Opinion ID: 2736701
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Shanika Robinson’s Claim of Error

Text: 1. Liability of an Aider and Abettor for Commission of a Crime While Armed D.C. Code § 22-4502 (a) permits the imposition of enhanced punishment on defendants convicted of having committed a crime of violence or a dangerous crime “when armed with or having readily available” a firearm or other dangerous or deadly weapon. The term “armed with” means having “actual physical possession” of the weapon in question,14 while “having readily available” means, “at a minimum,” having constructive possession of the weapon.15 The “while armed” charges in the present case were based on actual physical possession of the weapons used in the murder by Leon Robinson and Genus; that is why the court did not instruct the jury on the “having readily available” alternative. But whether 14 (Phillip) Johnson v. United States, 686 A.2d 200, 205 (D.C. 1996); see also Cox v. United States, 999 A.2d 63, 69 (D.C. 2010). 15 Guishard v. United States, 669 A.2d 1306, 1314 (D.C. 1995); see also Cox, 999 A.2d at 69. 20 actual or constructive, possession requires that the possessor knowingly be in control of the weapon.16 If the principal offender must know he is armed when he is committing a violent or dangerous crime in order to be subject to the “while armed” enhancement of § 22-4502, then the aider and abettor (if unarmed herself, like Shanika Robinson in this case) also must know the principal is armed for the enhancement to be applicable to her as well. This is so for two reasons. First, and most basically, to be guilty of a crime—here an offense committed while armed— as an aider and abettor, a person must, inter alia, intend to facilitate the entire offense, not some lesser offense.17 As the Supreme Court recently has put it, “an 16 Wheeler v. United States, 977 A.2d 973, 987 n. 36 (D.C. 2009) as amended by order, 987 A.2d 431 (D.C. 2010). Our cases have defined “actual possession” as “the ability of a person to knowingly exercise direct physical custody or control over the property in question.” (Courtney) Johnson v. United States, 40 A.3d 1, 14 (D.C. 2012) (emphasis added) (quoting United States v. Hubbard, 429 A.2d 1334, 1338 (D.C. 1981)); see also White v. United States, 763 A.2d 715, 724-25 (D.C. 2000). Constructive possession likewise entails knowledge of the location of the item, as well as the ability and intention to exercise dominion and control over it. See, e.g., Rivas v. United States, 783 A.2d 125, 129 (D.C. 2001) (en banc). 17 See Wilson-Bey, 903 A.2d at 831 (stating that aiding and abetting liability requires that the accomplice “„in some sort associate himself with the venture, that 21 aiding and abetting conviction requires not just an act facilitating one or another element, but also a state of mind extending to the entire crime. . . . [T]he intent must go to the specific and entire crime charged—so here, to the full scope (predicate crime plus gun use).”18 A person cannot intend to aid an armed offense if she is unaware a weapon will be involved.19 Second, as is articulated in our Wilson-Bey line of cases, the mens rea required for conviction of a crime is normally the same for an aider and abettor as it is for the principal offender.20 A he participate in it as in something that he wishes to bring about, that he seek by his action to make it succeed‟”) (quoting United States v. Peoni, 100 F.2d 401, 402 (2d Cir. 1938)). 18 Rosemond v. United States, 134 S. Ct. 1240, 1249-50 (2014) (holding that to convict a person as an aider and abettor under federal law prohibiting using or carrying a firearm during a crime of violence or a drug trafficking crime, the government must prove that the person knew in advance that one of his accomplices would be armed). We have looked to the federal courts‟ interpretation of the federal aiding and abetting statute, 18 U.S.C. § 2, for guidance in construing our own aiding and abetting statute, D.C. Code § 1805 (2012 Repl.). Wilson-Bey, 903 A.2d at 831. 19 Conversely, “for purposes of aiding and abetting law, a person who actively participates in a criminal scheme knowing its extent and character intends that scheme‟s commission.” Rosemond, 134 S. Ct. at 1249. 20 See, e.g., Kitt v. United States, 904 A.2d 348, 356 (D.C. 2006) (“[W]here a specific mens rea is an element of a criminal offense, a defendant must have had that mens rea himself to be guilty of that offense, whether he is charged as the principal actor or as an aider and abettor”); see also Collins v. United States, 73 22 defendant ordinarily cannot be convicted of an offense as an aider and abettor if he or she possessed a lesser mens rea than that required of the principal. In particular, Wilson-Bey rejected the proposition (and any jury instruction incorporating it) that a defendant may be held liable as an aider and abettor based on a merely negligent state of mind—i.e., for acts of confederates that were merely “reasonably foreseeable” to the defendant or the “natural and probable consequences” of the criminal venture in which the defendant intentionally participated—when a degree of mens rea higher than negligence was required to convict the principal actor for those acts.21 A.3d 974, 981 n.3 (D.C. 2013) (in order to convict a defendant as an aider and abettor “the government was required to show that the accomplice had the same intent necessary to prove commission of the underlying substantive offense by the principal.”); Lancaster v. United States, 975 A.2d 168, 174 (D.C. 2009) (“Because armed robbery is a specific-intent crime, the government must prove that the aider and abettor shared the same mens rea required of the principals.”). 