People v. Ledman

• Decision Date: 12 January 1981
• Docket Number: No. 79SA574,79SA574
• Citation: 622 P.2d 534
• Parties: The PEOPLE of the State of Colorado, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Ronald Charles LEDMAN, Defendant-Appellant.
• Court: Colorado Supreme Court

Page 534

622 P.2d 534

The PEOPLE of the State of Colorado, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Ronald Charles LEDMAN, Defendant-Appellant.

No. 79SA574.

Supreme Court of Colorado, En Banc.

Jan. 12, 1981.

Rehearing Denied Feb. 17, 1981.

J. D. MacFarlane, Atty. Gen., Richard F. Hennessey, Deputy Atty. Gen., Mary J. Mullarkey, Sol. Gen., J. Stephen Phillips, Asst. Atty. Gen., Denver, for plaintiff-appellee.

J. Gregory Walta, Colorado State Public Defender, Robert Breindel, Deputy State Public Defender, Denver, for defendant-appellant.

QUINN, Justice.

Ronald Charles Ledman (defendant) appeals his conviction for attempt to commit aggravated robbery. He asserts that his conviction was obtained in violation of due process of law because of the statutory scheme restricting the defense of impaired mental condition to that form of attempted aggravated robbery requiring a specific intent. He also claims that he was deprived of his right to a unanimous jury verdict due to a jury instruction defining the alternative ways to commit attempted aggravated robbery and a general guilty verdict for that offense. We affirm the conviction.

The defendant was charged with attempt to commit aggravated robbery. ¹ The information alleged that during the offense the defendant was armed with a deadly weapon, a knife, and that either he had the intent, if resisted, to kill, maim or wound the person robbed or any other person, ² or by the use of force, threats, or intimidation with the deadly weapon, he knowingly put the person robbed or any other person in reasonable fear of death or bodily injury. ³ The charge arose out of the defendant's attempt to take money at knife point from a bartender at Roger's Frontier Bar in Colorado Springs.

The evidence established that the defendant had been drinking at the bar during the afternoon hours on the day of the offense. At approximately 1:00 p. m. he asked a bartender how much money was in the cash register. Believing that the defendant wanted to cash a check, the bartender told him there was about forty dollars in the register. The defendant stated, "It's not worth it." Later that evening the defendant asked another bartender the same question. When this bartender responded that he didn't know, the defendant brandished a knife and demanded the money. The bartender, although afraid, managed to subdue him and, with the assistance of others, held him for the police.

During trial the defendant called a psychiatrist in order to establish that he lacked the requisite culpability for the offense. This psychiatrist testified that the defendant displayed some evidence of schizophrenia and this condition, coupled with alcoholism, rendered it difficult for him to appreciate many aspects of his conduct on the date of the offense. ⁴ However, the psychiatrist opined that the defendant knew what he was doing and intended to take money from the bartender. In rebuttal, the prosecution called a psychiatrist and elicited testimony that on the date of the offense the defendant was suffering from severe alcoholism but not schizophrenia. This psychiatrist offered the opinion that the defendant acted knowingly during the robbery and was capable of forming specific intent to kill, maim or wound the person robbed.

The court's instructions defined both specific intent and knowing conduct and advised the jury that the culpability required for attempt to commit aggravated robbery as charged is either: (1) the specific intent, if resisted, to kill, maim or wound the person robbed or any other person; or (2) knowingly putting the person robbed or any other person in reasonable fear of death or bodily injury by the use of force, threats or intimidation with the deadly weapon. The court further instructed the jury that an impaired mental condition is an affirmative defense to that form of attempted aggravated robbery requiring a specific intent to kill, maim or wound, but that such defense is not applicable to that form of aggravated robbery requiring knowing conduct. Additionally, the jury was instructed that "(i)n your determination of whether the People have proven beyond a reasonable doubt that the Defendant acted 'knowingly', you may consider all of the evidence offered in this matter, including evidence of his mental condition." ⁵

The court submitted general verdicts of not guilty and guilty on the charge of attempt to commit aggravated robbery and instructed the jury that any verdict must be unanimous. The defendant made no objection to the forms of verdict or to the court's instruction on unanimity. Nor did the defendant tender an instruction on unanimity or alternative verdict forms in lieu of those submitted by the court to the jury. Subsequent to the jury's verdict of guilty, the court denied the defendant's motion for a new trial and imposed a sentence for an indeterminate term not to exceed 40 months.

