances of this case, the court of appeals was correct in concluding that the jury instruction stated an obsolete offense and constituted an erroneous and prejudicial constructive amendment to the charge the prosecution brought against Weinreich. Weinreich, 98 P.3d at 923. Neither the information nor the current statute contemplated a possible conviction of child abuse resulting in death based on the obsolete may endanger formulation of an offense that no longer exists. Here, as opposed to People v. Madden, 111 P.3d 452, 455 (Colo.2005), the information did not place Weinreich on notice that he would have to defend against the charge actually submitted to the jury. People v. Rodriguez, 914 P.2d 230, 257 (Colo.1996). It is axiomatic that a defendant must be convicted of a crime that exists. See generally Sawyer v. People, 173 Colo. 351, 353-54, 478 P.2d 672, 674 (1970). The use of the word unreasonably in the trial court's instruction did not cure re-introduction of the long-disapproved may have endangered language, because the instruction as a whole exposed Weinreich to conviction for an act that the jury may have perceived as endangering the child's life or health but which did not cause his daughter's death.