Court Opinion

ID: 9522155
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 02:18:41.930266+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:02:20.894855
License: Public Domain

Skoglund, J.,
¶ 21. concurring. I agree with the majority’s conclusion that the evidence adduced at trial could not support the attempted voyeurism charge. And I certainly agree with the jury’s *454apparent-but-unannounced decision that the evidence at trial did not support the original charge of voyeurism. I write this addendum because in my view the trial court’s decision to instruct the jury on a new charge — after they had begun to deliberate — was error, serious error that deprived defendant of his constitutionally protected right to a fair trial.
¶ 22. As the majority notes, defendant was only ever charged with voyeurism. The charge of attempted voyeurism, upon which he was ultimately convicted, came about only after the jury had begun deliberating on the charge of voyeurism and appeared to conclude that defendant was not guilty of the charged crime, sending the judge a note asking, “If we think he is guilty of trying; but was not able to see her nipples. What kind of verdict do we give? We have not proven that he saw anything.” In his initial instructions to the jury, the judge had told them repeatedly that “if the state has not met its burden [of proving each and every element of an offense], then you must return a verdict of not guilty for the offense.” Why the judge did not simply repeat that basic principle of criminal law in response to the jury’s question remains a mystery to me. Rather, the court responded by providing the jury with an alternative theory of the case and instructed the jury on the crime of attempt.3 Neither the prosecution nor the defense had suggested this additional charge; defense counsel, in fact, strongly objected to it, arguing that such a charge would be highly prejudicial and highlighting that she had not prepared for the new charge and would have changed her closing argument had she known such an instruction would be given.
¶ 23. We have generally recognized that the “necessity, extent and character of supplementary instructions requested by a jury” are within the sound discretion of the trial court. State v. West, 151 Vt. 140, 142, 557 A.2d 873, 875 (1988). As such, we will reverse only when an abuse of discretion by the court results in prejudice to the defendant. Id. at 143, 557 A.2d at 875; see State v. Day, 150 *455Vt. 119, 125, 549 A.2d 1061, 1065 (1988) (“[I]mproper jury instructions are grounds for reversal only when prejudice is shown; the burden of proof on the issue of prejudice is on the party alleging the error”). We find such an abuse of discretion “only upon a showing that the court failed to exercise its discretion, or that it exercised discretion for clearly untenable reasons, or to an extent that is clearly unreasonable.” West, 151 Vt. at 143, 557 A.2d at 875. I believe the trial judge’s exercise of discretion in this case cannot be sustained.
¶ 24. The bulk of our jurisprudence on supplementary jury instructions involves cases where the later instruction addressed a question about the trial or clarified an element of the existing charge. See, e.g., State v. Rideout, 2007 VT 59A, ¶¶ 13-14, 182 Vt. 113, 933 A.2d 706 (approving of trial court issuing additional instruction relating to available evidence); State v. Keiser, 174 Vt. 87, 92-94, 807 A.2d 378, 383-85 (2002) (affirming trial court’s clarifying instruction on element of crime charged). This case, however, is one of first impression. While we have dealt with cases where a new charge was brought to the jury before deliberation, see State v. Young, 139 Vt. 535, 542-43, 433 A.2d 254, 258 (1981) (affirming conviction for attempted rape when defendant was charged only with rape and an attempt instruction was given before deliberation), we have yet to rule upon the propriety of responding to a question from the jury during deliberation by instructing the jurors on a new theory of liability. See generally Cruz v. State, 963 A.2d 1184 (Md. 2009) (reviewing cases involving supplemental instructions on lesser-included offenses).
¶ 25. At first glance, it is clear that instructing the jury on attempt — based on their apparent belief that “he is guilty of trying” — was an abuse of discretion and violated defendant’s right to a fair trial. The jury’s question to the judge was simple: “[Defendant] was not able to see her nipples. What kind of verdict do we give?” The judge had clearly instructed the jury on the elements of voyeurism, including the central requirement that defendant “intentionally viewed the intimate areas of another person,” and had explained that the burden was on the State to prove each and every element of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt. The appropriate response to the jury’s question, then, was to restate the elements and burden of proof instructions. Instead, the judge assisted the jury’s expressed inclination to find defendant guilty of “trying” but failing, and provided them with an instruction on attempted voyeurism.
