People v. Jones

• Decision Date: 23 December 2014
• Docket Number: Docket No. 147735.
• Citation: 860 N.W.2d 112,497 Mich. 155
• Parties: PEOPLE v. JONES.
• Court: Michigan Supreme Court

497 Mich. 155

860 N.W.2d 112

PEOPLE

v.JONES.

Docket No. 147735.

Supreme Court of Michigan.

Argued Oct. 9, 2014.

Decided Dec. 23, 2014.

Bill Schuette, Attorney General, Aaron D. Lindstrom, Solicitor General, Kym L. Worthy, Prosecuting Attorney, and Timothy A. Baughman, Chief of Research, Training, and Appeals, for the people.

James C. Howarth for defendant.

Bill Schuette, Attorney General, Aaron D. Lindstrom, Solicitor General, Matthew Schneider, Chief Legal Counsel, and B. Eric Restuccia, Deputy Solicitor General, for amici curiae the people.

Peter Jon Van Hoek for amici curiae the Criminal Defense Attorneys of Michigan.

Opinion

MARY BETH KELLY, J.

This interlocutory appeal concerns whether a defendant charged with reckless driving causing death¹ is entitled to a jury instruction on the misdemeanor lesser offense of moving violation causing death,² notwithstanding the Legislature's prohibition against such an instruction.³ Ordinarily, statutory law entitles criminal defendants to instructions on necessarily included lesser offenses when the facts at issue warrant such instructions.⁴ Here, because the Legislature specifically created an exception prohibiting an instruction on moving violation causing death where the charged offense is reckless driving causing death, and because the Legislature did not exceed its constitutional authority in doing so, we hold that it was error for the circuit court to grant the defendant's request to instruct the jury on moving violation causing death.

We therefore reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals and remand this case to the Wayne Circuit Court for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. Specifically, on remand, the circuit court shall enter an order vacating its ruling granting defendant's request to instruct the jury on the misdemeanor lesser offense of moving violation causing death. In light of the clear legislative dictates of MCL 257.626(5), the circuit court is precluded from granting defendant's request and providing such a jury instruction.

I. FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

On the afternoon of March 2, 2012, defendant was driving his automobile at approximately 80 mph on a road with a posted speed limit of 35 mph. While changing lanes, defendant collided with another vehicle, which, in turn, struck a third vehicle that had been parked on the side of the road. The driver of the second vehicle was killed in the collision. Consequently, defendant was charged with reckless driving causing death under MCL 257.626(4).

Prior to trial, defense counsel filed a motion in limine, requesting that the circuit court instruct the jury on the misdemeanor lesser offense of committing a moving violation causing death. Despite the explicit prohibition in MCL 257.626(5) against such an instruction, the circuit court granted the motion, concluding that moving violation causing death is a necessarily included lesser offense of reckless driving causing death and, therefore, MCL 257.626(5) violates the doctrine of separation of powers under Const 1963, art. 3, § 2.

The prosecution appealed, and the Court of Appeals affirmed in a split published opinion. The majority held that MCL 257.626(5) is constitutionally infirm because it violates both the separation of powers and a criminal defendant's fundamental due process right to a trial by jury.⁵ Noting the general rule that a jury may acquit a defendant of the charged offense and instead find him guilty of a lesser offense, the majority first concluded that it is a violation of the separation of powers for the Legislature to prohibit the courts from instructing the jury on a necessarily included lesser offense. Because MCL 257.626(5) impermissibly precludes an instruction on moving violation causing death, which “by definition” is a necessarily included lesser offense of reckless driving causing death, the majority held the statutory prohibition to be unconstitutional.⁶ The majority explained that because the Legislature's sole function is to create substantive law whereas the Supreme Court has exclusive rulemaking authority in matters of practice and procedure, effectuating the right to a properly instructed jury is exclusively within the domain of the judiciary.⁷ Therefore, by prohibiting courts from instructing juries on the necessarily included lesser offense of moving violation causing death, the Legislature, via MCL 257.626(5), unconstitutionally infringed the judiciary's authority to establish court practice and procedure.⁸

