Opinion ID: 757051
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 8

Heading: Constitutionality of Aggravating Factors

Text: 149 Hall contends that several of the statutory and nonstatutory aggravating factors that the district court submitted to the jury to evaluate in determining whether to recommend a death sentence were unconstitutionally vague, overbroad, or duplicative. Specifically, Hall challenges the following factors: 150 (1) the statutory aggravating factor that the defendant committed the offense in an especially heinous, cruel or depraved manner in that it involved torture or serious physical abuse of the victim, set forth in 18 U.S.C. § 3592(c)(6); 151 (2) the statutory aggravating factor that the death occurred during the commission of another offense, set forth in § 3592(c)(1); and 152 (3) the nonstatutory aggravating factor of the effect of the instant offense on the family of Lisa Rene. 153 We consider each of these arguments in turn. 154
Depraved Manner 155 During the penalty phase, one of the aggravating factors about which the district court instructed the jury was that Hall committed the offense in an especially heinous, cruel, or depraved manner in that it involved torture or serious physical abuse of the victim, Lisa Rene. This statutory factor was accompanied by the following instruction: 156 To establish that the defendant killed the victim in an especially heinous, cruel, or depraved manner, the government must prove that the killing involved either torture or serious physical abuse to the victim. The terms heinous, cruel, or depraved are stated in the disjunctive: any one of them individually may constitute an aggravating circumstance warranting imposition of the death penalty. Heinous means extremely wicked or shockingly evil, where the killing was accompanied by such additional acts of torture or serious physical abuse of the victim as set apart from other killings. Cruel means that the defendant intended to inflict pain upon the victim in addition to killing the victim. Depraved means that the defendant relished the killing or showed indifference to the suffering of the victim, as evidenced by torture or serious physical abuse of the victim. 157 Torture includes mental as well as physical abuse of the victim. In either case, the victim must have been conscious of the abuse at the time it was inflicted. Furthermore, the defendant must have specifically intended to inflict severe mental or physical pain or suffering upon the victim, apart from killing the victim. Serious physical abuse means a significant or considerable amount of injury or damage to the victim's body which involves a substantial risk of death, unconsciousness, extreme physical pain, protracted and obvious disfigurement, or protracted loss or impairment of the function of a bodily member, organ, or mental faculty. Serious physical abuse--unlike torture--may be inflicted either before or after death and does not require that the victim be conscious of the abuse at the time it was inflicted. However, the defendant must have specifically intended the abuse apart from the killing. 158 Pertinent factors in determining whether a killing was especially heinous, cruel, or depraved include, but are not necessarily limited to, the following: infliction of gratuitous violence upon the victim above and beyond that necessary to commit the killing; needless mutilation of the victim's body; senselessness of the killing; and helplessness of the victim. The word especially should be given its ordinary, everyday meaning of being highly or unusually great, distinctive, peculiar, particular, or significant. 159 Hall contends that the especially heinous, cruel, or depraved aggravating factor is unconstitutionally vague, overbroad, and improperly allowed the jury to consider the conduct of his coconspirators in determining whether to impose the death penalty. We disagree. 160 First, Hall's vagueness challenge is foreclosed by United States v. Jones, 132 F.3d 232 (5th Cir.1998). In that case, this court held that a § 3592(c)(6) aggravating factor and accompanying instruction virtually identical to that at issue here was not unconstitutionally vague. See id. at 249-50. We are therefore compelled by principles of intra-circuit stare decisis to conclude that the instruction in this case is not unconstitutionally vague. See United States v. Garcia Abrego, 141 F.3d 142, 151 n. 1 (5th Cir.1998) (It has long been a rule of this court that no panel of this circuit can overrule a decision previously made by another. (internal quotation marks omitted)). 161 Hall next claims that the instructions accompanying this aggravating factor rendered it unconstitutionally overbroad. Specifically, Hall complains that the district court's definition of serious physical abuse would allow the jury to conclude that the killing was committed in an especially heinous, cruel, or depraved manner based solely upon the fact that Hall killed Lisa Rene. Hall bases this argument upon the fact that the district court defined serious physical abuse to include a significant or considerable amount of injury or damage to the victim's body, which involves a substantial risk of death, a definition that includes any killing. 