U.S. v. Johnson

• Citation: 366 F.Supp.2d 822
• Decision Date: 31 March 2005
• Docket Number: No. CR 01-3046-MWB.,CR 01-3046-MWB.
• Parties: UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff, v. Angela JOHNSON, Defendant.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Northern District of Iowa

366 F.Supp.2d 822

UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff, v. Angela JOHNSON, Defendant.

No. CR 01-3046-MWB.

United States District Court, N.D. Iowa, Central Division.

March 31, 2005.

Charles J. Williams, Patrick J. Reinert, US Attorney's Office, Cedar Rapids, IA, Thomas Henry Miller, Des Moines, IA, for Plaintiff.

Alfred E. Willett, Terpstra, Epping & Willett, Cedar Rapids, IA, Dean A. Stowers, Rosenberg, Stowers & Morse, Robert R. Rigg, Des Moines, IA, Patrick J. Berrigan, Watson & Dameron, LLP., Kansas City, MO, for Defendant.

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER REGARDING SCOPE OF LIFE — AND DEATH-QUALIFYING QUESTIONS IN JURY SELECTION

BENNETT, Chief Judge.

                TABLE OF CONTENTS
                I. INTRODUCTION ......................................................824
                     A. Background .....................................................824
                     B. The Present Controversy ........................................825
                 II. LEGAL ANALYSIS ....................................................825
                     A. Purpose And Discretion .........................................825
                     B. The Starting Point: Morgan v. Illinois .........................826
                        1. The decisions below .........................................826
                        2. The issues presented ........................................827
                           a. Jury impartiality ........................................827
                           b. The defendant's right to challenge .......................827
                

                c. The defendant's right to inquire .........................828
                           d. Constitutionally sufficient voir dire ....................829
                        3. Holding .....................................................830
                     C. An Eighth Circuit Decision .....................................831
                     D. The McVeigh Decision ...........................................832
                        1. Background ..................................................832
                        2. "General Morgan questions" ..................................833
                        3. "Specific Morgan questions" .................................834
                     E. The Spectrum Of Case-Specific Questions ........................834
                        1. "Abstract" questions ........................................835
                        2. "Defendant's status" questions ..............................836
                        3. "Case-categorization" questions .............................837
                        4. "Case-specific" questions ...................................840
                        5. "Stake-out" questions .......................................842
                        6. Summary .....................................................844
                     F. The Fallacies Of The General Rule ..............................844
                        1. Misconception of Morgan .....................................844
                        2. Misconception of "stake-out" questions ......................845
                        3. Fallacious exclusion of "speculative" questions .............845
                        4. The fallacy of "extremes" ...................................846
                        5. The lesson learned from experience ..........................847
                     G. A Sensible Rule ................................................848
                III. CONCLUSION ........................................................849
                

What is the proper degree of case-specific questioning, if any, that is permissible in the course of life — or death-qualifying prospective jurors in this federal death-penalty case? That question has animated several discussions the court has had with counsel in the course of pretrial preparations in this case. Because the trial date in this case is fast approaching, the question now requires resolution.

I. INTRODUCTION

A. Background

Defendant Angela Johnson is facing trial beginning in April 2005 on ten capital charges arising from her alleged involvement in the murders in 1993 of five witnesses to the drug-trafficking activities of Johnson's sometime boyfriend, Dustin Honken. The alleged murder victims are Gregory Nicholson, Lori Duncan (Nicholson's friend), Amber Duncan and Kandi Duncan (Lori Duncan's daughters, ages 6 and 10, respectively), and Terry DeGeus. The capital charges are five counts of killing witnesses while engaging in a drug-trafficking conspiracy ("conspiracy murder"), in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 848(e)(1)(A) and 18 U.S.C. § 2; and five counts of killing the same witnesses in furtherance of a continuing criminal enterprise ("CCE murder"), also in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 848(e)(1)(A) and 18 U.S.C. § 2.

