Opinion ID: 2611426
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The State's inconsistent arguments on Nika's motive to kill.

Text: Finally, I believe that it was improper for the State to argue during the guilt phase that Nika acted with a motive and then argue during the penalty phase that Nika acted without a motive. At trial, the prosecution presented a jailhouse snitch who testified that Nika told him that he had killed Smith because Smith had called him a motherfucker, a term that Nika stated was a grave insult in his country of origin. Because the prosecution elicited this testimony in the guilt phase to show that Nika killed Smith and why he killed Smith, it cannot in the penalty phase or on appeal legitimately argue that such provocation did not provide Nika with a motive to kill Smith. [4] See Tore, Ltd. v. Rothschild Management Corp., 106 Nev. 359, 364, 793 P.2d 1316, 1319 (1990) (stating that this court will not permit an attorney or party to argue one theory at trial and another on appeal). The prosecution should not be able to present evidence and argue its validity at one portion of a trial and then repudiate it at another because it no longer serves the State's purpose. In conclusion, I believe that Nika's constitutional rights were violated when his incriminating statement to jail personnel was admitted into evidence. Upon retrial I would discard the definition we have used in Bennett, Paine, and other subsequent cases that permits a finding of random and motiveless killing if murder was not necessary to complete the robbery and then define the three critical terms random, apparent, and motive with specificity.