Court Opinion

ID: 9565964
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 19:30:51.708677+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:18:22.566533
License: Public Domain

FIDEL, Judge,
specially concurring:
I join in the majority decision, but add these comments in response to Judge Gerber, who raises issues in concurrence that were neither argued in the trial court nor on appeal. I limit my comments to the subject of culpable mental state.
A.R.S. § 13-1105(B) provides that felony murder “requires no specific mental state other than what is required for the commis*556sion of [the underlying felony]”. Though Judge Gerber criticizes this provision, our supreme court has upheld its constitutionality. State v. McLoughlin, 139 Ariz. 481, 485-86, 679 P.2d 504, 508-09 (1984).
Three years later, however, the U.S. Supreme Court pointedly defined the subjective culpability at the heart of the felony murder rule — not in terms of the underlying felony alone, but in terms of indifference to a foreseeable risk of death. The Court stated:
Participants in violent felonies like armed robberies can frequently ‘anticipate that lethal force ... might be used ... in accomplishing the underlying felony.’ ... Indeed, the possibility of bloodshed is inherent in the commission of any violent felony and this possibility is generally foreseeable and foreseen; it is one principal reason that felons arm themselves.
Tison v. Arizona, 481 U.S. 137,150-51,107 S.Ct. 1676, 1684-85, 95 L.Ed.2d 127 (1987).
According to Tison, the Constitution permits capital punishment for felony murder despite the absence of intent to kill if a sufficiently culpable level of indifference is proven. The Court stated:
[W]e hold that the reckless disregard for human life implicit in knowingly engaging in criminal activities known to carry a grave risk of death represents a highly culpable mental state, a mental state that may be taken into account in making a capital sentencing judgment when that conduct causes its natural, though also not inevitable, lethal result.
481 U.S. at 157-58, 107 S.Ct. at 1688-89.
In State v. Marchesano, our court described Tison as setting “essentially a ‘conscious indifference’ standard” for capital felony murder cases. 162 Ariz. 308, 315, 783 P.2d 247, 254 (App.1989). We went on to hold the lesser standard of reasonable foreseeability sufficient to support a felon’s non-capital sentence for a killing or attempted killing by an accomplice. Id. Marchesano suggests by implication that reasonable foreseeability is likewise sufficient to support a non-capital sentence for felony murder. Under either a conscious indifference or reasonable foreseeability standard, however, these authorities suggest that culpable mental state with respect to the murder — not just the underlying felony — must be shown.
If this analysis is valid, the constitutionality of A.R.S. § 13-1105(B) is suspect. Although our supreme court upheld that statute in McLoughlin, it did so without addressing questions of foreseeability or indifference. These questions have come into sharper focus after Tison.
Even if McLoughlin is ripe for reconsideration, however, and even if foreseeability or conscious indifference should be recognized as a necessary element of felony murder, I see no fundamental, reversible error in the present case. Both foreseeability and indifference were abundantly proven in this record.
Defendant came armed for a violent encounter. At least one of his three companions came armed as well. The victim was conspicuously armed with a gun and holster. Defendant fired first and shot to kill. A jury that accepted this much of the state’s case — as this jury necessarily did when it rejected defendant’s claim of self-defense — could not reasonably have failed to additionally find that defendant “knowingly engag[ed] in criminal activities known to carry a grave risk of death,” that the death of all the victims was reasonably foreseeable, and that defendant proceeded in conscious indifference to that risk.
Judge Gerber suggests that the law forfeits respect in cases such as this by holding a felon culpable for an “unpredictable” reactive killing by his victim. I disagree. The victim’s reaction in this case was all too predictable. When defendant launched a shooting war, he knew or should have known that when the body count was taken, his companions might be found among the dead. The law may properly impose responsibility for each death defendant caused.
This is not to say that the felony murder rule is the best way for the law to do so; there is reason to debate in other forums whether there are better means to enhance *557the punishment of a felon whose crime results in foreseeable but unintended death. The legislature has promised a reevaluation of our criminal code, and Judge Gerber’s criticisms warrant thoughtful evaluation when that occurs. I am not a legislator, however, and, finding adequate proof of culpability in the case at hand, join in the majority decision. I