Alternatively, the majority concluded that MCL 257.626(5) could likewise be invalidated as an unconstitutional deprivation of a defendant's right to a trial by a properly instructed jury. The majority observed that although MCL 257.626(5) plainly prevents the court from instructing the jury on the lesser offense of moving violation causing death, the statute does not bar or otherwise restrict a judge sitting as fact-finder from finding a defendant guilty of that lesser offense. The majority reasoned that, had the Legislature intended to limit a judge's consideration of moving violation causing death, it could have easily included language to that effect. Because a criminal defendant has no right to a bench trial unless the prosecutor and judge agree,⁹ MCL 257.626(5) places a criminal defendant in the position of compromising one right in favor of another, namely, a criminal defendant must relinquish his constitutional right to a trial by jury in order to permit the fact-finder to consider the lesser offense of moving violation causing death.¹⁰

We granted the prosecution's interlocutory application for leave to appeal, directing the parties to brief the following issues:

(1) whether a legislative provision barring consideration of a necessarily included lesser offense violates the separation of powers doctrine, Const. 1963, art. 3, § 2 ; (2) whether MCL 257.626(5) violates a defendant's right to a jury trial by foreclosing a jury instruction on a lesser offense; and (3) whether MCL 257.601d is a necessarily included lesser offense of MCL 257.626(4).^{[ 11 ]}

II. STANDARD OF REVIEW

The prosecution contends that the circuit court erred by granting defendant's request to instruct the jury on the misdemeanor lesser offense of moving violation causing death. We review de novo a claim of instructional error involving a question of law.¹² However, a circuit court's decision as to whether a requested lesser-included-offense instruction is applicable under the facts of a particular case will only be reversed upon a finding of an abuse of discretion.¹³ An abuse of discretion occurs when the circuit court chooses an outcome that falls outside the range of principled outcomes.¹⁴ Before addressing any alleged instructional error by the circuit court, however, we first consider whether a defendant is entitled to a jury instruction on the offense of moving violation causing death despite the statutory prohibition set forth in MCL 257.626(5). We review this and other questions of law de novo.¹⁵

III. ANALYSIS

In determining whether the circuit court erred by granting the request to instruct the jury on the misdemeanor lesser offense of moving violation causing death, we begin by reviewing the common law and statutory basis for lesser offense instructions, after which we will address the extent to which this review affects the construction of the reckless driving causing death and moving violation causing death provisions.¹⁶

A. PROPRIETY OF LESSER–INCLUDED–OFFENSE INSTRUCTIONS

At common law, the general rule of lesser included offenses was that

when an indictment charged an offense which included within it another less offense or one of a lower degree, the defendant, though acquitted of the higher offense, might be convicted of the less.

This rule, however, was subject to the qualification, that upon an indictment for a felony, the defendant could not be convicted of a misdemeanor.^[ [[^{17 ]}

This common-law rule has since been legislatively modified¹⁸ and appears in what is now MCL 768.32(1), which provides as follows:

Except as provided in subsection (2), upon an indictment for an offense, consisting of different degrees, as prescribed in this chapter, the jury, or the judge in a trial without a jury, may find the accused not guilty of the offense in the degree charged in the indictment and may find the accused person guilty of a degree of that offense inferior to that charged in the indictment, or of an attempt to commit that offense.^{[ 19 ]}

Reduced to its simplest terms, when a defendant is charged with an offense “consisting of different degrees,” the factfinder may, consistent with the statutory text, acquit the defendant of the charged offense and find him of her “guilty of a degree of that offense inferior to that charged in the indictment....”

In People v. Cornell,²⁰ this Court considered what crimes constitute lesser or “inferior” offenses within the meaning of MCL 768.32(1). After reviewing the dissonant approaches to lesser-included-offense instructions articulated throughout our jurisprudence, this Court noted that “the word ‘inferior’ in the statute does not refer to inferiority in the penalty associated with the offense, but, rather, to the absence of an element that distinguishes the charged offense from the lesser offense.”²¹ On this basis, this Court concluded that a defendant is entitled to a lesser offense instruction only if that lesser offense is necessarily included in the greater offense; that is, the offense must be committed as part of the greater offense insofar as it would be “impossible to commit the greater offense without first committing the lesser offense.”²² Cornell thus interpreted the legislative prerogative contained in MCL 768.32(1) —that an included-inferior-offense instruction may be appropriate upon request—as limited to necessarily included lesser offenses only; it foreclosed consideration of cognate lesser offenses, which, in the absence of adequate notice, may violate a defendant's fundamental due...