Court Opinion

ID: 9750726
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 15:27:41.159609+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:26:19.948703
License: Public Domain

Handier, J.,
concurring. For reasons which I have expressed in my concurring opinion in State v. Stasio, 78 N. J. 467 (1979), decided this day, I would recognize that facts bearing upon voluntary intoxication may be presented to the jury as a defense to the crime here charged, breaking and entering with intent to steal. To reiterate some of my observations in the companion case, I would allow voluntary intoxication as a defense but not for the reason that the crime with which Atkins was charged involves “specific intent” as opposed to “general intent”. That is a distinction which I reject. Nevertheless intoxication, obviously, may affect a defendant’s mental state and, if the crime calls for a particular state of mind to affix criminal responsibility, intoxication as a fact should not be withheld from a jury’s deliberations and assessment of guilt. To ignore or disregard such facts imports a fiction into the criminal process which ought not be countenanced.
The criminal law should not excuse criminal acts merely because they have been committed by drunks. The need to protect society from this brand of criminality is as real and important as protection from sober malefactors. That need, however, is adequately met by recognizing that the level or degree of intoxication which will be sufficient in fact to overcome a mental state otherwise required to ascribe guilt to a defendant must be substantial. Intoxication that so affects a defendant’s mind as to render him unconscious or deprive him of will or volition or leaves him unable to *464reason or think should be required in order to constitute a defense in fact to the commission of a crime calling for consciousness, volition, purpose or knowledge. State v. Stasio, supra at 489 (Handler, J., concurring).
The majority of this Court, while professing to repudiate voluntary intoxication as a defense in these circumstances, approaches a similar result. Intoxication of a degree that will prostrate the senses may constitute a defense, according to the majority, if it demonstrates defendant was “mistaken”, Ante at 459-461, or in some way negates the very commission of the crime, State v. Stasio, supra at 482-484.
In my view, the requisite mental state for the commission of the charged crime of breaking and entering with intent to steal involves volitional ability and consciousness, of-N. J. S. A. 2C :2-2. If a defendant has become so inebriated as to be in a stuporous and unconscious state, without will or ability to think, then voluntary intoxication would become a relevant fact bearing upon the mental components of the crime itself and should be considered by the jury in their determination of the facts.
This case illustrates, as does State v. Stasio, supra, a level of intoxication which, in my opinion, would not justify a factual determination that defendant lacked the requisite consciousness, volition and reasoning ability to be responsible for his criminal acts. The facts indicative of defendant’s mental state are recited in the majority’s opinion. Ante at 456-457. To be underscored is defendant’s admission of guilt on the scene, “I just want to take your T.V.”. This revealed graphically willful and purposeful conduct on the part of defendant. It is inconceivable that the jury’s conviction would have been altered even by an instruction on voluntary intoxication as a factual defense. While it would have been proper for the trial court to have given that charge, since there was evidence of substantial drinking by defendant antecedent to the breaking and entering, under the total factual picture demonstrating overwhelmingly *465defendant’s guilt, the error was harmless. State v. Stefanelli, 78 N. J. 418 (1979).
I must also express disagreement with the majority’s decision upholding the admission into evidence under Evict. B. 55 of the two 1965 convictions. The Court does so on the thesis that since defendant claimed his presence in the Maggi-pinto house was the result of a mistake or accident, these prior convictions involving similar charges were probative of the “absence of mistake or accident”, Ante at 461-462.
The reasoning of the majority of the Appellate Division on the question of the admissibility of these prior convictions is sound. 151 N. J. Super. 555, 558-568. The record demonstrates only that the prior conviction involved similar charges; it is barren of any proof that these were similar crimes. I do not agree with its conclusion, however, that the admission of these convictions was not harmless error. The evidence of defendant’s guilt was overwhelming. The guilty verdict upon this evidence was inescapable. The evidential ruling of the trial court on the admissibility of the prior conviction was, it is to be emphasized, a discretionary one involving close balancing of competing considerations. While that exercise of discretion was mistaken, it did not serve to destroy the essential fairness of defendant’s trial. The error therefore should be regarded as harmless in light of the abundant evidence of guilt and the overall proper discharge of the judge’s responsibility in assuring a fair trial.
Accordingly, I worild reverse the decision below and reinstate the convictions.
Justice Clibtokd joins in this opinion.