21 Wilson-Bey, 903 A.2d at 836-39; accord, Coleman v. United States, 948 A.2d 534, 553 (D.C. 2008) (holding that a conviction for second-degree murder as an aider and abettor “cannot stand on the basis that the defendant was merely negligent”). “A person acts negligently with respect to a material element of an offense when he should be aware of a substantial and unjustifiable risk that the material element exists or will result from his conduct.” Model Penal Code § 2.02. Of course, if the circumstances support a supposition that a person had reason to know a fact, those circumstances might also support an inference that the person had actual knowledge of that fact. 23 For these reasons, we conclude that the enhanced penalty provisions of D.C. Code § 22-4502 may not be applied to an aider and abettor who only had “reason to know” the principal offender was “armed with” a dangerous weapon during the commission of a violent or dangerous crime. Actual knowledge of the weapon is required for either the principal offender (which is seldom an issue) or the aider and abettor to be subject to § 22-4502. Any jury instruction on the “while armed” element must be consistent with that requirement.22 22 The Redbook‟s proposed instruction regarding aiding and abetting “while armed” offenses states that “[a]n aider and abettor is legally responsible for the principal‟s use of a weapon during an offense if the government proves beyond a reasonable doubt that the aider and abettor had actual knowledge that some type of weapon would be used to commit the offense.” Instruction 3.200 (emphasis added). While this instruction correctly requires that the aider and abettor have actual knowledge of a weapon, it should be modified to require only knowledge that the principal is armed (since use of a weapon to commit the offense is not a prerequisite for guilt under § 22-4502). Additional modification of the instruction may be necessary to properly reflect the requirements of constructive possession when the principal is not alleged to have had actual possession. 24 This court‟s decision three years ago in Fox,23 on which the trial court relied, does not stand in the way of that conclusion. Fox stated that “Wilson-Bey did not overrule the principle, well-established in our case-law, that an individual is guilty of aiding and abetting an armed robbery if he aids and abets a robbery and he knows or has reason to know that the principal will be armed.”24 That statement is literally true; indeed, while post-Wilson-Bey cases have expanded the applicability of Wilson-Bey beyond specific-intent crimes,25 the present case is the first one in which we have had to consider Wilson-Bey‟s application to the “while armed” enhancement provided by D.C. Code § 22-4502.26 The Fox court did not have occasion to consider that question; the quoted language is dictum and not a binding holding, because (1) the evidence at trial in Fox demonstrated that the aider and abettor in fact had actual knowledge that the crime would be committed while 23 Fox v. United States, 11 A.3d 1282 (D.C. 2011). 24 Id. at 1289 (citing, inter alia, Guishard v. United States, 669 A.2d 1306, 1314 (D.C. 1995)). 25 See Sutton v. United States, 988 A.2d 478, 490 (D.C. 2010); Wheeler v. United States, 977 A.2d 973, 986 n. 34 (D.C. 2009), as amended by order, 987 A.2d 431 (D.C. 2010). 26 Our holding in this case was anticipated, though, in Wheeler; see id. at 987 n.36. 25 armed;27 (2) the jury was not told an aider and abettor could be guilty of armed robbery if he lacked such knowledge or if he only had reason to know the principal would be armed;28 (3) the instruction given on aiding and abetting was clearly a proper one under Wilson-Bey and subsequent case law;29 and (4) the appellant had not objected to that instruction in the trial court, nor had he requested a different one, so this court‟s review of the instruction‟s adequacy therefore was, as the court said, “only for plain error.”30 To the extent Fox‟s dictum nonetheless implies that an unarmed aider and abettor may be guilty of an armed offense if she merely has reason to know the principal offender is armed, we disavow it along with the pre- 27 Fox, 11 A.3d at 1287. 28 See id. at 1288-89. 