Opinion ID: 1959985
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Submission of Aggravating Factor (f)

Text: Defendant claims that the trial court erroneously submitted to the jury aggravating factor (f): the murder was committed for the purpose of escaping detection for another offense committed by another (here Franciotti). He argues that sufficient indicia of reliability did not exist to support the hearsay statement contained in defendant's confession, which gave rise to the submission of that factor. Defendant confessed that a man named Franciotti paid him money to kill Potcher because Potcher was going to rat on Franciotti and his associates. The aspect of the confession concerning Potcher implicating Franciotti in criminal activity formed the basis of the State's submission of aggravating factor (f). Defendant maintains that because the State failed to show the underlying crime for which Franciotti meant to avoid detection by having Potcher killed, the submission of aggravating factor (f) was reversible error. We disagree. The record was sufficient for a reasonable jury to conclude that defendant had murdered Potcher because Potcher was about to alert the authorities to Franciotti's criminal activity. Although the defense did establish that no investigation of Franciotti was in progress, the State did provide evidence that Franciotti had had a long involvement in criminal activity. Moreover, the State presented substantial evidence corroborating defendant's confession. In accordance with our opinion in Di Frisco I, supra, the trial court instructed the jury that for the State to carry its burden of proving an aggravating factor beyond a reasonable doubt, it had to produce independent evidence of the aggravating factor or it had to corroborate defendant's confession sufficiently. Here, the State did both. Defendant argues that at most the State proved that defendant believed that he killed Potcher to stop Potcher from implicating Franciotti in criminal activity. Proof of his subjective belief, argues defendant, is insufficient to establish aggravating factor (f). According to defendant, to establish aggravating factor (f), the State must show that the actual purpose for the murder was to escape detection for another crime. If no other crime actually existed for which one would want to avoid detection, the court cannot submit aggravating factor (f). The State argues that N.J.S.A. 2C:11-3c(4)(f) only requires a showing of subjective intent  i.e., the murderer believed that a purpose of the murder was to avoid detection of the murder's own crime or of another's crime. The trial court concluded that the State had to demonstrate that one of defendant's purposes in murdering Potcher was to prevent Potcher from implicating Franciotti in actual criminal activity. In Martini, supra, 131 N.J. at 279, 619 A. 2d 1208, we upheld the submission to the jury of aggravating factor (f) based mainly on Martini's confession. In so doing, we rejected Martini's contention that the State must produce direct evidence of a defendant's intention to avoid apprehension to support the factor. Id. at 282, 619 A. 2d 1208. Similarly, here, defendant's confession was sufficiently corroborated for the State to establish that Franciotti had actually been involved in criminal activity and that DiFrisco had murdered Potcher to prevent Potcher from implicating Franciotti in that activity. Hence, we need not decide whether a mistaken belief on the part of a murderer that the murder was committed to prevent detection for another crime is sufficient to establish aggravating factor (f). In other words, we need not address here whether a hired killer's mistaken belief that his or her target had to be killed because the target was about to implicate some of the killer's associates in criminal activity establishes aggravating factor (f). Even if the trial court's submission of aggravating factor (f) was in error, the error would have been harmless because the jury did not find aggravating factor (f) unanimously. The jury, however, did find aggravating factor (d) (murder for hire) and also found that that factor alone outweighed the mitigating factors beyond a reasonable doubt. We noted in Rose, supra, 112 N.J. at 533, 548 A. 2d 1058, that in view of the nature of the weighing process in the penalty phase of a capital prosecution, it would be highly speculative to conclude that the erroneous submission to the jury of aggravating factor c(4)(c), a factor rejected by the jury, prejudicially affected [the] jury's deliberations concerning the remaining aggravating factors, the mitigating factors, and its weighing process. Unlike an erroneous submission that presents a jury with mutually exclusive choices, see State v. Christener, 71 N.J. 55, 66, 362 A. 2d 1153 (1976), the erroneous submission of an aggravating factor neither compels nor inhibits [a jury's] determination that another factor exists. Rose, supra, 112 N.J. at 533, 548 A. 2d 1058. Thus, the submission of aggravating factor (f) was harmless.