Opinion ID: 2198104
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: Jury Instruction Adequate

Text: Burrell also argues in this appeal that the felony murder jury instruction was legally deficient because the jury instruction did not specifically track the then existing language of Title 11, section 636(a)(1) of the Delaware Code. At the time, the statute provided that a person is guilty of Felony Murder in the First Degree when in the course of and in furtherance of the commission or attempted commission of a felony or immediate flight therefrom, the person recklessly causes the death of another person. At the 1999 trial, Burrell's jury was instructed that the fourth element of the felony murder charge was that the killing was in furtherance of or was intended to assist in the commission of the felony of robbery in the first degree. Burrell argues that using the term assists encompasses factual circumstance broader from those captured by the term in furtherance of. Burrell contends that this subsidiary question about the propriety of the assists language in the 1998 felony murder jury instruction, was raised in the brief submitted by Burrell in the Superior Court. The Superior Court decision denying the second post-conviction relief motion does not address that legal argument. Since this legal argument is not contained in Burrell's second Rule 61 motion, and was not addressed in the Superior Court's 2007 decision, there is some question as to whether the deficient jury instruction claim was really fairly presented to the trial court. [25] Generally, questions not fairly presented to the trial court are not considered on appeal unless the interests of justice mandate such consideration. Assuming arguendo that this issue was either properly presented to the trial court or the interests of justice require its consideration, we have concluded that Burrell's jury instruction argument is also not a basis for granting him post-conviction relief. A trial court's jury instructions are not a ground for reversal if they are reasonably informative and not misleading when judged by common practices and standards of verbal communication. [26] When the correctness of a jury instruction is raised on appeal, our analysis focuses `not on whether any special words were used, but whether the instruction correctly stated the law and enabled the jury to perform its duty.' [27] In the circumstances of Burrell's case, we conclude that any semantic distinction between the word assists and the term in furtherance of is not of such a magnitude that the jury was either misled as to its function or unable properly to apply the law to the facts of Burrell's case. [28] Accordingly, we hold that the felony murder jury instruction at Burrell's trial was reasonably informative and not misleading. [29]