State v. Belleville, 2012–572
| Decision Date | 11 February 2014 |
| Docket Number | No. 2012–572,2012–572 |
| Citation | 88 A.3d 918,166 N.H. 58 |
| Parties | The STATE of New Hampshire v. Chad BELLEVILLE |
| Court | New Hampshire Supreme Court |
Michael A. Delaney, attorney general (Diana E. Fenton, assistant attorney general, on the brief and orally), for the State.
David M. Rothstein, deputy chief appellate defender, of Concord, on the brief and orally, for the defendant.
The defendant, Chad Belleville, appeals his conviction for second degree assault following a bench trial in Superior Court (O'Neill, J.), arguing that the State presented insufficient evidence to prove that he acted recklessly. See RSA 631:2 (2007) (amended 2010). We affirm.
The court could have found the following facts. The defendant's conviction stems from a motor vehicle accident that seriously injured the child of another motorist, which occurred on December 23, 2010, at approximately 9:15 p.m. on Route 28 near Pittsfield. The section of Route 28 where the accident occurred contains three travel lanes: (1) a northbound travel lane; (2) a median turning lane measuring approximately the width of two lanes and set off from the travel lanes by two sets of solid double yellow lines; and (3) a southbound travel lane. The defendant was driving southbound in a Ford Explorer, a sport utility vehicle (SUV). Corey Pickering was driving in the opposite direction, in the northbound lane, followed by a Subaru occupied by Tressa Flanders (Flanders), who was in the front passenger seat, Flanders' husband, who was driving, and their son (the victim) and two daughters, who were in the back seat. Behind the Flanderses' vehicle was a Honda driven by Evan Welch. It was dark and the weather was dry, clear, and cold.
Just before the accident, Pickering observed the defendant's SUV, traveling in the opposite direction, drifting into the median lane. The SUV came within inches of Pickering's driver's side mirror and Pickering had to swerve his vehicle to avoid being hit. Pickering then saw in his rearview mirror that the SUV hit the Flanderses' Subaru.
Prior to the collision, Flanders saw headlights from an oncoming vehicle and yelled to her husband to "watch out." Her husband tried to swerve to avoid being hit, but the oncoming vehicle hit the driver's side of their car. Welch saw the Subaru "fishtail[ ] really suddenly" and saw its back end "explode into a lot of pieces." He then saw "headlights coming straight at [him]" and within a couple of seconds, the SUV hit his vehicle. Welch skidded into the passenger side of the Subaru and both vehicles came to a stop on the side of the road. The SUV "traveled across a small field" and came to rest alongside the road.
Immediately after the collision, Flanders "saw a gaping hole" in the back of the Subaru on the driver's side and noticed that her son was no longer in the vehicle. She climbed out of the vehicle, made sure that her daughters and her husband were not seriously injured, and then looked for her son. She located him lying "in a cradled position." As a result of the accident, her son sustained a traumatic brain injury, loss of "his left eye socket," and dislocation and fracture of his jawbone.
When Sergeant Matthew Shapiro of the New Hampshire State Police arrived at the scene, he asked the defendant whether he had made any telephone calls "either just prior to the collision or just after the collision." The defendant told Shapiro that he had telephoned his girlfriend after the collision to tell her what had happened. Shapiro asked to look at the defendant's cellular telephone to ascertain what time that call had been made. The defendant showed Shapiro his call history and Shapiro noticed that no calls were shown as having been made before the accident. Shapiro testified that he asked the defendant about the history of calls that had occurred prior to the collision and the defendant told him that he thought he had "erased the history or something."
Shortly thereafter, Sergeant David Scott McCormack of the New Hampshire State Police arrived at the scene. He spoke with the defendant, who told him that he could not recall what had happened. Approximately eight months later, on August 7, 2011, McCormack again spoke with the defendant. During their conversation, the defendant admitted that, at the time of the accident, he was checking a text message. He stated that he did not see the Subaru and that, "I just looked down and the next thing you know I crashed."
