Ortega v. State
| Decision Date | 25 September 1998 |
| Docket Number | No. 97-114,97-114 |
| Citation | 966 P.2d 961 |
| Parties | Richard A. ORTEGA, Appellant (Defendant), v. The STATE of Wyoming, Appellee (Plaintiff). |
| Court | Wyoming Supreme Court |
Sylvia L. Hackl, Public Defender; and Donna D. Domonkos, Appellate Counsel, Cheyenne, for Appellant.
William U. Hill, Attorney General; Paul S. Rehurek, Deputy Attorney General; D. Michael Pauling, Senior Assistant Attorney General; and Robin Sessions Cooley, Assistant Attorney General, Cheyenne, for Appellee.
Before LEHMAN, C.J., and THOMAS, MACY, GOLDEN and TAYLOR, * JJ.
Appellant, convicted of interference with a peace officer, contests the admission of certain portions of his jail record and the denial of a proffered self-defense jury instruction. We affirm the judgment of the district court.
Appellant, Richard A. Ortega (Ortega), presents two issues for review:
Issue I.
Did the trial court abuse its discretion when it refused to allow Appellant to assert his claim of privilege in his medical records and failed to hold an in camera inspection of materials [the] State sought to enter into evidence?
Did the trial court commit reversible error by failing to give jury instructions which sufficiently apprised the jury of Appellant's theory of the case and by failing to instruct the jury on the proper burden of proof that [the] State must meet in [a] self-defense case?
Appellee, the State of Wyoming, restates the issues:
I. Whether the district court abused its discretion by admitting into evidence the complete jail record, after an in-camera review.
II. Whether the district court properly refused appellant's proffered jury instruction.
II. FACTS
On March 18, 1996, Officer Ditzler of the Cheyenne Police Department responded to a REDDI (Report Every Drunk Driver Immediately) report that a truck was driving erratically in the alley between 8th and 9th streets in Cheyenne, Wyoming. Officer Ditzler located the vehicle and observed it barely miss one curb, hit another, nearly hit a pole and several garbage cans, and he noticed the driver had difficulty backing into a driveway. After observing this erratic driving, Officer Ditzler approached the vehicle which was occupied by two people. Ortega was in the driver's seat, while Patrick Valencia occupied the passenger seat. Officer Ditzler approached Ortega and asked him for his driver's license. Ortega initially refused to cooperate, but eventually relinquished his vehicle registration to Officer Ditzler.
Officer Ditzler returned to his patrol car and called dispatch to check the status of Ortega's driver's license. Officer Munari arrived on the scene as Officer Ditzler was learning that Ortega's Wyoming driver's license had been surrendered to another jurisdiction, and that Ortega had a prior DUI in 1995. While the officers were thus engaged, Mike Lucero, Ortega's nephew, arrived at the scene with Antonio Griego.
The two officers returned to Ortega's vehicle and asked him to step out of the truck. Ortega refused until Officer Ditzler opened the driver's side door. Ortega then got out of the vehicle, stumbled, and leaned against the truck for support. The officers asked Ortega to perform several field sobriety tests, but they were met with profane refusals. Faced with an obviously intoxicated and uncooperative individual, the officers arrested Ortega for DUI.
The officers instructed Ortega to turn around so he could be handcuffed. When Ortega refused, the officers attempted to turn Ortega around physically to facilitate the arrest. Ortega then grabbed Officer Ditzler's arm and punched him in the face. In the ensuing struggle, Ortega repeatedly kicked at both officers, striking Officer Munari in the thigh and Officer Ditzler in the ankle.
In order to subdue Ortega, Officer Ditzler removed his ASP Baton and struck him several times in the legs. Eventually, the officers placed Ortega on the ground, but he continued to kick at them, forcing the use of mace. After a considerable struggle, the officers were able to handcuff Ortega. When Ortega was finally taken to the detention facility, his injuries were photographed by detention facility personnel.
During trial, the defense offered a very different version of the arrest to the jury. The defense presented three eyewitnesses, who each testified that Ortega never hit or kicked either officer during the struggle. Patrick Valencia testified he never saw Ortega attempt to strike or be aggressive. Likewise, Antonio Griego testified Ortega was merely covering himself with his hands and never struck either of the officers. Finally, Ortega's neighbor, Angela Poutney, who witnessed the entire incident from her kitchen window, testified Ortega engaged in no violent action whatsoever. In addition, the defense presented the photographs of Ortega taken at the jail in an attempt to show that the officers used excessive force during the arrest.
