Gray v. Com., 84-SC-301-DG
Decision Date | 05 September 1985 |
Docket Number | No. 84-SC-301-DG,84-SC-301-DG |
Citation | 695 S.W.2d 860 |
Parties | Dudley GRAY, Movant, v. COMMONWEALTH of Kentucky, Respondent. |
Court | United States State Supreme Court — District of Kentucky |
Paul E. Hieronymus, McKee, for movant.
David L. Armstrong, Atty. Gen., W. Bruce Cowden, Jr., Asst. Atty. Gen., Frankfort, for respondent.
The movant was indicted for murder, was convicted of second-degree manslaughter and was sentenced to seven years imprisonment. The conviction was affirmed on appeal to the Court of Appeals, and we granted discretionary review to consider movant's claim that the instructions concerning second-degree manslaughter were erroneously given.
Movant and some of his friends attended a party at movant's home which lasted into the early morning hours. All of those in attendance had been drinking. Movant shot and killed the victim, but claimed he acted in self-defense because the victim was in the process of drawing a gun on him at the time.
At trial the movant objected to an instruction on second-degree manslaughter because all the evidence indicated the shooting was an intentional act, not a wanton or negligent act. The Court of Appeals upheld the instruction on the authority of Blake v. Commonwealth, Ky., 607 S.W.2d 422 (1980). Since that time, this court in Baker v. Commonwealth, Ky., 677 S.W.2d 876 (1984), overruled Blake v. Commonwealth.
It is without question that the movant intended to shoot the victim. He admitted the shooting and attempted to justify it on the ground of self-protection. There is no evidence whatever that his actions were anything other than intentional.
Second-degree manslaughter by statutory definition consists of causing the death of another wantonly, not intentionally. K.R.S. 507.040. A person acts wantonly with respect to a result when he is aware of and consciously disregards a substantial and unjustifiable risk that the result will occur. K.R.S. 501.020(3).
Wanton conduct is to be distinguished from intentional conduct and is punishable by a lesser penalty simply because it does not involve the element of evil intent.
As this court indicated in Baker v. Commonwealth, supra, an instruction as to a specific offense should not be given unless there is some evidence which would reasonably sustain the conclusion as to the defendant's guilt of the specific offense.
Because there is no question here but that the movant's act of shooting was intended by him to kill or to injure the victim, the instructions on specific offenses should have been limited to intentional crimes, and it was error to instruct, over the objection by movant, so as to permit the jury to find movant guilty of wanton conduct.
The instructions concerning self-defense were as follows:
These instructions were erroneous for the reason that they permitted the jury to find movant guilty of second-degree manslaughter if his belief in the necessity to use deadly force to protect himself was unreasonable. As we held in Baker v. Commonwealth, supra, an unreasonable belief concerning the necessity of self-defense is not a factor in the statutory definition of second-degree manslaughter. To constitute second-degree manslaughter a person must be guilty of...
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