General v. State

• Decision Date: 14 January 2002
• Docket Number: No. 32 Sept. Term, 2001.,32 Sept. Term, 2001.
• Citation: 367 Md. 475,789 A.2d 102
• Parties: Damian Ramon GENERAL v. STATE of Maryland.
• Court: Maryland Court of Appeals

789 A.2d 102

367 Md. 475

Damian Ramon GENERAL v. STATE of Maryland.

No. .

Court of Appeals of Maryland.

January 14, 2002.

Claudia A. Cortese, Assistant Public Defender (Stephen E. Harris, Public Defender, on brief) Baltimore, for petitioner.

M. Jennifer Landis, Assistant Attorney General (J. Joseph Curran, Jr., Attorney General of Maryland, on brief) Baltimore, for respondent.

Argued before BELL, C.J., ELDRIDGE, RAKER, WILNER, CATHELL, HARRELL, and BATTAGLIA, JJ RAKER, Judge.

Damian Ramon General appeals his convictions for failure to remain at the scene of an accident in violation of Maryland Code (1957, 1999 Repl.Vol., 2001 Supp.) § 20-102(a) of the Transportation Article,¹ failure to return to the scene of an accident in violation of § 20-102(b), failure to render reasonable assistance in violation of § 20-104(a), and negligent driving in violation of § 21-901.1(b). The single question that he raises is whether the trial court erred in refusing to instruct the jury concerning mistake of fact as a defense. We shall answer that question in the affirmative, reverse the Court of Special Appeals, and remand the case for a new trial.

In the early morning hours of December, 11, 1997, the police recovered the body of Lynn Thompson from the shoulder of southbound I-95, the Capital Beltway, in Prince George's County. Damian Ramon General, petitioner, had been driving the car that struck and killed Ms. Thompson, and he did not stop after he struck her. The next morning, petitioner gave a statement to the police, which the State introduced as evidence in its case-in-chief at trial. He told them the following:

"I was dropping my brother off at the ahm, at a hotel. I was going south, going to my Mother's house.... [S]he lives off St. Barnabas Road. Ahm and it, it will be a bag, something white was in the, in the far right hand lane and it was a three or a sixteen wheeler beside me on my left. Imagine as I got closer to it, I realized it probably was something, something big, so I tried to move over to my right, so when I moved over, I mean my left. I moved over to my left and I thought I had missed it; that's when I heard that it hit the side of the, the light. By it being dark I went off, I got off at St. Barnabas, Marlow Heights exit, I went and stopped at the gas station to look at the car and the yellow blinker light was gone, so then I went on home and told my mother. Told my mother that I wrecked Troy's car, I know he's going to get me for that, and then she told me don't worry about it, we'll see about it in the morning. I got up the next morning and looked at it again, I didn't see no, I didn't see nothing else but the light gone, the side fender was bent."

Trooper First Class David Reinholt of the Maryland State Police testified at trial as an expert in the field of accident reconstruction. In his opinion, the impact of petitioner's car striking Ms. Thompson occurred on the right shoulder of the roadway, and petitioner's statement was not consistent with the physical evidence.² Defense counsel requested the Maryland State Bar Association, Inc., Criminal Pattern Jury Instruction (MPJI-Cr) 5:06, which addresses the mistake of fact defense.³ The trial court denied the request, stating that such an instruction was not applicable under the factual scenario of the case.⁴ The court did, however, instruct the jury as to the requisite intent and knowledge of the defendant.

The trial court instructed the jury as to proof of intent in accord with MCJI-Cr 3:31. The court told the jury as follows:

"I instruct you that intent is a state of mind and ordinarily cannot be proven directly, because there is no way of looking into another person's mind. Therefore a defendant's intent may be shown by surrounding circumstances. In determining the defendant's intent, you may consider the defendant's acts and statements, as well as the surrounding circumstances. Further, you may but are not required to infer that a person ordinarily intends the natural and probable consequences of his acts."

