Opinion ID: 2396947
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Constitutional Harm

Text: Having found a Miranda violation, we must now determine whether the trial court's denial of the motion to suppress the statement constitutes reversible constitutional error. See, e.g., Stewart, 668 A.2d at 868 (applying Chapman v. California, 386 U.S. 18, 20, 87 S.Ct. 824, 17 L.Ed.2d 705 (1967) to the erroneous admission of inculpatory statements violating Miranda ). If there is no reasonable possibility that the offending evidence might have contributed to the conviction, the error is harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. Chapman, 386 U.S. at 23, 87 S.Ct. 824. Stated differently, the erroneous admission into evidence of an illegally obtained confession is harmless beyond a reasonable doubt when there remains overwhelming evidence to support the jury's verdict. Smith v. United States, 529 A.2d 312, 318 (D.C.1987) (citing Derrington v. United States, 488 A.2d 1314, 1331 & n. 25 (D.C. 1985)). Applying these principles, we cannot conclude that the error of admitting appellant's statement was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. [14] The government's case depended on the testimony of Bush, Zacharias, and Saab. [15] See note 3, supra. Of these, only Saab's testimony clearly rebutted appellant's claim that he shot the decedent in self-defense as he continued to threaten appellant. Saab's account, however, was substantially contradicted by both Bush's and Hughes's testimony, who, in contrast to Saab, saw no retreat by the decedent in the moments before the shooting, but rather, a herculean advance upon appellant even after the first volley of three shots. See note 3 and corresponding text, and page ___, supra. Thus, to discredit appellant's self-defense claim, the government necessarily relied on appellant's incriminating statement to the police, which was a focal point of the prosecution: it was presaged in the government's opening statement; it was introduced into evidence at the very end of the government's case-in-chief through Detective Rivera's testimony; it was used to challenge appellant's claims of self-defense during his cross-examination; and it was showcased in the government's closing argument. A recurrent prosecution theme was that appellant's confession to the police belied any claim to self-defense, either because appellant did not raise it specifically at the time, or because appellant's vague reference to a shiny object  as opposed to the knife, which appellant conceded at trial was the weapon the decedent brandished  was a deliberate attempt to lay the groundwork for what the prosecution theorized was appellant's early plan to fabricate a claim of self-defense. That the jurors were quickly deadlocked on the lesser-included charge of manslaughter confirms the critical role that these arguments, and the statement upon which they relied, likely played in the jury's verdict. Given the centrality of appellant's unwarned statement to the government's case, and the evident difficulty the jury had in reaching its verdict, we cannot conclude that the statement's admission was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. In the absence of overwhelming independent evidence supporting the jury's verdict, there is a reasonable possibility that the conviction was tainted by appellant's illegally-obtained incriminating statement. We accordingly reverse the judgments of conviction and remand the case for a new trial.