*456¶ 26. Other courts have observed that one of the chief dangers of instructing a jury on new charges during deliberation is that “the stalled jury may regard the newly furnished theory of liability as the court’s recommendation to resolve the impasse.” United States v. Welbeck, 145 F.3d 493, 497 (2d Cir. 1998). In Rush v. State, the court on appeal reversed the defendant’s second-degree murder conviction, holding that the trial court’s instruction to the jury on second-degree murder after they had deliberated for 28 hours and were unable to reach a verdict on first-degree murder — the charged offense — was prejudicial error. 395 S.W.2d 3, 8-9 (Ark. 1965). The state had requested no instruction on second-degree murder, and the defense counsel objected to the later instruction when it was given. The Arkansas Supreme Court held that the supplemental instruction on a lesser-included offense “had the effect of bargaining with the jury and . . . violated the rights of the defendant.” Id. at 9. In People v. Stouter, the California Supreme Court found that the trial judge’s decision to instruct the jury that they could “convict the defendant of the attempt was clearly an afterthought suggested by the statements of the jurors as to how they then stood, and apparently intended to help them, not generally to arrive at a verdict, but to arrive at some sort of a verdict of guilty.” 75 P. 780, 781 (Cal. 1904) (emphasis added). The court wrote: “Such a proceeding is ... a most dangerous interference with the right of a defendant to a fair trial.” Id. In much the same vein, the appellate court in State v. Jones reversed the defendant’s conviction for fourth-degree assault where the trial judge had offered it to the jury for the first time after an apparent deadlock. 518 A.2d 496 (N.J. Super. Ct. App. Div. 1986). The appellate court recognized that “charging a deadlocked or apparently deadlocked jury with a theretofore uncharged lesser-included offense is unduly and unfairly coercive.” Id. at 499; see also State v. Amos, 553 S.W.2d 700, 703 (Mo. 1977) (“The jury might very well have considered the last instruction as an intimation of the desire of the court that the defendant be convicted of some offense.”)4 (quotations omit*457ted). As these cases recognize, even where the new charge is directly related to the initial charge, the potential for the jury to perceive a new instruction as a judge’s preferred verdict is too great to be lightly put aside.
¶ 27. Beyond this potential influence and the fact that, as the majority makes clear, there was insufficient evidence to support any such attempt charge, defendant was harmed on a fundamental level when the trial court offered a new charge against him which altered the central theory of his defense and in effect denied him the right to respond to this new compromise charge. In making his closing argument, defendant essentially focused on one element of voyeurism, his inability to see the complainant’s intimate areas through her second-story window from his position below in the parking lot. Counsel emphasized: “How is it that at five feet tall, standing in her shower, [defendant] could have looked up and seen the intimate areas of [the complainant]? And we’re talking about her breasts here. How is that possible? Again, that’s where you’ll find reasonable doubt .... The question is, could he see her? And that’s what the State needs to prove today.” Not knowing the charge of attempted voyeurism would ever be before the jury, defendant never addressed the concept that he may have attempted to see her intimate areas.
¶ 28. This highlights another danger of giving a new instruction on an uncharged crime after the jury has begun deliberations: it deprives á defendant of the ability to adequately defend himself during the trial against the ultimate charge, and it denies him the ability to make a full and complete closing argument “on the evidence and the applicable law.” Herring v. New York, 422 U.S. 858, 860 (1975) (quotation omitted). In Herring, the United States Supreme Court recognized:
The very premise of our adversary system of criminal justice is that partisan advocacy on both sides of a case will best promote the ultimate objective that the guilty be convicted and the innocent go free. In a criminal trial, which is in the end basically a factfinding process, no aspect of such advocacy could be more important than the opportunity finally to marshal the evidence for each side before submission of the case to judgment.
Id. at 862. When a criminal defendant is denied the opportunity to address a charge against him because it is provided to the jury *458after the closing argument, this right is violated. His opportunity for a fair trial is virtually nil when, in reliance upon one set of instructions, he makes an argument conceding points that can prove his guilt under a later set of instructions. See Welbeck, 145 F.3d at 497 (noting that “prejudicial harm occurs where the defendant makes strategic concessions in summation which are damaging in relation to the later charged lesser included offense”).