29 The instruction did not contain the “natural and probable consequences” language that Wilson-Bey had disapproved, and it properly informed the jury that to convict a defendant as an aider and abettor, it had to find that he “knowingly” associated himself with the commission of a crime, participated in the crime as something that he “wished to bring about,” and “intended by his actions to make it succeed. Id. The same instruction recently had been approved as adequate in another post-Wilson-Bey decision, Appleton v. United States, 983 A.2d 970, 978 (D.C. 2009), and the Fox court found it “hard to imagine” how it could have confused the jury with respect to mens rea. Fox, 11 A.3d at 1289. 30 Id. at 1288. 26 Wilson-Bey precedent on which it relied, as being incompatible with the reasoning of the en banc court in Wilson-Bey.31 We perforce hold that the trial court in the present case erred by instructing the jury, in response to its inquiries, that a defendant could be convicted of seconddegree burglary while armed as an aider and abettor if she had reason to know the principal perpetrator of that crime was armed. 2. Whether the Instructional Error Was Prejudicial The government argues that the instructional error was harmless as to all of Shanika‟s convictions other than the one for the charge to which the jury‟s inquiries and the court‟s responses specifically related, second-degree burglary while armed. This is so, the government contends, because even if Shanika did not know at the time her co-conspirators entered the Pizza Mart that they were armed, the evidence was overwhelming that she herself entered the Pizza Mart and was “present, participating, and aware of the presence of weapons” when the armed 31 See Wheeler, 977 A.2d at 986 n. 34 (citing Thomas v. United States, 731 A.2d 415, 420 n.6 (D.C. 1999)). 27 robbery and murder were committed. Shanika Robinson disagrees. She argues that the instructional error compromised the jury‟s verdict finding her guilty of all the “while armed” offenses—not only second-degree burglary while armed, but also the charges of armed robbery, felony murder while armed with the predicate felony of armed robbery, and second-degree murder while armed. For as the jury was instructed, even if it believed that Shanika did not know Genus or Leon was armed, the “while armed” element of each of the offenses was satisfied if she merely had reason to know it. We think Shanika Robinson has the better of this argument. There is no question that the government presented sufficient evidence to permit the jury under proper instructions to find her guilty as an aider and abettor of each “while armed” crime charged in the indictment. But the erroneous instruction allowed the jury to convict her of aiding and abetting those offenses without finding she had the necessary mens rea to do so. Such an error is of constitutional magnitude, meaning we must vacate the convictions in question unless we are persuaded the 28 error was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.32 If there exists a reasonable possibility that the jury‟s verdict on a given count was affected by the instructional error, Shanika is entitled to relief.33 Judging by the jury‟s verdict and the questions it asked the court during its deliberations, we think it is reasonably possible the jury found Shanika guilty of each “while armed” offense as an aider and abettor without finding she knew her confederates were armed. Shanika, it will be recalled, denied intending to kill Shahabuddin or knowing that her confederates were going to do so, and she denied knowing they were armed. Moreover, she claimed that she did not enter the Pizza Mart while Genus and Leon were inside it committing the murder and robbery. Instead, she testified, she left them after they went inside and waited for them back 32 See Wilson-Bey, 903 A.2d at 843 (citing Chapman v. California, 386 U.S. 18, 24 (1967)). 33 Morten v. United States, 856 A.2d 595, 601 (D.C. 2004) (acknowledging that “the harmless „beyond a reasonable doubt‟ standard and the test of „[no] reasonable possibility‟ of an effect on the conviction” are equivalent) (citing United States v. Bagley, 473 U.S. 667, 679 n.9 (1985)). 29 at the car. Despite Genus‟s testimony to the contrary, there is reason to believe the jury credited Shanika on these points. First, the jury acquitted her of the two charges that required it to find she had an intent to kill: first-degree premeditated murder while armed and felony murder while armed with armed second-degree burglary as the predicate felony.34 Given that the jury simultaneously convicted Shanika of both the burglary and the lesser offense of second-degree murder while armed (of which intent to kill is not an essential element35), the acquittals imply that the jury credited her testimony that 34 Because robbery is one of the felonies enumerated in the felony murder statute, D.C. Code § 22-2101 (2012 Repl.), and second-degree burglary is not, the government is required to prove an intent to kill in order to convict a defendant of felony murder with the underlying felony of second-degree burglary, but is not required to prove that intent for robbery. See Kitt v. United States, 904 A.2d 348, 355 (D.C. 2006). 