Opinion ID: 1961129
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: The Re-Instruction

Text: Among other crimes, petitioner was charged with daytime housebreaking, which is a felony, and first degree felony murder based on the daytime housebreaking. The court instructed the jury that, in order to convict petitioner of daytime housebreaking, the State had to prove that there was a breaking of another's dwelling house with the intent to steal goods therefrom and that the Defendant was the person who committed the housebreaking. The court defined breaking for the jury as the creation of an opening, such as breaking or opening a window or pushing open a door. In order to convict under that instruction, the jury had to find that petitioner created such an opening with the intent to steal goods. With respect to felony murder, the court instructed in accord with the Pattern Jury Instructions (MPJI-Cr.4:17.7): In order to convict the Defendant of first degree felony murder the State must prove, one, that the Defendant or another participating in the crime with the Defendant committed a felony or felonies. Two, that the Defendant or another participating in the crime killed Adeline Curry Wilford. And three, that the act resulting in the death of [Ms. Wilford] occurred during the commission of the felonies. Felony murder does not require the State to prove that the Defendant intended to kill the victim. As part of its introductory general instructions, prior to instructing on the elements of any of the charged offenses, the court informed the jury that [a] person's presence at the scene of a crime without more is not enough to prove that the person committed the crime but that a person's presence at the time and place of a crime is a fact in determining whether the Defendant is guilty or not guilty. That instruction, also taken from the Pattern Jury Instructions (MPJI-Cr.3:25) is sometimes referred to as the mere presence instruction. After some period of deliberation, the jury sent the following question to the judge: In the case of first degree felony murder, does the evidence have to prove that the Defendant committed the murder or only that he was present during the commission of a felony when the murder occurred? Without objection, the court responded by repeating the felony murder instruction it had given. Petitioner then asked the court to repeat as well the mere presence instruction, which the court declined to do. Petitioner contends that the court abused its discretion in refusing to repeat the mere presence instruction. Although no objection was made to the initial instructions, petitioner now contends that they must have seemed contradictory to the jury: (1) mere presence at the scene of the crime does not make you guilty; and (2) mere presence at the scene of a felony does make you guilty of murder if it occurs during the felony. Instead of addressing that seeming contradiction by repeating the mere presence instruction, petitioner avers that the court exacerbated the problem by repeating only the felony murder instruction. We find no error. Maryland Rule 4-325(a) requires the court to instruct the jury at the close of the evidence and permits the court to supplement those instructions at a later time. In Mitchell v. State, 338 Md. 536, 540, 659 A.2d 1282, 1284 (1995) (quoting Howard v. State, 66 Md.App. 273, 284, 503 A.2d 739, 744-45, cert. denied, 306 Md. 288, 508 A.2d 488 (1986)), we made clear that [t]he decision to supplement [jury] instructions and the extent of supplementation are matters left to the sound discretion of the trial judge, whose decision will not be disturbed on appeal in the absence of a clear abuse of discretion. Bearing on the exercise of that discretion is the principle, embodied in Maryland Rule 4-325(c), that the court need not grant a requested instruction if the matter is fairly covered by instructions actually given. The repetition of the felony murder instruction, in our view, fairly and accurately addressed the jury's question. It told the jury that, to convict of felony murder, it must find that either petitioner or someone participating in the crime with petitioner committed a felony, that petitioner or someone participating in the crime with petitioner killed Ms. Wilford, and that the act resulting in Ms. Wilford's death occurred during the commission of the felony. That told the jury that petitioner did not have to commit the murder himself, but it also told the jury that he or someone participating with him had to have committed the felony and the killing. The necessary implication was that mere presence at the scene, without more, would not suffice. [2] In convicting petitioner of daytime housebreaking under the instructions given with regard to that offense, the jury necessarily concluded, in any event, that he was not merely present at the scene but actually broke into the house and thereby participated in the felony. JUDGMENT OF COURT OF SPECIAL APPEALS AFFIRMED, WITH COSTS. ELDRIDGE, J., and CATHELL, J., dissenting. We totally fail to comprehend what legal issue of public importance is presented by this case so as to justify the issuance of a writ of certiorari. The writ should be dismissed as improvidently granted.