People v. Vanrees

• Decision Date: 19 December 2005
• Docket Number: No. 03SC290.,03SC290.
• Citation: 125 P.3d 403
• Parties: The PEOPLE of the State of Colorado, Petitioner, v. Vernon L. VANREES, Respondent.
• Court: Colorado Supreme Court

Page 403

125 P.3d 403

The PEOPLE of the State of Colorado, Petitioner, v. Vernon L. VANREES, Respondent.

No. 03SC290.

Supreme Court of Colorado, En Banc.

December 19, 2005.^*

John W. Suthers, Attorney General, Matthew S. Holman, First Assistant Attorney General, Appellate Division, Criminal Justice Section, Denver, for Petitioner.

David S. Kaplan, Colorado State Public Defender, Andrew C. Heher, Deputy State Public Defender, Denver, for Respondent.

BENDER, Justice.

I. INTRODUCTION

We review the court of appeals' decision in People v. Vanrees, 80 P.3d 840 (Colo.App.2003), which held that a criminal defendant need not comply with the pleading requirements of the insanity statute in order to introduce evidence of his mental slowness to contest the culpable mental element of the crime charged. In addition, that court reversed Vanrees's convictions for the crimes requiring the culpable mental state of "knowingly," reasoning that the trial court's instruction given during jury deliberation wrongfully precluded the jury from considering evidence of Vanrees's mental slowness as it related to the crimes requiring the mental state "knowingly."

The People sought certiorari review of the court of appeals' decision, arguing that evidence of a defendant's mental slowness is not admissible to counter the required culpable mental state of the crime charged (mens rea) unless the defendant's "mental slowness" satisfied the threshold set forth in Colorado's affirmative defense of impaired mental condition.¹ Thus, the People argue that because he did not comply with the pleading requirements of the insanity-impaired mental condition statute, evidence of Vanrees's mental slowness had no bearing on whether he acted with the culpable mental state of "knowingly" when he committed the crimes requiring this culpable mental state.

Mental slowness does not fit the statutory definition of "mental disease or defect" unless "mental slowness" rises to the level of a "severely abnormal mental condition[] that grossly and demonstrably impair[s] a person's perception or understanding of reality." § 16-8-101.5(2)(b), C.R.S. (2005). We conclude that evidence of mental slowness in this case does not meet the threshold requirements of the affirmative defense of impaired mental condition and that the defendant may introduce relevant evidence of his mental slowness to counter or to contest factually whether he formed the culpable mental state of the crimes charged. Thus, the trial court acted properly by admitting evidence of Vanrees's mental slowness to contest his guilt for the crimes requiring the culpable mental state of "knowingly."

Turning to the issue concerning the instruction given during jury deliberations, we reverse the holding of the court of appeals. We reason that when the trial court informed the jury that it could consider "any evidence, other than intoxication" to determine whether Vanrees possessed the culpable mental state of "knowingly," this directive permitted the jury to consider evidence of Vanrees's mental slowness as to whether he acted "knowingly." Thus, we hold that this supplemental instruction did not preclude the jury from considering his mental slowness.

Hence, we reverse the judgment of the court of appeals and remand this case to that court with directions to return this case to the trial court to reinstate its original judgments of conviction for the following crimes: attempted second degree murder, attempted first degree sexual assault, and first degree burglary.

II. FACTS AND PROCEEDINGS BELOW

Vanrees was charged with attempted first degree murder, first degree assault, attempted first degree sexual assault, and first degree burglary for allegedly having assaulted a family acquaintance after breaking into her home.

Vanrees worked as an assistant manager at a fast-food restaurant. One evening when his shift ended at 5:00 p.m., he walked to a nearby bar where he drank approximately six beers and three shots of whiskey during a two- to three-hour period. Vanrees then left the bar, walked to a liquor store, purchased three bottles of schnapps, and consumed approximately two and one-half bottles of the schnapps before walking to a second bar. At the second bar, Vanrees drank eight to nine beers and six to seven shots of whiskey before leaving the bar at approximately 9:30 p.m.

Vanrees then walked to the home of J.W., a sixty-six-year-old woman whom he knew. Vanrees's parents had been long-time tenants of J.W.'s parents, but Vanrees and J.W. had not seen each other for several years. J.W. testified that she and Vanrees had never had so much as a conversation with each other in the past and that she had never had any problems with him.

