Opinion ID: 1258086
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: State's Claim of Waiver

Text: Prior to addressing the merits of the Appellant's substantive contentions, preliminary issues of waiver raised by the State must be resolved. The State contends that the Appellant waived his right to challenge the issue of improper admission of evidence and the trial court's failure to grant a mistrial in two distinct manners. First, the State maintains that the Appellant waived the alleged errors by failing to object to the admission of the victim statement containing the reference to the sex offender status. This Court has explained: [T]o establish waiver there must be evidence demonstrating that a party has intentionally relinquished a known right. Potesta v. U.S. Fidelity & Guar. Co., 202 W.Va. 308, 315, 504 S.E.2d 135, 142 (1998). When there has been a knowing and intentional relinquishment or abandonment of a known right, there is no error and the inquiry as to the effect of a deviation from the rule of law need not be determined. Syl. Pt. 8, in part, State v. Miller, 194 W.Va. 3, 459 S.E.2d 114 (1995) (emphasis supplied). In the circumstances of the present case, this Court concludes that the Appellant's counsel's failure to object to the introduction of R.C.'s statement cannot be characterized as a knowing and intentional waiver. The Appellant's counsel contends that he was unaware of the existence of the final page upon which the reference was contained. In his brief to this Court, Appellant's counsel theorized that the inadvertent admission was likely caused by a clerical error and contends that the copy of the victim statement in Appellant's counsel's file did not include a final page. For purposes of this discussion and based upon the record before this Court, we accept the declaration of Appellant's counsel regarding his lack of knowledge of the existence of the reference to Appellant's status as a sex offender. Assuming such veracity of Appellant's counsel, we must acknowledge that one cannot knowingly and intentionally waive something of which one has no knowledge. As Justice Miller astutely articulated in his dissent in State v. Layton, 189 W.Va. 470, 432 S.E.2d 740 (1993), with regard to waiver of a right to be present at trial, the defendant could not waive what he did not know had occurred. 189 W.Va. at 500, 432 S.E.2d at 770 (Miller, J., dissenting). Second, the State contends that the issue of denial of a mistrial was not properly presented for appellate review in the Appellant's brief. The State emphasizes inconsistency between the Assignments of Error identified in the Appellant's Petition for Appeal and those included in the Appellant's Brief to this Court. Specifically, in his Petition for Appeal, the Appellant raised the issue of whether the evidence regarding the Appellant's status as a sex offender was inadmissible as a matter of law and whether the trial court had erred in refusing to declare a mistral. In his brief, however, the Appellant raised only the issue that evidence of the sex offender registry was inadvertently admitted, that it was improperly admitted, and that it was more prejudicial than probative. The State attempts to characterize that inconsistency as a waiver of the Appellant's right to appeal the issue of denial of a mistrial, citing this Court's holdings that failure to properly raise an issue on appeal will result in waiver. See Britner v. Medical Sec. Card, Inc., 200 W.Va. 352, 354 n. 5, 489 S.E.2d 734, 736 n. 5 (1997) (The defendants' petition for appeal cited as error the circuit court's application of the five year statute of limitations to this case. However, the defendants did not address that issue in their brief and therefore have abandoned that assignment of error); State v. LaRock, 196 W.Va. 294, 302, 470 S.E.2d 613, 621 (1996) (Although we liberally construe briefs in determining issues presented for review, issues which are not raised, and those mentioned only in passing but are not supported with pertinent authority, are not considered on appeal.). Indeed, the Appellant did not specifically articulate the mistrial denial as a numbered assignment of error in his brief. However, a close reading of the Appellant's petition and brief reveals that the issue of mistrial denial was initially discussed in the petition, and the brief was thereafter dedicated to the argument that the mistrial denial was improper since there had been an inadvertent admission of prejudicial evidence. We consequently decline to find that the Appellant waived the issue of the denial of the mistrial for appellate review.