35 Coleman v. United States, 948 A.2d 534, 550 (D.C. 2008) (intent to kill not an essential element of second-degree murder); Lee v. United States, 699 A.2d 373, 383 (D.C. 1997) (“To prove burglary, the government must establish „that the defendant entered the premises having already formed an intent to commit a crime therein.‟”). The jury was instructed it could find a defendant guilty of seconddegree murder based on a mens rea of “conscious disregard of extreme risk of death or serious bodily injury to the decedent,” or intent to inflict serious injury, as alternatives to the intent to kill. It was instructed that it could find a defendant guilty of second-degree burglary if at the time he or she entered the Pizza Mart, the defendant had the “intent to steal the property of another.” 30 she did not mean for Shahabuddin to be killed when she arrived at the Pizza Mart on the morning of August 18.36 Second, the jury‟s final note to the court before it returned its verdict (asking when during the commission of an armed burglary an aider and abettor needs to know or have reason to know that the principal is armed, and whether knowing or having reason to know after the entry is sufficient) indicates that the jury credited Shanika‟s testimony that she did not know Genus or Leon was armed as of the time the men entered the Pizza Mart. Third, we have no sound basis to conclude the jury must have found that Shanika knew even by the time of the murder and/or the robbery inside the Pizza Mart that Genus and Leon were armed. We cannot infer from the inquiry in its 36 The jury‟s conviction of Shanika on the conspiracy count does not contradict this inference. The jury was instructed that “the object of the conspiracy was to commit four offenses: burglary, robbery, murder, and obstruction of justice,” but that to find a defendant guilty of the offense of conspiracy, it only had to find that an agreement existed to “commit at least one of th[os]e four crimes.” The verdict form does not indicate which of the four crimes the jury relied upon, nor does it specify what overt acts in furtherance of the conspiracy the jury found. Shanika‟s conspiracy conviction therefore does not show the jury found she conspired to kill Shahabuddin. 31 note that the jury found Shanika learned the men were armed after they entered the Pizza Mart, because the jury was careful to ask whether “knowing or having a reason to know” that fact following the entry would suffice. To be sure, if the jury found that Shanika followed Genus and Leon into the store, then we might be confident it also found she knew then that the men were armed. But Shanika denied that she entered the Pizza Mart at any time on the morning of Shahabuddin‟s murder, and nothing in the jury‟s verdict shows that it disbelieved her. In sum, the jury could have found that Shanika drove Genus and Leon to the Pizza Mart only to rob and burglarize it, that she waited for her accomplices in the car after they gained entry, and that she did not enter the Pizza Mart herself at any time during this trip. And the jury could have found that Shanika did not know Genus and Leon were armed until sometime after the robbery and murder were completed, if it all.37 The jury still might have found Shanika guilty of the “while 37 Because Shanika testified that she never saw a weapon, even after Leon and Genus returned to the car, there is no question as to whether, even if the jury believed her narrative of events, she became aware of the armed nature of the crime while asportation of the stolen goods was ongoing, and whether that awareness would satisfy the “while armed” mens rea requirement. 32 armed” offenses if, misled by the court‟s erroneous response to the jury note, it thought reason to know the principal offenders were armed was all the prosecution had to show to establish the mens rea required for aiding and abetting those offenses. Because it is reasonably possible the instructional error caused the jury to misunderstand and misapply the law in finding Shanika Robinson guilty on the “while armed” counts, we cannot find the error harmless with respect to any of them. 3. Appropriate Relief It does not necessarily follow that Shanika Robinson is entitled to a new trial on each “while armed” count. While retrial on those counts is certainly an available option, there may be a more tailored alternative: allowing the trial court to enter judgments of conviction, with the consent of the government, for the lesser-included, “unarmed” offenses. This alternative is open to consideration so long as the instructional error did not affect the jury‟s determination of Shanika‟s guilt on a given count other than with respect to the “while armed” element of the 33 offense. Because the parties did not address the availability of this option in their briefs prior to oral argument, we requested and have received supplemental postargument briefing on the question. The government argues that it would be appropriate to allow