People Of The State Of Mich. v. Mcghee, 295708

• Decision Date: 17 February 2011
• Docket Number: LC No. 09-017549-FC,No. 295708,295708
• Parties: PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF MICHIGAN, Plaintiff-Appellee, v BRYAN MAURICE McGHEE, Defendant-Appellant.
• Court: Court of Appeal of Michigan — District of US

PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF MICHIGAN, Plaintiff-Appellee,
v
BRYAN MAURICE McGHEE, Defendant-Appellant.

No. 295708
LC No. 09-017549-FC

STATE OF MICHIGAN
COURT OF APPEALS

UNPUBLISHED: February 17, 2011

Before: Jansen, P.J., and Owens and Shapiro, JJ.

Per Curiam.

Defendant appeals by right his jury trial conviction for second degree murder, MCL 750.317.¹ He was sentenced to 22½ to 40 years in prison. We affirm.

Defendant's conviction involves the stabbing death of William Fish on May 18, 2009, in Detroit. The prosecution alleged that defendant stabbed Fish in anger over an earlier fight that had occurred between defendant and an individual named Cameron, and in which Fish was also involved. Defendant maintained that Fish assaulted him with a knife and that he stabbed Fish in self-defense during a struggle for that knife. At trial, two men who were present with Fish during the stabbing, Benjamin Tucker and Patrick Mayo, provided their versions of the incident, as did defendant. In addition, all three men testified about the earlier fight, as did a fourth witness, Johnny McDaniel.

On November 24, 2009, after the close of proofs and closing arguments, the jury was dismissed for the remainder of the week. When they returned on November 30, 2009, the trial court provided its instructions and the jury deliberated for approximately an hour before sending out a note requesting to view the police report, the crime scene photographs, and the testimony from defendant, McDaniel and Tucker. The trial court initially sent in the photographs, but did not respond to the other requests because it was engaged in jury selection on another matter. Approximately 20 minutes later the jury again requested transcripts of the testimony of

Page 2

defendant, McDaniel, Tucker, and Mayo, as well as police reports and statements that Tucker and Mayo made to the police. The following discussion occurred:

[The Court]. This is my suggested response: "You have all the admitted exhibits. Any police reports not in evidence are not-not in evidence are not admitted evidence. The testimony of the witnesses is taken down in a system of symbols. The testimony in this case has not been transcribed into words. This takes some time to do. Please rely on your collective memories."
Any objection to that response?
[Prosecutor]. I have no objection.
I would request that because it was five days in between the time they have heard testimony until today's date that they started deliberating, if I could ask the Court to adjust the language that if they insist having (sic) the copy of the transcript that it's an option still available to them.
[The Court]. I'm not gonna add that. I mean it leaves it open that it can be done.
But right now the court reporter's in another trial so she can't sit down and transcribe that testimony. So I am not saying I won't do it, but we'd have to excuse her for a couple days to do it. So I mean really probably longer than that actually.
Any objection to my response?
[Defense Counsel].

...