Court Opinion

ID: 9520526
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 01:42:01.243776+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:46:22.887421
License: Public Domain

GILDEA, Justice
(concurring).
I join in the majority’s conclusion that Caine’s conviction should be affirmed. I write separately because I disagree with the way in which the majority resolves the issue relating to the lesser-included offense of first-degree manslaughter under Minn.Stat. § 609.20(3) (2006). In my view, we need not decide whether it was error to refuse to give this instruction because any error was not prejudicial.
The district court instructed the jury on Caine’s duress defense that “[t]he defendant is not guilty of a crime if the defendant participated in the crime only because of a reasonable fear caused by the threats of another * ⅜ * that the defendant would be immediately killed if he refused to participate in the commission of the crime.” Under this instruction, in order to accept the defense, the jury would have had to find that Caine committed the murder because he reasonably believed that if he did not kill Lynch, Caine would be killed. See Minn.Stat. § 609.08 (2006) (stating that a defendant is excused from criminal liability for a crime that was committed because the defendant had “a reasonable apprehension * * * that in case of refusal [he] is liable to instant death”). Indeed, Caine’s lawyer argued to the jury during closing argument that Caine “had a reasonable fear of death if he didn’t” kill Lynch. The jury rejected this defense when it found Caine guilty.
Similar to the duress instruction given, the lesser-included offense instruction would have required the jury to find that Caine reasonably believed that he had to kill Lynch in order to prevent his own *361death. Minn.Stat. § 609.20(3) (defining manslaughter as “intentionally eaus[ing] the death of another person because the actor is coerced by threats * * * which cause the actor reasonably to believe that the act performed by the actor is the only means of preventing imminent death to the actor or another”). Because the jury rejected the theory that Caine reasonably believed he had to kill Lynch in order to save his own life when it rejected his duress defense, Caine has not shown that he was prejudiced by the district court’s failure to give the lesser-included offense instruction. See State v. Dahlin, 695 N.W.2d 588, 599 n. 2 (Minn.2005) (“[A]p-pellate courts must consider the jury instructions given and the verdict actually rendered to determine whether a possibility exists that the jury could have returned a verdict of guilty on only the requested lesser-included offense instruction. If so, the defendant is prejudiced and the court’s failure to give the instruction is reversible error.”). I would therefore hold that any error was harmless.