the trial court on remand to enter judgment on four unarmed offenses—first-degree felony murder with the predicate of simple robbery, second-degree murder, robbery, and second-degree burglary. Shanika disagrees, however, and urges us to reject that option in this case because the jury was not asked to consider any lesser-included unarmed offenses and because the government, before it responded to our request for supplemental briefing, did not ask this court for any disposition other than outright affirmance of her convictions. In addition to those objections, Shanika argues it would be improper to enter a judgment of conviction against her for either unarmed murder offense, because the instructional error also tainted the jury‟s findings supporting that offense, or because the jury did not even find all the elements of the “lesser included” offense. It is well-established that this court “may direct [or allow] the entry of judgment for a lesser included offense when a conviction for a greater offense is 34 reversed on grounds that affect only the greater offense.”38 Our authority to do this derives from our broad statutory power to “affirm, modify, vacate, set aside or reverse any order or judgment of a court . . . lawfully brought before it for review, and [to] remand the cause and direct the entry of such appropriate order, judgment, or decision, or require such further proceedings to be had, as is just in the circumstances.”39 We are not precluded from exercising this authority to provide 38 Gathy v. United States, 754 A.2d 912, 919 (D.C. 2000) (allowing judgment of conviction for assault with a deadly weapon as a lesser-included offense of aggravated assault while armed where trial court failed to instruct on serious bodily injury but all other elements of assault with a deadly weapon were satisfied by the proof at trial and the jury‟s verdict); see, e.g., Willis v. United States, 692 A.2d 1380, 1383 (D.C.1997) (allowing judgment of assault with a deadly weapon when instructional error only affected greater offense of assault with intent to murder while armed); Zellers v. United States, 682 A.2d 1118, 1122 (D.C.1996) (directing that first-degree theft conviction be reduced to seconddegree theft when evidence of value, needed to prove first-degree theft, was insufficient); Boone v. United States, 296 A.2d 449, 450 (D.C.1972) (reversing grand larceny conviction and directing that conviction of petit larceny be entered); see also Allison v. United States, 409 F.2d 445, 452 (D.C. 1969) (directing judgment of conviction of offense of taking indecent liberties with minor child as lesser-included offense of assault with intent to commit carnal knowledge where material facts of greater offense were not sufficiently corroborated); Austin v. United States, 382 F.2d 129, 142-43 (D.C. 1967) (directing judgment of conviction of second-degree murder where government‟s evidence was insufficient to warrant submission of an issue of premeditation and deliberation required for conviction of greater offense of first-degree murder); Rutledge v. United States, 517 U.S. 292, 305 and 305 n. 15 (1996) (citing Allison and Austin with approval). 39 D.C. Code § 17-306 (2012 Repl.)); see Austin, 382 F.2d at 140-41. 35 for relief that is “just in the circumstances” merely because the litigants did not seek it. The notion of a governmental “waiver” here is out of place, for an appellant is not entitled to more relief from this court than is necessary to cure the error we find; nor can an appellant justifiably claim to be surprised that we would consider the far-from-novel option of directing or permitting entry of judgment on a lesser-included offense unaffected by any error.40 Moreover, we have never held that this option is foreclosed if the jury was not instructed on the lesser-included offense.41 We perceive no reason that should 40 In any event, as we often have stated, “no matter whose ox is gored, this court has frequently requested post-argument briefing of issues not adequately raised by counsel, to the end that, after both parties have been fully heard, the court is in the best position to render a sound decision.” Randolph v. United States, 882 A.2d 210, 226 (D.C. 2005). We did exactly that here. 41 Shanika asserts that Lee v. United States, 959 A.2d 1141 (D.C. 2008) and Bostick v. United States, 605 A.2d 916 (D.C. 1992) preclude the entry of judgment on a lesser-included offense on which the jury was not instructed, but she misreads both decisions. In Lee and Bostick, we reversed second-degree murder convictions because the trial court erroneously refused to instruct the jury on provocation as a mitigating circumstance. In each case, this court considered whether to afford the government the option to accept entry of a verdict on the lesser-included charge of voluntary manslaughter as an alternative to a retrial even though the trial court had not instructed the jury on the lesser charge. We declined to adopt that course, not because there had been no instruction on voluntary manslaughter, but