King v. United States

• Decision Date: 22 August 2013
• Docket Number: No. 10–CF–1263.,10–CF–1263.
• Citation: 75 A.3d 113
• Parties: Rashawn M. KING, Appellant, v. UNITED STATES, Appellee.
• Court: D.C. Court of Appeals

75 A.3d 113

Rashawn M. KING, Appellant,

v.UNITED STATES, Appellee.

No. 10–CF–1263.

District of Columbia Court of Appeals.

Argued May 30, 2013.

Decided Aug. 22, 2013.

Debra L. Soltis, Washington, DC, for appellant.

James M. Pérez, Assistant United States Attorney, with whom Ronald C. Machen Jr., United States Attorney, and Elizabeth Trosman, Jennifer Kerkohoff, and Todd Gee, Assistant United States Attorneys, were on the brief, for appellee.

Before GLICKMAN and THOMPSON, Associate Judges, and RUIZ, Senior Judge.

RUIZ, Senior Judge:

Rashawn King appeals his convictions for first-degree murder and related weapons charges. On appeal, he challenges two evidentiary rulings: The admission of evidence of flight and the admission of evidence he claims falsely implicated him in threatening a witness. We conclude there was no error requiring reversal and affirm appellant's convictions.

I.

On October 14, 2008, Toni Smart identified appellant as the man she saw shoot and kill her friend, James Hill, earlier that day.¹ After Smart's identification, police searched for appellant. They obtained a warrant for his mother's house on Howison Street, S.W., where they believed he lived, but did not find him there. The police set up surveillance in the neighborhood and monitored the area for ten days. During the period the police were monitoring the area, they did not see appellant return. Ten days after Hill's death, elsewhere in the District of Columbia, police pursued a vehicle through rush hour traffic after receiving a report of a carjacking. The driver crashed the car and fled on foot, but was eventually caught and arrested. After his arrest, the driver told police his name was “James King.” The police later discovered that the name was fake, and that the driver was actually appellant, Rashawn King. Appellant was tried and convicted on carjacking charges before his trial on the murder charges began.²

II. Flight Evidence

A.The Evidence of Flight and the Trial Court's Rulings

Appellant contends that the trial court erred when it allowed the government to present “flight” evidence to the jury as evidence of his consciousness of guilt. Before analyzing the precedents in this jurisdiction governing the admissibility of flight evidence, we recount the evidence and the trial court's rulings in this case.

The government asked permission to admit flight evidence during a pre-trial conference. The government explained it wanted to introduce evidence that, after the shooting, appellant “had fled from the neighborhood.” The government also asked to introduce evidence that appellant had been apprehended after a car chase and “gave a fake name” when arrested. The government “believe[d] that providing a false name, particularly where he had reason to believe he was wanted for this murder, is admissible evidence to show consciousness of guilt.” In order to avoid presenting prejudicial evidence of the carjacking, the government “intended to present ... evidence that officers attempted to stop [appellant] in a vehicle, with no mention of the armed carjacking or that it was a vehicle taken in an armed carjacking, that [appellant] fled in a vehicle, and that after the chase was stopped and gave the name on October 24th, and to leave it at that.”

The court commented that “it appears to me that [appellant's] absence from his regular neighborhood immediately after this event for 10 days, giving—you know, basically being—I don't know if it amounts to a chase or just being followed by the police over quite a few blocks, giving a fake name—it seems all of that is admissible on the issue of consciousness of guilt.” Defense counsel responded that he “ha[d] no objection to the second part about being stopped in the car,” but questioned the government's ability to “establish that he was spending the night in his mother's up until the [day of the shooting], and a lot of the times he was not. Just to add consciousness of guilt we think is a leap without any foundation.” The government proffered that a police officer had “talked to [appellant] a week before the incident” outside his mother's house, and explained that appellant's mother had “testified at the last trial, the carjacking trial, that while [appellant] sometimes stayed elsewhere, he regularly stayed at her house and was living with her at the time ... of the armed carjacking.” Defense counsel then proffered that appellant was “actually on the run for a juvenile matter” between the time of the shooting and his apprehension.