J.W. was watching television in her bedroom when she looked up and saw a naked man standing in the doorway with a small appliance cover over his head. The man was holding a butter knife in one hand and a screwdriver in the other. When J.W. started screaming at the man, he rushed toward her, and the two wrestled. J.W. got the screwdriver and knife away and took the cover off of the man's head. She immediately recognized Vanrees.

When J.W. asked Vanrees what he was doing there, he said, "I came here to kill you." The two exchanged words and then engaged in a physical struggle, during the course of which Vanrees hit J.W. multiple times with a carpet sweeper, asked her to perform oral sex on him, pounded a screwdriver into her body multiple times, and attempted to suffocate her.

Vanrees then told J.W. that he was going to kill himself and J.W. asked if he would first call 911 because she was injured. Vanrees placed the call even though he had earlier told J.W. that he had pulled the telephone wires to the house. After placing the call, Vanrees borrowed a pair of pants from J.W. and asked her not to tell police he had been there. Before he was able to leave, ambulance personnel arrived and shortly thereafter Vanrees was arrested by the police.

Detective James Gavin testified that Vanrees smelled of alcohol and one of the firefighters who had responded to the 911 call testified that Vanrees was drunk. Two days after the incident, J.W. told detective Gavin that Vanrees's eyes were "glazed over" and that he appeared to be "off in another world" when he was at her house. At trial, J.W. described Vanrees's behavior during the incident as "bizarre."

Vanrees testified that he had no recollection of what had occurred between the time he went to the second bar and when he was later handcuffed by police. He stated that he was a high school graduate but that he had always taken special education classes because, according to his own admission, he was "kind of slow." No additional evidence concerning Vanrees's mental slowness was presented.

In closing, defense counsel argued that Vanrees's voluntary intoxication, coupled with his mental slowness, caused him to behave in such a "disorganized, bizarre, and strange" fashion that he necessarily could not have acted with the specific intent or deliberation to commit the crimes charged whose culpable mental state was "intentionally."² Defense counsel stated: "What you've heard and seen is a picture of someone who has something very wrong with him. Whose problems combined with alcohol led to J.W.'s night of terror.... [I]t is the combination of what is going on in his mind and how alcohol has affected him ... [I]ntoxication made it so that Mr. Vanrees did not have the ability to have specific intent and deliberation". She argued that the bizarre nature of Vanrees's behavior was "evidence of the fact that [he did not act] with intent or deliberation" and she asked the jury to "convict [Vanrees] of the lesser [included] offenses."

During deliberation, the jury submitted a question to the trial judge asking how to understand the term "knowingly":

Almost every count includes the term "knowingly."³ Can mental capacity, "slowness" of an individual, or potential insanity be part of the knowingly definition.

Please provide us a better definition of knowingly.

In response, the judge issued a supplemental written instruction, informing the jury that insanity and impaired mental condition were not issues in the case but that the jury could consider any evidence presented other than intoxication in their deliberations on the culpable mental state "knowingly." The supplemental instruction stated:

The defendant has not entered a plea of not guilty by reason of insanity. Thus, whether the defendant suffered from a severely abnormal mental condition caused by mental disease or defect that grossly and demonstrably impaired his perception or understanding of reality is not an issue for your consideration.

You will not receive any additional instruction regarding the culpable mental state "knowingly," other than that contained in Instructions Nos. 17⁴ and 18⁵.

In determining whether or not the element of "knowingly" has been proved beyond a reasonable doubt, you may consider any evidence, other than intoxication, presented in this case, or lack of evidence, that you believe to bear on that element.

You are reminded that you must consider the instructions as a whole.

(Emphasis added.)

The jury convicted Vanrees of attempted second degree murder, second degree assault, attempted first degree sexual assault, and first degree burglary.

On appeal, Vanrees asserted that the trial court's supplemental instruction erroneously prevented the jury from considering evidence of his "mental slowness" to determine whether the prosecution had proven beyond a reasonable doubt that he possessed the culpable mental state of "knowingly."⁶ The court of appeals held that evidence of mental slowness could be introduced without complying with the pleading requirements of the insanity statute and that the supplemental instruction "did not inform the jury that it could consider evidence of [the] defendant's `mental slowness' and capacity in assessing whether he knowingly...