Court Opinion

ID: 9562437
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 18:29:06.277046+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:17:21.049898
License: Public Domain

YALE McFATE, Judge,
dissenting:
I must dissent. The burden of proof in a criminal case is an indispensable concept concerning which the jury must be apprised. If the instructions, taken as a whole, permit the jury to apply an excessive and unfair burden of proof on the defendant, it is fundamental error which is not waived by counsel’s failure to request the proper instruction and is beyond the reach of rule 21.3(c), Rules of Criminal Procedure.
The trial court instructed the jury as to what the state must prove to find the defendant guilty, and that it must prove the defendant’s guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. But it also gave an instruction requiring the defendant to “meet” certain evidentiary requirements on the issue of self-defense as justification for the homicide, and failed to explain the burden of the state to disprove beyond a reasonable doubt that defendant acted in self-defense. This was unfair to defendant in that it placed some sort of burden on him to present proof of self-defense without explaining the extent of the burden or the quantum of proof required. The instruction on reasonable doubt does not supply the missing information. That instruction places on the state the burden to prove the existence of facts necessary to establish guilt, but does not place any burden on the state to prove the absence of facts to establish justification. Nor does it limit the defendant's burden on the issue of self-defense to that of raising a reasonable doubt. It is vital that this aspect of burden of proof be explained to the jurors, for without it one or more of them are apt to impose on the defendant a higher burden of proof than the law prescribes, to his prejudice. This rationale is implicit in the following words of Justice Hays in State v. Denny, 119 Ariz. 131, 579 P.2d 1101 (1978):
“The very purpose of a jury charge is to flag the jurors’ attention to concepts that must not be misunderstood, such as reasonable doubt and burden of proof.” Lakeside v. Oregon, 435 U.S. 333, 340, 98 S.Ct. 1091, 1095, 55 L.Ed.2d 319 (1978). It is vital that the jury not misunderstand the concept of the defendant’s burden of proof on self-defense; the jury must be instructed with great care to prevent the misunderstanding of this concept. 119 Ariz. at 134, 579 P.2d at 1104.
Although counsel in Denny requested and was refused an instruction on burden of proof re justification, the main focus of the court’s rationale is not on counsel’s diligence, but on the trial court’s imperative duty to instruct the jury on a fundamental concept that they must not misunderstand. One cannot ignore the forceful statements characterizing that duty as “vital” and emphasizing that the jury must be instructed with great care to prevent the misunderstanding of the concept of burden of proof. The corollary to these admonitions is that if the jurors are left to speculate and thereby impose an unfair burden of proof on defendant, he is deprived of a fundamental right to a fair trial.
It is not correct to say that counsel may, by failing to request the instruction, trap the court into error, to be raised the first time on appeal, as suggested in People v. Sandoval, cited in the majority opinion. One does not, by such omission, “trap” a trial judge into neglecting his duty to fully instruct on the essential law of the case.
Except as noted above, I concur in the majority opinion.
For the reasons stated above, the conviction should be reversed and the case remanded.