Court Opinion

ID: 9884700
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-10-06 03:08:49.169719+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:48:40.140799
License: Public Domain

RANDALL, Judge
(concurring in part, dissenting in part).
I concur with the majority on all issues except the upward durational sentence given to appellant. On the departure issue, I dissent and would remand to the trial court to impose the presumptive sentence of 15 years.
Appellant contends the trial court abused its discretion in imposing a 50% upward du-rational sentencing departure. Appellant argues that the particular vulnerability of Estelle Flaherty was a necessary condition for the occurrence of her death, and therefore of the felony murder. I agree.
The court may not use as aggravating factors the elements of the offense. State v. Brusven, 327 N.W.2d 591, 593 (Minn.1982). Estelle Flaherty’s vulnerability to the elements, although not technically required to prove either the predicate offense, kidnapping, or the felony murder, was truly the causal factor without which felony murder could not have occurred. Had she not been susceptible to the elements because of her age, no death would have occurred. Appellant would have been facing charges of only motor vehicle theft and kidnapping. Her death escalated the underlying offenses into felony murder. The upward departure improperly penalizes appellant twice. He has already been penalized by the victim’s vulnerability because he is being sentenced for murder, not kidnapping.
A trial court has discretion to depart upward only if substantial and compelling aggravating circumstances are present. State v. Best, 449 N.W.2d 426, 427 (Minn.1989). Although the result was a tragic and needless death, the kidnapping not only was not extraordinarily egregious, but was, in fact, something less than a typical kidnapping. See id. Appellant and his accomplice started out to steal a car. The kidnapping was not part of any preconceived plan. It was accidental. The record supports appellant’s contention that, although attempted in a clumsy and hurried fashion, he tried to leave Estelle Flaherty in a place where she would be discovered. These facts are the opposite of those set forth in such representative cases as State v. Deschampe, 332 N.W.2d 18, 20 (Minn.1983) (departure for criminal sexual *379conduct supported in part by conduct of making victim walk blindfolded late at night through a wooded area in fear for her life); State v. Coley, 468 N.W.2d 552, 556 (Minn.App.1991) (departure for kidnapping supported in part by particular cruelty of recapturing and retying victim after escape attempt); and State v. Strommen, 411 N.W.2d 540, 544 (Minn.App.1987) (departure for kidnapping and criminal sexual conduct supported where victim trapped in a vehicle with three strangers and dumped in a remote cornfield at 4:30 a.m.), pet. for rev. denied (Minn. Oct. 28, 1987).
The record supports only one conclusion, and that is that the victim’s age and vulnerability were a direct causal factor in her death, and that death elevated appellant’s crime from kidnapping to felony murder. Thus, the victim’s vulnerability is already being legitimately used by the law to enhance the severity of appellant’s punishment. It is improper to use it twice.