More specifically, Counts 1 through 5 of the Second Superseding Indictment in this case charge that, on or about July 25, 1993, or in the case of Terry DeGeus, on or about November 5, 1993, while engaging in an offense punishable under 21 U.S.C. § 841(b)(1)(A) and 846, relating to a conspiracy to manufacture and distribute 100 grams or more of pure methamphetamine and 1000 grams or more of a mixture or substance containing a detectable amount of methamphetamine between 1992 and 2000, Angela Johnson intentionally killed and counseled, commanded, induced, procured, and caused and aided and abetted the intentional killing of Gregory Nicholson, Lori Duncan, Amber Duncan, Kandi Duncan, and Terry DeGeus, respectively, and that such killings resulted, all in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 848(e)(1)(A) and 18 U.S.C. § 2. Counts 6 through 10 of the Second Superseding Indictment charge that, on or about July 25, 1993, or in the case of Terry DeGeus, on or about November 5, 1993, while working in furtherance of a continuing criminal enterprise between 1992 and 2000 in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 848(c), Angela Johnson intentionally killed and counseled, commanded, induced, procured, and caused and aided and abetted the intentional killing of Gregory Nicholson, Lori Duncan, Amber Duncan, Kandi Duncan, and Terry DeGeus, respectively, and that such killings resulted, all in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 848(e)(1)(A) and 18 U.S.C. § 2. On November 14, 2002, the government filed a notice of intent to seek the death penalty on all ten of these charges.

Jury selection is set to begin in this case on April 12, 2005.

B. The Present Controversy

The court and the parties have had several discussions of the manner in which jury selection will be conducted in this case. Of the many issues concerning jury selection that the court and the parties have attempted to resolve, one that stands out as requiring separate consideration in a written ruling is the extent, if any, to which the parties should be permitted to ask case-specific questions in the course of life — or death-qualifying prospective jurors. This issue arose without notice in the midst of jury selection in the separate trial of Johnson's co-defendant, Dustin Honken. At that time, the court and the parties had little opportunity to research, argue, or deliberate on the question of the scope of case-specific voir dire questions. Therefore, this court relied primarily on the decision of the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals in United States v. McVeigh, 153 F.3d 1166, 1205-11 (10th Cir.1998), cert. denied, 526 U.S. 1007, 119 S.Ct. 1148, 143 L.Ed.2d 215 (1999), to impose some limitations on the scope of the parties' case-specific questions in the process of life — or death-qualifying potential jurors. In this case, where the matter can be anticipated pretrial, the court deems it appropriate to reconsider in more detail, and with more time for reflection, the following question: In an attempt to empanel a fair and impartial jury, what degree of specificity about the facts of this particular case, if any, is it permissible to include in questions to prospective jurors about their ability to consider both life and death sentences, if the defendant were to be found guilty of one or more of the capital offenses with which she is charged?

II. LEGAL ANALYSIS

A. Purpose And Discretion

Before embarking on a discussion of the proper scope of case-specific questioning in voir dire in a capital case, it is well to keep in mind the purpose of voir dire. As the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals recently explained,

The Sixth Amendment guarantees "the criminally accused a fair trial by a panel of impartial, indifferent jurors." Irvin v. Dowd, 366 U.S. 717, 722, 81 S.Ct. 1639, 6 L.Ed.2d 751 (1961) (internal quotations omitted); see also Pruett v. Norris, 153 F.3d 579, 584 (8th Cir.1998). Voir dire serves the purpose of assuring a criminal defendant that this right will be protected. See Rosales-Lopez v. United States, 451 U.S. 182, 188, 101 S.Ct. 1629, 68 L.Ed.2d 22 (1981). "Without an adequate voir dire the trial judge's responsibility to remove prospective jurors who will not be able impartially to follow the court's instructions and evaluate the evidence cannot be fulfilled. Similarly, lack of adequate voir dire impairs the defendants' right to exercise peremptory challenges...." Id. (internal quotations omitted).

United States v. Ortiz, 315 F.3d 873, 888 (8th Cir.2002). Thus, voir dire of prospective jurors serves a critical purpose in affording a criminal defendant a fair trial. It is also well to keep in mind that, at least in the absence of a constitutional requirement or prohibition, "[t]rial judges have broad discretion in determining how best to conduct voir dire." Id. (noting that this discretion "is not without boundaries"). "The reason given [for such discretion] is that juror bias `cannot be easily discerned from an appellate record.'" Id. (quoting Wainwright v. Witt, 469 U.S. 412, 429, 105 S.Ct. 844, 83 L.Ed.2d 841 (1985)). Thus, the court must determine, in the best exercise of its discretion, what degree of case-specific questioning, if any, is permissible in the course of life — or death-qualifying prospective jurors in this federal death-penalty case, guided first and foremost by the goal of voir dire to provide for a fair trial by a panel of impartial jurors.

In its search for direction in the exercise of its discretion on this critical issue, the court has discovered that the various paths blazed by the lower courts all have at their trail...