¶ 29. The State argues that defendant waived his opportunity to address the jury on the new charge by not requesting a supplemental closing argument. I express no opinion on whether that burden lies upon defendant, but observe that other courts have recognized that when such an opportunity is granted, it may not necessarily right the wrong of adding an additional charge after the closing argument. Compare United States v. Horton, 921 F.2d 540, 547 (4th Cir. 1990) (holding that “where a new theory is presented to the jury in a supplemental instruction after closing argument, the court generally should give counsel time for additional argument . . . [which] can cure any prejudice experienced as a result of supplemental instruction” and finding under facts of the case no prejudice because original charge and new charge were “so similar that the arguments to be made against guilt are essentially the same under both theories”) with Cruz, 963 A.2d at 1192 (“We are not persuaded that a supplemental closing argument would have cured the problem created by the court’s eleventh hour insertion of this new theory of culpability. Even in a supplemental closing argument, defense counsel could not eradicate her earlier concession . . . .”).
¶ 30. Our Rules of Criminal Procedure are also instructive on this point. Rule 30 unequivocally states that the “court shall inform counsel of its proposed action upon the requests [for jury instruction] prior to their [closing] arguments to the jury.” Multiple courts have held that when a judge alters or adds an additional instruction after closing argument, it violates the equivalent of Rule 30 and may require reversal. See, e.g., People v. Millsap, 724 N.E.2d 942, 948 (Ill. 2000) (reversing defendant’s conviction where court instructed jury on attempt after closing arguments because “defendant was possibly convicted based upon a theory that he was never given a chance to address”); Cruz, 963 A.2d at 1195 (finding abuse of discretion when court gave “the jury a supplemental instruction on attempted battery during the jury’s deliberations, because the court at the close of evidence *459indicated that it would only instruct the jury on battery, the sole theory . . . elected by the State.”); People v. Clark, 556 N.W.2d 820, 827 (Mich. 1996) (“The prejudice to the defendant in this case was incurred by virtue of defense counsel’s argument in reliance on one instruction and the judge’s subsequent decision to instruct the jury on a different one. This misled defense counsel in formulating his closing argument.”).
¶ 31. From my perspective, there is little question that defendant’s right to address the charges against him was violated in this case. Defendant’s closing argument focused on the impossibility of defendant committing the offense from his vantage point and thus, even if he stood in the parking lot and looked at complainant’s second-floor bathroom window, he knew he could not view complainant’s intimate areas. The jury easily could have found this argument to be a concession that he intended to commit the crime but was “prevented in the execution” of the underlying offense — a central component in the attempt charge — by the height of the window. No additional argument could undo such concessions and, if anything, the closing only bolstered the charge of attempted voyeurism.
¶ 32. In responding to the jury’s statement that defendant was not able to commit the charged crime but was “guilty of trying” by providing them with an instruction enabling them to find him “guilty of trying,” the trial court exercised its discretion to an unreasonable extent. The compromise instruction effectively distorted defendant’s closing argument into an expression of frustration and denied him the opportunity to address the novel charge against him. It upended his entire theory of the case, and he had virtually no ability to respond to it. This stands to reason as the instruction itself came out of the jury’s own desire to convict defendant of something. But that is not the role the jury fills. Alongside the majority’s holding on the insufficiency of the evidence, I would likewise reverse based on this violation of defendant’s right to a fair trial.
¶ 33. I am authorized to state that Justice Johnson joins this concurrence.

 The judge’s instruction was the statutory definition of attempt from 13 V.S.A. § 9:
Under Vermont law, a person who attempts to commit an offense and does an act toward the commission thereof, but by reason of being interrupted or prevented in the execution of the same, may be found guilty of the offense charged if the jury finds, beyond a reasonable doubt, that the attempt to commit the offense was made.

 The State points out that these cases involved stalled juries who had been deliberating for hours or even days. While I do not equate the jury’s impasse in this case — which, again, pointed to a verdict of not guilty — with some of the longer deadlocked cases above, I believe the danger of undue influence is present whenever a judge responds to a jury’s request for more options with an additional charge.