The trial court instructed the jury as to the requisite knowledge of the defendant as follows:

"Ladies and Gentlemen, the charges of failing to remain at the scene of an accident involving bodily injury or death, failing to return to the scene of an accident involving personal injury or death, and failing to render assistance to a person injured in an accident require the State to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant had knowledge of both the accident and the underlying injury in order for the defendant to be found guilty of each of the three charges.... Knowledge in the context of this case can be proven in one of two ways. The first way is actual knowledge. In other words did the State produce any evidence that the defendant actually saw or perceived the accident or injury? The second way in which knowledge is proven is by showing that the defendant should have known that an accident occurred or should have anticipated that ... the accident resulted in an injury to a person. The term should have known is an objective standard and not a subjective one. It means that given all the evidence that you believe you are to determine whether a reasonable person who possessed all of the information at the time of the collision should have known that a collision occurred and should have anticipated that an accident resulted in an injury to a person."

Although the court refused to give the requested mistake of fact instruction, the court granted defense counsel's request to argue mistake of fact in closing argument.

Petitioner was convicted of all charges. He noted a timely appeal to the Court of Special Appeals. In an unreported opinion, that court affirmed the judgments. The court reasoned that "[i]f the jury is adequately instructed as to the intent required for conviction, the mistake of fact instruction is superfluous." The court then determined that the critical inquiry is whether the instructions as given adequately defined the intent necessary to convict petitioner. Following an examination of the intent instruction, the intermediate appellate court concluded:

"The trial court's charge instructed the jury to convict appellant only if it found beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant knew or should have known that an accident occurred. Because the elements of the offense set forth in the trial court's charge forced the jury to consider appellant's alleged mistake of fact before conviction, the omission of a mistake of fact instruction did not cause appellant any actual harm."

The court held that the trial court's instructions "fairly covered" the mistake of fact instruction requested by petitioner, and, thus, no error occurred in the failure to give the instruction requested by petitioner. We granted certiorari to consider the following question:

"Does a jury instruction on the requisite intent necessary to support a conviction on the charged offenses relieve the trial court of the obligation to instruct the jury on a `mistake of fact' defense generated by the facts, and, specifically, was it error for the trial court in this case to fail to give the jury an instruction on `mistake of fact' generated in this case?"

Petitioner argues that he acted under a mistake of fact, and, as such, he is not criminally responsible for his act. He argues that he is not guilty of the charges because, at the time that his automobile struck Ms. Thompson, he actually and reasonably believed that he struck a trash bag and not a person. The trial court gave a proof of intent instruction, but refused to give defense counsel's requested instruction on mistake of fact. The State argues that the trial court's instruction on the mental state required for conviction of the offenses charged adequately covered the mistake of fact defense.

As a general rule, mistake of fact is a recognized common law defense to certain crimes.⁵See, e.g., Outmezguine v. State, 335 Md. 20, 641 A.2d 870 (1994) (quoting Garnett v. State, 332 Md. 571, 632 A.2d 797 (1993)) (Bell, J., dissenting) (stating that, when a defendant generates the issue of mistake of fact, the State must prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the act was committed without any mistake of fact); CLARK & MARSHALL CRIMES, 323 (Marian Barnes ed., 7th ed.1967) (stating that ignorance or nonnegligent mistake of fact as a defense was well settled at common law). Mistake or ignorance of fact exists when the actor does not know what the actual facts are or believes them to be other than as they are. In essence, a mistake of fact is a defense when it negates the existence of the mental state essential to the crime charged. See WAYNE R. LAFAVE & AUSTIN W. SCOTT, JR., SUBSTANTIVE CRIMINAL LAW § 5.1 (2d ed.1986).⁶

The issue posed by our grant of certiorari is whether a jury instruction on the requisite intent necessary to support a conviction on the charged offenses relieves the trial court of the obligation to instruct the jury on a mistake of fact defense generated by the evidence. We answer that question in the negative.

Generally, it is the duty of the trial judge to instruct the jury as to the applicable law of the case. See Maryland Rule 4-325; Roach v. State, 358 Md. 418, 749 A.2d 787 (2000). Rule 4-325 provides, in pertinent part:

"The court may, and at the request of any party shall, instruct the jury as to the applicable law and the extent to which the instructions are binding. The court may give its instructions orally or, with the consent of the parties, in writing instead of orally. The court need not grant a requested instruction if the matter is fairly covered by instructions actually given."

Maryland Rule 4-325(c). Thus, it is clear that the trial judge is required to give a requested instruction that correctly states the applicable law and that has not been fairly covered in other instructions.

We have often said that the main purpose of jury instructions is to aid the jury in...