Court Opinion

ID: 9537534
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 07:19:41.124032+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:56:46.046888
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE ERICKSON
dissenting:
I respectfully dissent.
In re Winship, 397 U.S. 358, 90 S.Ct. 1068, 25 L.Ed.2d 368 (1969), stands for the proposition that the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution “protects the accused against conviction except upon proof beyond a reasonable doubt of every *48fact necessary to constitute the crime with which he is charged.” A conviction of murder in the second-degree must be supported by a showing that the defendant’s acts were committed “knowingly,” by proof beyond reasonable doubt. By depriving a defendant of the right to introduce relevant and exculpatory evidence pertaining to his mental state (i.e., that he was intoxicated and did not act knowingly), the majority deprives the defendant of his right “to require proof beyond a reasonable doubt of every element of the crime charged.” People v. Cornelison, 192 Colo. 337, 559 P.2d 1102 (1977).
Second-degree murder is defined by the provisions of section 18-3-103, C.R.S. 1973 (1978 Repl. Vol. 8):
“Murder in the second degree. (1) A person commits the crime of murder in the second degree if:
“(a) He causes the death of a person knowingly, but not after deliberation.
“(2) Diminished responsibility due to lack of mental capacity or self-induced intoxication is not a defense to murder in the second degree.”
It is clear that the impaired mental condition statute cannot be interposed as a defense against a charge of second-degree murder. The defense authorized by that statute is by its terms only available when a defendant is charged with a specific intent crime. Second-degree murder is a general intent crime. Section 18-1-501(6), C.R.S. 1973 (1978 Repl. Vol. 8). People v. Mingo, 196 Colo. 315, 584 P.2d 632 (1978).
The predecessor to the present second-degree murder statute was before us in People v. Cornelison, 192 Colo. 337, 559 P.2d 1102 (1977). The statute then provided that:
“(1) A person commits the crime of murder in the second degree if:
“(a) He causes the death of a person intentionally, but without premeditation ....
“(2) Diminished responsibility due to lack of mental capacity is not a defense to murder in the second degree.” Section 18-3-103, C.R.S. 1973.
The defendant in People v. Cornelison, supra, attempted to offer evidence to prove that his self-induced intoxication prevented him from forming the then requisite specific intent to commit second-degree murder. We held that he was entitled to introduce evidence of intoxication:
“We construe section 18-3-103(2) to mean that diminished responsibility due to lack of mental capacity is not a defense, unless it precludes a defendant from entertaining the requisite specific intent to commit the crime of second-degree murder. The absence of specific intent, like the absence of any other element of the crime, mandates an acquittal. And under section 18-1-804(1) a defendant’s voluntary intoxication may be evidence of his inability to entertain the specific intent required for conviction of second-degree murder.
*49“To hold otherwise would effectively relieve the People of the burden of proving every essential element of the charge beyond a reasonable doubt. As the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania observed in Commonwealth v. Graves, 461 Pa. 118, 334 A.2d 661:
‘“It would clearly be an anomaly to suggest that although the Commonwealth must establish the existence of a mental state beyond a reasonable doubt, and that failure to sustain that burden requires an acquittal; yet preclude the defendant from producing relevant evidence to contest the issue.’
“More than an anomaly, such a holding would deprive defendant of his right, secured by the due process clause, to require proof beyond a reasonable doubt of every element of the crime charged. In re Winship, 397 U.S. 358, 90 S.Ct. 1068, 25 L.Ed.2d 368. See People v. Kanan, 186 Colo. 255, 526 P.2d 1339.” People v. Cornelison, supra.
After our decision in Cornelison, the second-degree murder statute, section 18-3-103 was amended by the legislature. The culpable mental state required for conviction was changed by the legislature from “intentionally” to “knowingly.” In my view, however, subsection (2) of that statute, as amended, still violates the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment because the defendant is foreclosed from introducing evidence that his diminished responsibility resulting from the lack of mental capacity rendered him unable to form the requisite culpable mental state knowingly to commit the crime of second-degree murder.