Before addressing the issues here presented it is appropriate to summarize the culpability requirements for attempt to commit aggravated robbery and the affirmative defense of impaired mental condition. We then will consider separately the defendant's constitutional challenge to the restrictions on impaired mental condition as an affirmative defense and his unanimity argument on the jury verdict.

I.

Criminal attempt to commit aggravated robbery requires that the offender act with the kind of culpability otherwise required for aggravated robbery and engage in a substantial step toward the commission of aggravated robbery. Section 18-2-101(1), C.R.S. 1973 (1978 Repl. Vol. 8). Under the pertinent provisions of section 18-4-302(1), C.R.S. 1973 (1978 Repl. Vol. 8), a person has the requisite culpability for aggravated robbery when:

"(a) He is armed with a deadly weapon with intent, if resisted, to kill, maim, or wound the person robbed or any other person; or

"(b) He ... by the use of force, threats, or intimidation with a deadly weapon knowingly puts the person robbed or any other person in reasonable fear of death or bodily injury ..."

Specific intent means that the actor's "conscious objective is to cause the specific result proscribed by the statute defining the offense." Section 18-1-501(5), C.R.S. 1973 (1978 Repl. Vol. 8). In contrast to specific intent, section 18-1-501(6), C.R.S. 1973 (1978 Repl. Vol. 8), defines knowingly as follows:

"A person acts 'knowingly' ... with respect to conduct or to a circumstance described by a statute defining an offense when he is aware that his conduct is of such nature or that such circumstance exists. A person acts 'knowingly' ... with respect to a result of his conduct, when he is aware that his conduct is practically certain to cause the result."

Offenses requiring knowledge as the culpable mental state are not specific intent crimes. Section 18-1-501(6), C.R.S. 1973 (1978 Repl. Vol. 8); People v. Del Guidice, Colo., 606 P.2d 840 (1979); People v. Mingo, 196 Colo. 315, 584 P.2d 632 (1978).

Section 18-1-803, C.R.S. 1973 (1978 Repl. Vol. 8), addresses the issue of criminal responsibility for specific intent offenses when the offender suffers from an impaired mental condition:

"Evidence of an impaired mental condition though not legal insanity may be offered in a proper case as bearing upon the capacity of the accused to form the specific intent if such an intent is an element of the offense charged."

The issue of responsibility due to an impaired mental condition is an affirmative defense. Section 18-1-805, C.R.S. 1973 (1978 Repl. Vol. 8). Unless the prosecution's evidence raises the issue involving the defendant's impaired mental condition, the defendant must present some credible evidence to raise it. Section 18-1-407(1), C.R.S. 1973 (1978 Repl. Vol. 8). Once the issue is raised, the prosecution must prove beyond a reasonable doubt the guilt of the defendant as to that issue the defendant's capacity to form the requisite specific intent as well as all other elements of the offense. Section 18-1-407(2), C.R.S. 1973 (1978 Repl. Vol. 8).

II.

The defendant raises a two-pronged argument against the validity of his conviction. Reduced to plain terms his claim is that his conviction was obtained in violation of due process of law because: (1) the statutory scheme and the jury instructions based thereon relieved the prosecution of establishing beyond a reasonable doubt the culpability requirement of knowledge; and (2) the same statutory scheme and jury instructions prevented him from contesting during trial this essential element of the crime charged. We are not persuaded by his claim.

A.

The defendant argues that section 18-1-803, C.R.S. 1973 (1978 Repl. Vol. 8), which limits the affirmative defense of impaired mental condition to specific intent offenses, creates a conclusive presumption of culpability for non-specific intent crimes, such as those involving knowing conduct, and thereby relieves the prosecution of its burden of proving beyond a reasonable doubt the accused's culpability for these non-specific-intent offenses. This argument is untenable.

Admittedly, due process of law requires the prosecution to establish all essential elements of a crime beyond a reasonable doubt. E. g., In re Winship, 397 U.S. 358, 90 S.Ct. 1068, 25 L.Ed.2d 368 (1970); People v. District Court, 165 Colo. 253, 439 P.2d 741 (1968); section 18-1-402, C.R.S. 1973 (1978 Repl. Vol. 8). This constitutional mandate, however, does not impair the legislature's competence to establish the statutory constituents of criminal culpability for various offenses and to formulate particular rules of justification or excuse for acts that otherwise might be criminally punishable. The United States Supreme Court in Patterson v. New York, 432 U.S. 197, 97 S.Ct. 2319, 53 L.Ed.2d 281 (1977), considered in a due process context a state statutory scheme that imposed on a defendant the burden of establishing by a preponderance of evidence the affirmative defense of extreme emotional disturbance in order to...