The court ruled that the government had “a basis” for its flight argument, but cautioned the prosecutor to “avoid anything about the vehicle being carjacked or ... stolen.” As to defense counsel's explanation that appellant was avoiding his house because of “a juvenile matter,” the court explained that the defense would be “permitted to offer that alternative explanation as to why [appellant] was not there,” but that the explanation did not change the fact that “the government has a basis with the information they have, wishing to argue consciousness of guilt to the jury.” ³

At trial, the government called Officer Willie Galtney. Galtney testified that, around 5:30 p.m. on October 24, 2008, he began pursuing a vehicle in response to “a transmission over the Seventh District radio zone from the dispatcher.” Galtney described a chase conducted at a “high rate of speed” over the Anacostia Bridge, weaving out of “bumper-to-bumper traffic,” that culminated when the vehicle went “into a parking garage” and “crash[ed] into ... a U.S. postal van that was parked in the garage.” The driver then “bailed out of the vehicle,” went over a fence, and ran off. Galtney pursued, but the driver was eventually apprehended by another officer “a short time later.” ⁴ At trial, Galtney identified pictures of the car crash, the car inside the parking garage, and appellant.

Defense counsel asked Galtney if he had been “pursuing [appellant] related to this murder[.]” The government objected, and the court summoned the attorneys to the bench. There, the court asked defense counsel if he really “intended to get into” this area of questioning. Counsel responded that he thought the question to the officer was “fair,” and “would still keep the ground rules of not getting into the carjacking.” The court replied “I don't think so,” and cautioned the defense attorney that he would “open the door” if he continued. Counsel withdrew the question, and Galtney was excused.

The government also introduced evidence showing that a search warrant had been executed shortly after the shooting at the home of appellant's mother. During the search, the police located two identification cards belonging to appellant. No other homes were searched in connection with the investigation. Detective Antonio Duncan described his work with the “fugitive task force,” as they set about attempting to locate appellant. The detective recounted “setting up[ ] multiple units ... throughout the block” where appellant's mother's home was located, but testified that between October 15 and 24, no one on the task force observed appellant in the neighborhood near his mother's house. Detective Duncan explained that the task force had conducted “computer checks” for appellant and his family, “conducted interviews,” and placed appellant's father under surveillance. On cross-examination, DetectiveDuncan admitted that the task force had lacked a current address for appellant's girlfriend, but had looked for her unsuccessfully at an address she vacated before the investigation began.

During closing arguments,⁵ the prosecutor focused primarily on the eyewitness evidence that tied appellant to the shooting. However, the prosecutor also remarked on the evidence of appellant's flight from the neighborhood and from the police:

You also have as corroboration the defendant's flight. You know from the evidence presented to you that the defendant didn't stay at his house. Officers were there within hours executing a search warrant. They had an arrest warrant. The defendant was not at his home. The task force, the fugitive task force, was put on it. They staked out his house. They canvassed the area. They staked his father and followed his father around. No defendant. All the officers in the First District were told to look for Rashawn King. No one found him.

October 24^th, 10 days after the shooting, he's not in Southwest. He's down in another part of the city, the Seventh District, where when the officers try to stop him, he engages in a high-speed chase through the city at rush hour, crashing the car. And when he's finally stopped on foot, he says, “My name is James King,” not Rashawn King. And the judge has instructed you [that] you may consider his flight, his flight from the area and his flight on October 24th as evidence of consciousness of guilt. All that corroboration is evidence that what Toni [Smart] has said is truthful. That is evidence you may consider.

B.Flight Evidence AnalysisEvidence related to appellant's apprehension following his pursuit by the police

Appellant claims the trial court erred when it permitted the government to introduce evidence that he fled from the police in a car at high speeds and, after he was apprehended and arrested, gave a false name. However, as the government correctly notes, appellant waived this issue during the pre-trial hearing when defense counsel informed the court that he had “ha[d] no objection to the second part about being stopped in the car.” “We have repeatedly held that a defendant may not take one position at trial and a contradictory position on appeal.” Brown v. United States, 627 A.2d 499, 508 (D.C.1993). Here, appellant affirmatively acquiesced to the introduction of the evidence about which he now complains. As a result, we “will not consider [appellant's] present claim that the court erred” by failing to sua sponte exclude the evidence of the police chase and appellant's use of an...