The majority asserts that the statute barring evidence of intoxication are founded in the common-law tradition that evidence of voluntary intoxication cannot be used to negate a general intent crime. Although the legislature has declared second-degree murder to be a general intent crime, the addition of the element “knowingly,” in my view, has removed second-degree murder from the common law realm of general intent crimes and has placed it in the class of crimes contemplated in Cornelison.
Under the common law, there are two broad classes of crime, each reflecting a different conception of the mental state required for conviction. The largest class of crimes are general intent crimes. To prove that a general intent crime has been committed, the prosecution has traditionally been required to show only that the defendant performed a voluntary act, and that he had the mental capacity to do so. See Remington and Helstad, The Mental Element in Crime — A Legislative Problem, 1952 Wis. L. Rev. 645. In that context, general intent means only that the defendant voluntarily intended to do the act which led to his prosecution.
The second class of offenses at common law is comprised of specific intent crimes. In addition to those elements which will serve for conviction of a general intent crime, a “special mental element” such as premeditation must be proved, when a specific intent crime is charged. See Perkins on Criminal Law (2d ed. 1969).
*50Whenever proof of a special mental element has been required for conviction, defendants have been allowed to introduce evidence on the question of whether they were capable of acting with the special mental state required. See Model Penal Code, Tentative Draft No. 9, pp. 7-8 (1962). Evidence of diminished capacity or self-induced intoxication has traditionally been admissible to negative the defendant’s ability to entertain the requisite mental state. We held in People v. Cornelison, supra, that In re Winship, 397 U.S. 358, 90 S.Ct. 1068, 25 L.Ed.2d 368 (1969), elevated a defendant’s right to introduce evidence on that special mental element to a constitutional level.
The legislative definition of the word “knowingly” is substantially the same as the definition given that word in the Model Penal Code § 2.02: “(b) Knowingly. A person acts knowingly with respect to a material element of an offense when:
“(i) if the element involves the nature of his conduct or the attendant circumstances, he is aware that his conduct is of that nature or that such circumstances exist; and
“(ii) if the element involves a result of his conduct, he is aware that it is practically certain that his conduct will cause such a result.”
Section 2.08 of the model code sets out those crimes in which intoxication shall be a defense. That section makes the defense of intoxication available to any defendant who is charged with a crime which requires proof that the defendant acted “knowingly.” The comments to section 2.08 and section 2.02 make it abundantly clear that the American Law Institute intended that defendants be allowed to negate an allegation of knowing conduct by the introduction of evidence of diminished capacity due to voluntary intoxication:
“The first . . . question [is] whether intoxication ought to be accorded a significance that is entirely co-extensive with its relevance to disprove purpose or knowledge, when they are the requisite mental elements of a specific crime. We submit that the answer clearly ought to be affirmative; that when the definition of a crime or a degree thereof requires proof of such a state of mind, the legal policy involved will almost certainly obtain whether or not the absence of purpose or knowledge is due to the actor’s self-induced intoxication or to some other cause. For when purpose or knowledge, as distinguished from recklessness, is made essential for conviction, the reason very surely is that in the absence of such states of mind the conduct involved does not present a comparable danger, as in burglary or theft; or that the actor is not deemed to present as significant a threat, as in treason and perhaps the first degree of murder; or, finally, that the ends of legal policy are served by bringing to book or subjecting to graver sanctions those who consciously defy the legal norm.”
*51Model Penal Code, Tentative Draft No. 9, p. 7 (1962).
Accordingly, it is my view that the General Assembly’s efforts to bar the introduction of evidence on voluntarily-induced intoxication for second-degree murder does not comport with the Due Process requirements of proof beyond a reasonable doubt. For that reason I would reverse the judgment of the district court.
JUSTICE DUBOFSKY and JUSTICE LOHR join me in this dissent.