Court Opinion

ID: 9782441
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-30 18:33:07.678409+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:34:59.868755
License: Public Domain

SERNA, Justice (specially concurring). {36} I concur in the majority’s conclusion that the failure to instruct on the definition of possession did not constitute fundamental error. In New Mexico, “[a] distinction is made ... between the status of jury instructions on essential elements and definitional jury instructions.” Doe, 100 N.M. at 483, 672 P.2d at 656. “[T]he failure to instruct the jury on the definition or the amplification of the elements does not constitute error.” Stephens, 93 N.M. at 462, 601 P.2d at 432; accord State v. Allen, 2000-NMSC-002, ¶ 76, 128 N.M. 482, 994 P.2d 728; State v. Gonzales, 112 N.M. 544, 817 P.2d 1186 (1991); State v. Crain, 1997-NMCA-101, ¶¶ 10-12, 124 N.M. 84, 946 P.2d 1095; State v. Lucero, 118 N.M. 696, 700-01, 884 P.2d 1175, 1179-80 (Ct.App.1994); State v. Ramos, 115 N.M. 718, 726, 858 P.2d 94, 102 (Ct.App.1993); State v. Tarango, 105 N.M. 592, 734 P.2d 1275 (Ct.App.1987); State v. Jennings, 102 N.M. 89, 93, 691 P.2d 882, 886 (Ct.App.1984). {37} I do not read Mascarenas as being inconsistent with this principle. We held in Mascarenas that the omitted instruction was akin to a missing elements instruction because the jury was not informed of the essential statutory element of criminal negligence. 2000-NMSC-017, ¶ 20, 129 N.M. 230, 4 P.3d 1221. This missing element created fundamental error both because “it is the duty of the court, not the defendant, to instruct the jury on the essential elements of a crime,” Osborne, 111 N.M. at 662, 808 P.2d at 632, and because, “if the instruction omitted an element which was at issue in the case, the error could be considered fundamental: The question of guilt would be so doubtful that it would ‘shock the conscience’ of this Court to permit the conviction to stand.” Orosco, 113 N.M. at 783, 833 P.2d at 1149. {38} ”In determining what is or is not an essential element of an offense, we begin with the language of the statute itself, seeking of course to give effect to the intent of the legislature.” Osborne, 111 N.M. at 657-58, 808 P.2d at 627-28 (citation omitted). “[I]f the jury instructions substantially follow the language of the statute or use equivalent language, then they are sufficient.” Doe, 100 N.M. at 483, 672 P.2d at 656. In this case, the jury instruction contained all of the statutory elements of the crime. There is no indication that the Legislature intended for the definition of possession to be an element of the crime, notwithstanding Use Note 4 of UJI 14-3104. The language in a Use Note, like a definitional jury instruction, cannot elevate a jury instruction to the status of an essential element. This is not to imply that Use Notes may be ignored. Nevertheless, ... a defendant cannot sit back and insert error into a trial by his or her inaction and receive an automatic reversal when the crime has been fairly instructed on. Doe, 100 N.M. at 483-84, 672 P.2d at 656-57 (citation omitted). {39} While I agree with the majority that constructive possession has complex legal contours, this concept is certainly no more complex than the issue of proximate cause, for which we have held that the failure to define, in amplification of the essential elements of felony murder, does not constitute fundamental error. Stephens, 93 N.M. at 462, 601 P.2d at 432. Moreover, the lay definition of “possession” includes the basic concept of exercising control over the item. Thus, the jury’s application of the common meaning of the term would not have resulted in a failure to find a statutory element of the crime. See State v. Aragon, 99 N.M. 190, 193, 656 P.2d 240, 243 (Ct.App.1982) (rejecting the defendant’s argument that the failure to instruct on the definition of “possession,” as currently set out in UJI 14-130 NMRA 2004, which explained constructive possession, constituted error in the absence of a request for the instruction). {40} For the more onerous standard of fundamental error, which requires a miscarriage of justice, as with the less stringent standard of plain error, which does not require a miscarriage of justice, this Court will not reverse a conviction unless an alleged error “constituted an injustice that creates grave doubts concerning the validity of the verdict.” State v. Lucero, 116 N.M. 450, 453, 863 P.2d 1071, 1074 (1993). Because the trial court adequately instructed the jury on the essential elements of the crime, there is no fundamental unfairness that would make the question of guilt so doubtful as to shock the conscience to permit the conviction to stand. See Rodriguez, 81 N.M. at 505, 469 P.2d at 150 (“The doctrine of fundamental error is to be resorted to in criminal cases only for the protection of those whose innocence appears indisputably, or open to such question that it would shock the conscience to permit the conviction to stand.”), quoted in Cunningham, 2000-NMSC-009, ¶ 13, 128 N.M. 711, 998 P.2d 176. As a result, there is no fundamental error.