Court Opinion

ID: 9730949
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 15:29:13.370039+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:07:59.609565
License: Public Domain

NEUMAN, Justice
(dissenting).
This is, indeed, a tragic case. According to the majority the case is about a broken lamp and the “freak accident” that followed. It is not. This ease is about reckless conduct that the district court aptly described as “the final act in an episode of domestic violence.” Because the majority substitutes its judgment for the district court’s, and thereby refuses to hold Torres responsible for his recklessness, I respectfully dissent.
My disagreement with the majority begins with its recitation of the facts. Crucial details supporting the district court’s verdict are not adequately considered. For example, the majority describes “the act” this way:
Brenda slapped Jimmy. He responded in kind. During the altercation he beat her about the face and head and tore her shirt and bra from her body, leaving her in her underpants. He then turned to *683the nightstand between the waterbed and the doorway and, with a sweeping motion, cleared everything off the top of it.
The district court, whose fact-finding we are bound to accept in this law action, described a more violent scene:
[I]tems were later found strewn about the northeast corner of the room, including a shoe, flashlight, ash trays, writing instruments, metal pan, fingernail clippers, hairbrush, Mason jar, items of clothing, tweezers, make-up, bracelet and a waste basket. A brassiere hook found clinging to Brenda Torres’ upper back, the fact that the brassiere had hooks missing and the manner in which her bowling shirt was torn all establish that the blouse and brassiere had been forcibly ripped off her during the course of a violent struggle with the defendant.
Contrary to the testimony of the defendant at trial to the effect that he only slapped his wife once and previous statements to the effect that he only slapped her twice, the autopsy conducted by Dr. Stephens established that the defendant struck his wife a number of times about the face and head_ His autopsy indicated that Brenda Torres had recently been struck on the right side of her mouth, most likely with the defendant’s fist. Brenda Torres had recently been struck with a blunt force on the right cheek. She had recently been struck on the left cheek with a patterned object, possibly a watchband. She suffered a recent bruise on the right chin, and a recent blow to the left chin. She suffered contusions about the lower neck area. In addition, Brenda Torres had been struck several times about the scalp area with a blunt, rectangular object....
The defendant grabbed the telephone as well as a lamp made from a glass jug that were located on the table to the east of the bed and threw them down on the floor, breaking the lamp. He said he was leaving and walked out the bedroom door, kicking the broken lamp on his way out.
I highlight this contrast because the weight given the surrounding facts and circumstances is crucial in determining the “culpability of a person’s unintentional death-causing conduct.” State v. Kernes, 262 N.W.2d 602, 605 (Iowa 1978). The culpable conduct must be reckless, that is, evidencing a willful or wanton disregard for the safety of persons or property. State v. Conner, 292 N.W.2d 682, 684 (Iowa 1980); Kernes, 262 N.W.2d at 605; see Iowa Code § 702.12 (defining “reckless”). But according to our Kernes decision, an activity’s “inherent risk to others” is only one — and not necessarily the decisive — factor. The defendant’s conduct must also be assessed in light of “the activity he or she engaged in at the relevant time.” Kernes, 262 N.W.2d at 605. This broadening of the zone of danger is in keeping with the statutory proscription against “the commission of an act in a manner likely to cause death or serious injury.” Iowa Code § 707.5(2) (emphasis added).
Because the majority focuses so narrowly on the single act of breaking a lamp, it is not surprising that it finds “the act” insufficient to establish the requisite recklessness under the statute. I believe its analysis is faulty in two respects. First, as already noted, it wholly ignores the manner in which the act was performed, that is, the context in which a reasonable fact finder could conclude that Torres’ act was reckless. Second, it defines recklessness by a new, higher standard — “fraught with a high degree of danger” — that is beyond the scope of the criminal code and our prior cases.
In keeping with a declared policy of uniformity, our criminal code requires that the way in which a word is defined in chapter 702 shall be the meaning given “wherever it appears in the Code.” Iowa Code § 702.1. The Code states that “[a] person is ‘reckless’ or acts recklessly when the person willfully or wantonly disregards the safety of persons or property.” Iowa Code § 702.16. In State v. Caldwell, 385 N.W.2d 553, 556 (Iowa 1986), we found no merit in a defendant’s allegation that the term recklessness should “expressly require conduct creating a high and unreasonable risk of death.” Without saying so *684the majority has substantially departed from Caldwell here, much to the detriment of future involuntary manslaughter prosecutions.
The district court, properly applying the statutory definition of recklessness as the standard by which to judge the culpability of Torres’ act, found the State proved each of the essential elements of the crime. Torres’ act of breaking the lamp was conscious and intentional. He knew or should have known that the large shards of glass left in the doorway of the small room posed a risk of serious injury to anyone attempting to negotiate the threshold. He knew that Brenda’s ability to do so was impaired by her intoxication and the beating he had just inflicted. His blows to her head would have likely left her dazed. It was foreseeable that she would inevitably encounter the dangerous condition he had created. The risk of injury was heightened by Brenda’s partial state of undress. Taken together, the court found these factors established a sufficient causal relationship between Torres’ reckless disregard for the consequences of his act and the probable harm that would result.
The majority concludes, as a matter of law, that the consequence of Torres’ act was not foreseeable. But by usurping a decision traditionally left to the fact finder, and by defining the death-causing act so narrowly, the majority has excused conduct that meets the sine qua non test for criminal culpability: but for Torres’ conduct, the fatal injury to his wife would not have occurred. State v. Marti, 290 N.W.2d 570, 585 (Iowa 1980). Moreover, I know of no policy in the law that would prevent the otherwise harmless act of breaking a lamp from meeting the test of legal causation given the violent context in which the damage was here carried out. Id.
I would affirm Torres’ conviction for involuntary manslaughter.
HARRIS, SNELL and ANDREASEN, JJ., join this dissent.