in the 36 make a difference, as long as we are assured that the jury, in convicting the defendant on the greater offense, necessarily and actually did find all the elements of the putative lesser offense42 on a record permitting it to do so, and that entry of judgment on the lesser offense will result in “no undue prejudice” to the accused.43 In declining to request an instruction on a lesser-included offense, the defendant may have preferred to make an all-or-nothing gamble on the trial‟s outcome; but where the defendant has lost that gamble and been found guilty of the greater exercise of our discretion because the government did not request it (nor did the appellant) and a simple remand for a new trial rendered it unnecessary to reach other claims of error. See Lee, 959 A.2d at 1145 & n.6, and Bostick, 605 A.2d at 920 & n.15. 42 See Brown v. Ohio, 432 U.S. 161, 166 (1977) (using the “Blockburger test,” which asks “whether each provision requires proof of an additional fact which the other does not” to determine whether an act constitutes one crime or two, in order to determine that joyriding is a lesser included offense of auto theft) (quoting Blockburger v. United States, 284 U.S. 299, 304, (1932)); Gathy, 754 A.2d at 919 (“A crime can only be a lesser-included offense of another if its required proof contains some, but not all, of the elements of the greater offense.”) (internal quotation marks omitted). 43 Allison, 409 F.2d at 451 (stating that the authority to modify a criminal judgment by reducing the conviction to that of a lesser-included offense may be exercised where the greater offense cannot stand, provided that the evidence “sufficiently sustains all the elements of another offense, . . . , the latter is a lesser included offense of the former, and . . . no undue prejudice will result to the accused”). 37 offense, he is not aggrieved if his conviction is reduced to a true lesser-included crime that is supported by the evidence and untainted by error. Accordingly, with respect to each of Shanika Robinson‟s four convictions for a “while armed” offense, we may proceed to consider whether the government should have the option on remand of accepting the entry of judgment for a lesserincluded unarmed offense. Because the Chapman standard of harmlessness applies, the government bears the burden of persuading us there is no reasonable possibility that the instructional error affected the jury‟s finding of all the elements of the lesser-included offenses, and that appellant would not be unfairly prejudiced by entry of judgment thereon. That is the conclusion we readily reach in considering Shanika‟s convictions for armed robbery and second-degree burglary while armed. In finding Shanika guilty of those greater offenses, there is no question the jury necessarily and actually found, and could find, all the elements of the lesser crimes of (unarmed) 38 robbery and second-degree burglary beyond a reasonable doubt.44 We do not see how the instructional error possibly could have influenced the jury‟s determination of those elements. Shanika Robinson does not claim it did. And there is no unfairness that we can discern in reducing Shanika‟s convictions to those lesserincluded offenses. Shanika unquestionably “had full notice of [her] potential liability for the lesser crime[s]” and “[t]here is no indication that defense presentation would have been altered” if the armed charges had been dismissed at the end of the government‟s case or if the trial court had instructed the jury on the lesser-included offenses.45 We are unable to say the same about the two murder counts on which Shanika was convicted. Indeed, Shanika cogently argues that there is a reasonable possibility she would have been acquitted altogether of the homicide charges had 44 There is no dispute that unarmed robbery is a lesser-included offense of armed robbery and that unarmed burglary in the second degree is a lesser-included offense of armed burglary in the second degree. See Fortune v. United States, 59 A.3d 949, 958 (D.C. 2013) (noting that first-degree burglary is lesser-included offense of first-degree burglary while armed); Foreman v. United States, 988 A.2d 505, 506 (D.C. 2010) (noting that jury was instructed on unarmed robbery as a lesser-included offense of armed robbery). 45 Allison, 409 F.2d at 451. 39 the court properly instructed the jury on the mens rea for aiding and abetting a “while armed” offense. The government‟s arguments to the contrary—which rest primarily on its contention that no rational jury could have failed to find Shanika knew Leon and Genus were armed—are not responsive to the evidence adduced at trial or to the jury‟s questions during deliberations, and are therefore not sufficient to meet the government‟s “high burden” of demonstrating harmlessness.46 Let us begin by addressing Shanika‟s conviction for felony murder with the predicate of armed robbery. Regarding this charge, the court instructed the jury that an aider and abettor is guilty of felony murder “for a killing that was committed in furtherance of a common purpose to commit the felony or a killing that was in the ordinary course of things a natural and probable consequence of the acts done in committing that felony.” (Emphasis added.) Consistent with that instruction, Shanika argues, the jury might have found her guilty of felony murder as an aider and abettor based on its determination that the killing of Shahabuddin was “in the ordinary course of things a natural and probable consequence” of an armed robbery. “A „natural and probable‟ consequence in the „ordinary course of 46 Longus v. United States, 52 A.3d 836, 854 (D.C. 2012). 