162 Hall's argument ignores the remainder of the instruction, which makes clear that serious physical injury contemplates something more than an amount of injury necessary to cause death. Specifically, the instruction provides that, in order for a killing to be especially heinous, cruel, or depraved on the basis of an infliction of physical abuse, the defendant must have specifically intended the abuse apart from the killing. Further, the instruction lists a number of factors for the jury to consider in determining whether the offense was especially heinous, cruel, or depraved, including infliction of gratuitous violence upon the victim above and beyond that necessary to commit the killing  and needless mutilation of the victim's body. 163 Hall also argues that the definition of serious physical abuse was suspect because it allowed the jury to consider conduct that occurred after Lisa Rene lost consciousness. However, we see no reason why the jury should have been precluded from considering such conduct because it constituted evidence that the killing was committed in a depraved manner in that it provides an indication that Hall relished the killing. Cf. Jones v. Murray, 947 F.2d 1106, 1118 (4th Cir.1991) (holding that the Virginia Supreme Court had adopted a constitutionally limited construction of vileness as an aggravating factor where the state court had held that vileness was evinced by an aggravated battery such as mutilation, gross disfigurement, or sexual assault committed upon a corpse or an unconscious body). We therefore conclude that Hall has failed to establish that the district court's instructions regarding the especially heinous, cruel, or depraved aggravating factor rendered that factor unconstitutionally overbroad. 164 Finally, Hall claims that the district court's instructions invited the jury to consider the conduct of Hall's coconspirators throughout the course of the kidnapping in concluding that the killing was especially heinous, cruel, or depraved. However, the wording of the aggravating factor itself focuses upon the actions of Hall; it provides that the jury must conclude that the defendant committed the offense in an especially heinous, cruel, or depraved manner. The instructions accompanying the aggravating factor removed any doubt that the jury was required to focus on Hall's actions in determining whether this aggravating factor existed. Specifically, the instructions provide that, in order for the killing to have involved torture, the defendant must have specifically intended to inflict severe mental or physical pain or suffering upon the victim, apart from killing the victim. Similarly, the instructions provide that, in order for the killing to have involved serious physical abuse, the defendant must have specifically intended the abuse apart from the killing. 165 Hall finally argues that the especially heinous, cruel, or depraved aggravating factor was unconstitutionally duplicative of the factor that the death occurred during the course of a kidnapping. As the government points out, however, the fact that the murder occurred during the course of a kidnapping does not of itself indicate that the murder was especially heinous, cruel, or depraved. Likewise, a murder not committed in the course of a kidnapping may be especially heinous, cruel, or depraved. Moreover, the fact that Hall raped Lisa Rene prior to killing her was unnecessary to the jury's conclusion that the death occurred during the course of the kidnapping, but was clearly germane to the determination that Hall committed the offense in an especially heinous, cruel, or depraved manner. Hall has therefore failed to demonstrate any constitutional infirmity in the especially heinous, cruel, or depraved statutory aggravating factor. 166
167 Hall claims that the statutory aggravating factor that the death occurred during the commission of another offense, set forth in § 3592(c)(1), did not narrow the jury's discretion. We disagree. 168 In Lowenfield v. Phelps, 484 U.S. 231, 108 S.Ct. 546, 98 L.Ed.2d 568 (1988), the petitioner was found guilty of capital murder on the basis of a Louisiana statute that defined capital murder to include scenarios in which  'the offender has a specific intent to kill or inflict great bodily harm upon more than one person.'  Id. at 242-43, 108 S.Ct. 546 (quoting LA.REV.STAT. ANN. § 14:30A(3) (West 1986)). The Louisiana Code of Criminal Procedure provided that  '[a] sentence of death shall not be imposed unless the jury finds beyond a reasonable doubt that at least one statutory aggravating circumstance exists and, after consideration of any mitigating circumstances, recommends that the sentence of death be imposed.'  Id. at 242, 108 S.Ct. 546 (quoting LA.CODE CRIM. PROC. ANN. art. 905.3 (West 1984)). The sole statutory aggravating factor found by the jury and upheld by the Louisiana Supreme Court on direct review was that  'the offender knowingly created a risk of death or great bodily harm to more than one person.'  