McCormack and other law enforcement officers conducted reconstruction analysis and a post-collision inspection of the defendant's Ford Explorer. It was determined that there was no mechanical problem with the vehicle that would have led to the collision. Furthermore, based upon his investigation, McCormack opined that the cause of the collision was that the defendant was traveling "southbound on Route 28 in a Ford Explorer when he crossed two sets of double yellow lines and struck the Flanderses' vehicle and the Welch vehicle that were operating within their lane northbound." He noted that there was no evidence that the defendant had either braked or taken any evasive action to avoid the vehicles prior to the collision.
The defendant was charged with one count of second degree assault for recklessly causing serious bodily injury to another by "cross[ing] over two sets of double solid lines through a turning lane and into the northbound lane, causing a collision with oncoming motor vehicles." See RSA 631:2. He was also charged with one count of vehicular assault for negligently causing serious bodily injury to another based upon his failure "to pay due attention" while operating a motor vehicle and crossing "double solid yellow lines, causing a collision with oncoming vehicles." See RSA 265:79–a (2004), stricken in part as unconstitutional by State v. Rollins–Ercolino, 149 N.H. 336, 343, 821 A.2d 953 (2003).
The accident occurred at approximately 9:15 p.m. At trial, the State introduced the records of the defendant's cellular telephone activity from 8:50 p.m. to 9:25 p.m. The records disclosed that the defendant received at least two text messages between 8:51 p.m. and 9:04 p.m. They also established that the defendant made and received calls between 8:53 p.m. and 9:05 p.m. The records showed no calling or messaging activity between 9:05 p.m. and 9:18 p.m.; thus, the records were consistent with the defendant's admission that, at the time of the accident, he was checking a text message.
At the close of all of the evidence, the defendant moved to dismiss the charges on the ground that the evidence was insufficient to prove that his conduct was either criminally negligent or reckless. The court denied the motion and found him guilty of both charges. This appeal followed.
The defendant argues that the trial court erred in finding him guilty of second degree assault because the evidence was insufficient to prove that he acted recklessly. Although, in his brief, the defendant also argues that the trial court erred in finding him guilty of acting negligently, at oral argument, he conceded that his conduct was criminally negligent. We, therefore, limit our analysis to whether the evidence was sufficient to prove that the defendant acted recklessly.
To prevail upon his challenge to the sufficiency of the evidence, the defendant must prove that no rational trier of fact, viewing all of the evidence and all reasonable inferences from it in the light most favorable to the State, could have found guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.
State v. Shepard, 158 N.H. 743, 746, 973 A.2d 318 (2009). "Because persons rarely explain to others the inner workings of their minds or mental processes, a culpable mental state must, in most cases[,] be proven by circumstantial evidence." State v. Tayag, 159 N.H. 21, 24, 977 A.2d 510 (2009) (). When the evidence as to one or more of the elements of the charged offense is solely circumstantial, it must exclude all reasonable conclusions except guilt. State v. Germain, 165 N.H. 350, 360, 79 A.3d 1025 (2013). Under this standard, however, we still consider the evidence in the light most favorable to the State and examine each evidentiary item in context, not in isolation. Shepard, 158 N.H. at 746, 973 A.2d 318.
To have convicted the defendant of second degree assault, the State was required to prove, beyond a reasonable doubt, that the defendant "recklessly cause[d] serious bodily injury to another." RSA 631:2, I(a).
Assessment of criminal recklessness—that is, whether a defendant was aware of the risk of serious bodily injury resulting from his actions, consciously disregarded the risk, and had knowledge of circumstances that made disregarding the risk a "gross deviation" from law-abiding conduct—involves comparing the defendant's conduct with that of a law-abiding person. See State v. Evans, 134 N.H. 378, 385, 594 A.2d 154 (1991) ; see also Hull, 149 N.H. at 713, 827 A.2d 1001 ; Model Penal Code § 2.02 cmt. 3, at 237 (Official Draft and Revised Comments 1985). As the comment to the Model Penal Code section defining recklessness explains, when...
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