40 things‟ presupposes an outcome within a reasonably predictable range.”47 Shanika argues, and we must agree, that a homicide is a significantly more predictable outcome of an armed robbery than of an unarmed robbery. 48 It therefore seems reasonably possible that a properly instructed jury would not have found the killing to be the reasonably predictable outcome of the offense, unarmed robbery, that Shanika intended to facilitate, and hence would have acquitted her of felony murder. This means that an implied conviction for unarmed felony murder cannot be divorced from the instructional error. Moreover, the corollary fact that we cannot say the jury in this case necessarily and actually found the killing to be the natural and probable consequence of an unarmed robbery would seem to suggest that aiding and abetting felony murder with robbery as the underlying felony is not a true lesser-included offense of aiding and abetting felony murder with armed 47 Roy v. United States, 652 A.2d 1098, 1105 (D.C. 1995). 48 United States v. Jones, 517 F.2d 176, 181 (D.C. Cir. 1975) (“If there is a more natural and probable consequence of armed robbery than that the arms will be used and someone injured, we do not know what it is.”) (cited with approval by Allen v. United States, 383 A.2d 363, 368 (D.C. 1978)). 41 robbery as the underlying felony. Each of these reasons precludes the option of modifying the judgment by reducing Shanika‟s felony murder conviction.49 Shanika‟s conviction for second-degree murder likewise could have been affected by the erroneous instruction that a defendant is liable for her accomplices‟ use of a weapon if she merely had reason to know they were armed. For as she points out, the jury was permitted to infer from the use of a weapon that a defendant had the heightened mens rea required for second-degree murder.50 Conceivably, therefore, the erroneous instruction could have led the jury to find 49 While the instruction allowed the jury to convict Shanika of felony murder if it found the killing to have been committed “in furtherance of a common purpose to commit the felony,” rather than as a natural and probable consequence of the robbery, we cannot assume that the jury necessarily made such an “in furtherance” finding. As Shanika argues, the jury could have concluded from the testimony that Leon perpetrated the murder not in furtherance of the robbery but rather, to quote the prosecutor‟s summation, “[s]o he could exact revenge for disrespect to his sister.” 50 “Second-degree murder is a killing done with either specific intent to kill or inflict serious bodily harm, or a conscious disregard of the risk of death or serious bodily injury.” Coleman v. United States, 948 A.2d 534, 550 (D.C. 2008) (citing Comber v. United States, 584 A.2d 26, 38-39 (D.C. 1990)). The trial court instructed the jury that it could infer the existence of such a mens rea if “the use of a weapon under all the circumstances would naturally and probably have resulted in death.” 42 that Shanika satisfied the heightened mens rea requirement of second-degree murder based on proof that she had a less culpable mental state—not actual knowledge of her accomplices‟ possession of a weapon, but only reason to know they were armed (a mental state akin to negligence51). If that is what occurred, the erroneous instruction impermissibly lowered the government‟s burden of proving an essential element (the mens rea) of unarmed second-degree murder.52 That possibility renders it inappropriate to enter judgment against Shanika on that lesser-included offense. Accordingly, we reverse Shanika Robinson‟s convictions for each of the four “while armed” offenses and remand for a new trial on those counts of the indictment. However, in lieu of retrial on the armed robbery and armed seconddegree burglary counts, the trial court may, with the consent of the government, 51 See note 21, supra. 52 See Coleman, 948 A.2d at 553 (“Although conviction for second-degree murder does not necessarily require proof of an „intent to kill,‟ and may be based on proof of a „conscious disregard of an extreme risk of death or serious bodily injury,‟ a conviction for second-degree murder cannot stand on the basis that the defendant was merely negligent.”) (internal citation omitted). 43 enter judgments of conviction against Shanika on the lesser-included offenses of unarmed robbery and unarmed second-degree burglary.