Id. at 243 (quoting LA.CODE CRIM. PROC. ANN. art. 905.4(d) (West 1984)). The petitioner claimed that his death sentence was unconstitutional because the aggravating factor justifying its imposition did not narrow the class of persons eligible for the death penalty in that the statutory aggravating factor required proof of nothing more than that the defendant had committed capital murder. The supreme court rejected this argument: 169 The use of aggravating circumstances is not an end in itself, but a means of genuinely narrowing the class of death-eligible persons and thereby channeling the jury's discretion. We see no reason why this narrowing function may not be performed by jury findings at either the sentencing phase of the trial or the guilt phase. 170 ... 171 Here, the narrowing function was performed by the jury at the guilt phase when it found defendant guilty of three counts of murder under the provision that the offender has a specific intent to kill or to inflict great bodily harm upon more than one person. The fact that the sentencing jury is also required to find the existence of an aggravating circumstance in addition is no part of the constitutionally required narrowing process, and so the fact that the aggravating circumstance duplicated one of the elements of the crime does not make this sentence constitutionally infirm. There is no question but that the Louisiana scheme narrows the class of death-eligible murderers and then at the sentencing phase allows for the consideration of mitigating circumstances and the exercise of discretion. The Constitution requires no more. 172 Id. at 244-46. 173 Hall attempts to distinguish Lowenfield on the ground that Louisiana defined capital murder narrowly enough that the defendant was rendered death-eligible based solely upon his conviction. He notes that, in finding the petitioner guilty of capital murder, the jury in that case found that the petitioner killed more than one person with the specific intent to do so, and this circumstance alone was sufficient to render him eligible for the death penalty. Hall notes that conviction of the capital offense established by 18 U.S.C. § 1201 requires nothing more than proof beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant committed a kidnapping in which the death of any person result[ed], regardless of the mental state of the defendant with respect to the death. He thus notes that conviction under § 1201 does not of itself render a defendant eligible for the death penalty. See Enmund v. Florida, 458 U.S. 782, 797, 102 S.Ct. 3368, 73 L.Ed.2d 1140 (1982) (holding that the Eighth Amendment does not permit imposition of the death penalty on a defendant who aids and abets a felony in the course of which murder is committed by others but who does not himself kill, attempt to kill, or intend that killing take place or that lethal force will be employed). 174 While we agree with Hall that his conviction for violation of § 1201 did not, of itself, render him death-eligible, this fact does not render the aggravating factor that the death occurred during the course of a kidnapping constitutionally infirm. During the penalty phase, before it could consider this aggravating factor or any other, the jury was required to find beyond a reasonable doubt that Hall 175 (A) intentionally killed [Lisa Rene]; 176 (B) intentionally inflicted serious bodily injury that resulted in the death of [Lisa Rene]; 177 (C) intentionally participated in an act, contemplating that the life of a person would be taken or intending that lethal force would be used in connection with a person, other than one of the participants in the offense, and [Lisa Rene] died as a direct result of the act; or 178 (D) intentionally and specifically engaged in an act of violence, knowing that the act created a grave risk of death to a person, other than one of the participants in the offense, such that participation in the act constituted a reckless disregard for human life and [Lisa Rene] died as a direct result of the act. 179 18 U.S.C. § 3591(a)(2). Hall does not contend (nor can he) that he was not constitutionally eligible for the death penalty upon proof beyond a reasonable doubt that he committed a kidnapping during which death resulted and that, as to the death, Hall acted with one of the mental states listed above. See Tison v. Arizona, 481 U.S. 137, 158, 107 S.Ct. 1676, 95 L.Ed.2d 127 (1987) (holding that major participation in [a] felony committed, combined with reckless indifference to human life, is sufficient to satisfy the [Eighth Amendment's] culpability requirement regarding offenses that may be punishable by death). The fact that the jury was not required to find that Hall acted with a sufficiently culpable mental state to render him eligible for the death penalty until the penalty phase provides no material basis for distinguishing the aggravating factor at issue here from the one at issue in Lowenfield. There is no question but that the [FDPA] narrows the class of death-eligible murderers and then at the sentencing phase allows for the consideration of mitigating circumstances and the exercise of discretion. The Constitution requires no more. Lowenfield, 484 U.S. at 246, 108 S.Ct. 546; see also Jones, 132 F.3d at 249 (holding that an aggravating factor based upon 18 U.S.C. § 3592(c)(1) was not unconstitutional). 16 3. Effect on Lisa Rene's Family 180 Hall next argues that the nonstatutory aggravating factor of the effect of the instant offense on Lisa Rene's family was unconstitutionally overbroad and vague and that it was unauthorized by the FDPA. We need not reach this issue because we conclude that any error in submitting this aggravating factor to the jury was harmless. 