The jury was unpersuaded by the defense's version of events. Ortega was convicted of interfering with a peace officer in violation of Wyo. Stat. § 6-5-204(b) (1997). 1
The standard of review applied to the district court's evidentiary rulings is well known and often articulated:
Whether to exclude admissible evidence is a matter left to the exercise of sound discretion of the district court. Barnes v. State, 858 P.2d 522, 527 (Wyo.1993). A district court's discretionary rulings on evidence will not be upset absent a clear abuse of discretion, and the burden of establishing such abuse lies with the defendant. Id. An abuse of discretion occurs when a court acts in a manner which exceeds the bounds of reason under the circumstances. Id. Decisions of the district court with respect to admissibility of evidence are entitled to considerable deference and, as long as there is a legitimate basis for the district court's ruling, that ruling will not be reversed on appeal. Id.
A criminal defendant is entitled to have the jury instructed on a defense theory if a timely submission is made of a jury instruction that correctly states the law and is supported by the evidence. Chavez-Becerra v. State, 924 P.2d 63, 67 (Wyo.1996); Bouwkamp v. State, 833 P.2d 486, 490 (Wyo.1992). It is reversible error for a trial court to refuse to give such a properly requested jury instruction. Chavez-Becerra, 924 P.2d at 67; Oien v. State, 797 P.2d 544, 549 (Wyo.1990).
Ortega's first assertion of error is that the district court improperly admitted two notations from the jail record created at the Laramie County Detention Facility. One notation, made by a contract nurse at the detention facility, indicates that Ortega was not present during medical rounds the day after his arrest. The second notation, made by a facility administrator, indicates that Ortega requested dental services for a cap that he lost while eating at the detention center. Although Ortega's argument is far from clear, he seems to base his objection to the records on three separate grounds.
Ortega's first argument is that the records in issue should be excluded under Wyo. Stat. § 35-2-610 (1997), which provides in pertinent part:
(a) Health care information shall not be disclosed by a hospital pursuant to compulsory legal process or discovery in any judicial, legislative or administrative proceeding * * *[.]
The statute goes on to list several exceptions to the general rule of nondisclosure, none of which are pertinent to the case at hand.
Ortega's argument is misplaced. Wyo. Stat. § 35-2-610 applies only to disclosure of health care information, not to the admissibility of that information into evidence at trial. We have stated that discovery and admissibility at trial involve different concepts and questions. First Wyoming Bank, N.A., Jackson Hole v. Continental Ins. Co., 860 P.2d 1064, 1091, modified in part, 860 P.2d 1094 (Wyo.1993). The admissibility of the records is controlled by the rules of evidence, not the statutory provisions preventing disclosure. Moreover, the records at issue are not covered by the statute because the Laramie County Detention Facility is not a hospital and because the records are not qualified health care information. See Wyo. Stat. § 35-2-605(a)(vii) and (ix) (1997).
Ortega also seems to rely on the physician-patient privilege, although he fails to discuss the Wyoming statute that governs the privilege. 2 Neither of the notations are covered by the physician-patient privilege. The nurse's notation is not a communication by Ortega to anyone, and the request for dental work was communicated to a facility administrator who, under even the broadest interpretation of the statute, is not a physician.
Finally, Ortega asserts that the records were irrelevant and should have been excluded under W.R.E. 403. He states that because the records merely show that he missed an appointment the day after his arrest and asked for some dental work while detained, they are not relevant to the issue of his guilt or innocence. However, Ortega placed his physical condition in issue. The records then became relevant to dispute Ortega's claims of injury as a result of the arrest. Given that Ortega's physical condition was contested at trial, the district court's ruling on the matter did not exceed the bounds of reason under the circumstances.
Ortega's second assertion of error is that the district court erred in refusing a self-defense jury instruction. 3 Ortega presented three eyewitnesses in his defense, who all testified that they never saw Ortega strike Officer Ditzler or Officer Munari. In contrast, Officers Ditzler and Munari both testified that Ortega struck Officer Ditzler before he was maced or struck with the baton. Under either version of the facts, a...
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