Court Opinion

ID: 9674904
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 04:37:04.392996+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:16:30.145822
License: Public Domain

SHIRLEY S. ABRAHAMSON, J.
(dissenting). The majority holds that the defendant was not denied his constitutional right to a unanimous verdict and therefore is not entitled to a new trial. In order to reach its holding, the majority first had to conclude that the confrontation between the defendant and Noldin was “a short continuous incident that can not be factually separated” (supra, p. 456) rather than two incidents, the log-throwing incident and the ensuing fistfight. In order to reach this conclusion, the majority had to reach the conclusion that on the basis of this record the defendant had no right to a self-defense instruction regarding the fistfight.
Were it not for the existence of the self-defense instruction and self-defense theory, I would agree with the majority that this defendant was not denied his right to a unanimous verdict. I dissent because I cannot agree with the majority that the self-defense instruction constituted error.
The record shows that the defendant introduced evidence at trial to prove his theory of self-defense as to the fistfight, but not as to the log-throwing incident. Accordingly, the trial court gave a self-defense instruction to which the state never objected — not at trial, not during post-trial motions, not on appeal to the court of appeals and not in its briefs to this court. The majority, though, has raised and decided the issue of self-defense instruction sua sponte in order to reach its desired result.
This court has held that in determining whether a self-defense instruction should be given, “neither the trial court nor this court may, under the law, look to the *460‘totality’ of the evidence.” State v. Mendoza, 80 Wis. 2d 122, 152, 258 N.W.2d 260 (1977). To do so “would require the court to weigh the evidence — accepting one version of facts, rejecting another — and thus invade the province of the jury.” Id. Balancing the evidence and deciding the facts, however, are exactly what the majority does here. The proper standard to use to determine whether a self-defense instruction is proper is “not what the ‘totality of the evidence’ reveals but rather, whether a reasonable construction of the evidence will support the defendant’s theory ‘viewed in the most favorable light it will “reasonably admit of from the standpoint of the accused.” ’ Ross v. State [61 Wis. 2d 160, 211 N.W.2d 827 (1973)]. If this question is answered affirmatively, then it is for the jury, not for the trial court or this court, to determine whether to believe defendant’s version of events.” State v. Mendoza, supra, 80 Wis. 2d at 153.
The majority holds that the instruction was erroneous by implicitly rejecting the defendant’s testimony that he did not provoke the incident, that he did not throw the log at Noldin and that he did not become angry until Noldin scrambled out of the river, pointing his bow and arrow at the defendant. The majority states that “[t]he defendant was the party which provoked the entire incident. . . . The defendant then provoked the encounter by throwing the piece of wood at Noldin. Noldin immediately scrambled out of the river and the physical fight ensued with no retreat on the part of the defendant. The entire episode was based on the spontaneous conduct of the defendant in provoking and striking Noldin.” (Supra, p. 457)
My reading of the record convinces me that there are facts which, if the jury believed, would support the defendant's theory of self-defense. Therefore, I cannot agree with the majority’s holding that the self-defense *461instruction was error and that consequently there was no unanimity problem present in this case. Since the self-defense instruction was properly given, this court should uphold the trial court’s grant of a new trial because the two offenses, the log-throwing and the fistfight, are conceptually distinct in this case. Manson v. State, 101 Wis. 2d 413, 304 N.W.2d 729 (1981). I would affirm the court of appeals decision.