181 The FDPA provides that, in reviewing a death sentence imposed pursuant to the act, [t]he court of appeals shall not reverse or vacate a sentence of death on account of any error which can be harmless, including any erroneous special finding of an aggravating factor, where the Government establishes beyond a reasonable doubt that the error was harmless. 18 U.S.C. § 3595(c)(2). Under a death penalty framework pursuant to which the sentencer weighs aggravating factors against mitigating factors in determining whether death constitutes the appropriate sentence, the consideration of a constitutionally infirm aggravating factor constitutes harmless error if, beyond a reasonable doubt, the sentence would have been the same had the sentencer never considered the invalid aggravating factor. See Clemons v. Mississippi, 494 U.S. 738, 753, 110 S.Ct. 1441, 108 L.Ed.2d 725 (1990) (noting that whether beyond a reasonable doubt ... the jury's verdict would have been the same with or without the [constitutionally infirm] aggravating circumstance constituted an appropriate harmless error inquiry when evaluating the submission of an improper aggravating factor under a weighing framework); Wiley v. Puckett, 969 F.2d 86, 91 (5th Cir.1992) (indicating that, in conducting a harmless-error analysis of the submission of an improper aggravating factor under a weighing framework, a court [may] ask whether beyond a reasonable doubt the sentence would have been the same had the vague aggravating circumstance not been injected into the mix, or the court [may] ask whether beyond a reasonable doubt the sentence would have been the same had the circumstance been properly defined in the jury instructions). 182 Assuming that the nonstatutory aggravating factor of the effect of the instant offense on Lisa Rene's family was unconstitutionally overbroad or vague or that it was unauthorized by the FDPA, we conclude that the district court's error in submitting it to the jury was harmless. In addition to its determination that the effect of the offense on Lisa Rene's family constituted an aggravating factor, the jury also unanimously found the following aggravating factors: (1) that Hall intentionally killed Lisa Rene during the course of a kidnapping; (2) that he killed Lisa Rene in an especially heinous, cruel, or depraved manner; and (3) that Hall constitutes a future danger to the lives and safety of other persons. During the trial, the jury heard extensive evidence indicating that, during the course of the kidnapping, Hall and his coconspirators raped Lisa Rene, kept her tied up in a motel room for two days, forced her on two occasions to walk barefooted and masked through the woods to the site of her murder, brutally beat her into unconsciousness with a shovel, and buried her in a grave where she suffocated. Weighing against these facts and the aggravating factors that they prompted the jury to find unanimously were four mitigating factors: (1) [a]nother defendant or defendants, equally culpable in the crime, will not be punished by death; (2) [t]he age of the defendant at the time of the offense; (3) [t]he circumstances surrounding the defendant's upbringing; and (4) [a]ny other aspect of the defendant's character or background which calls for a sentence less than death. Of these mitigating factors, only the first was found by more than one juror. Given the atrociousness of this crime and the relative paucity of mitigating factors, we have little difficulty concluding beyond a reasonable doubt that the jury would have returned a recommendation that Hall receive a death sentence regardless of whether it had considered the aggravating factor of the effect of the offense on Lisa Rene's family. 183 This conclusion is bolstered by this court's recent decision in Jones, 132 F.3d at 232. In that case, the court concluded that two of the four aggravating factors found by the jury--[the victim's] personal characteristics and the effect of the instant offense on [her] family and [the victim's] young age, her slight stature, her background, and her unfamiliarity with [the area where the murder took place]--were unconstitutionally vague, overbroad, and duplicative. Id. at 250-51. This left two valid aggravating factors substantially similar to two of the factors that the jury found unanimously in this case and that we have previously held pass constitutional muster: [t]he defendant ... caused the death of [the victim], or injury resulting in the death of [the victim], which occurred during the commission of the offense of Kidnapping and [t]he defendant ... committed the offense in an especially heinous, cruel, and depraved manner in that it involved torture or serious physical abuse to [the victim]. Id. at 248-50. Weighing against these aggravating factors were ten mitigating factors, many of which were found by more than one juror. 17 The court concluded beyond a reasonable doubt that the jury would have returned a recommendation of death even if it had not considered the two invalid aggravating factors. See id. at 252. Our harmless-error analysis in this case leads us to the same conclusion.