State v. Coleman

• Decision Date: 31 March 2021
• Docket Number: A19-0708
• Citation: 957 N.W.2d 72
• Parties: STATE of Minnesota, Appellant/Cross-Respondent, v. Eric Joseph COLEMAN, Respondent/Cross-Appellant.
• Court: Minnesota Supreme Court

957 N.W.2d 72

STATE of Minnesota, Appellant/Cross-Respondent,

v.Eric Joseph COLEMAN, Respondent/Cross-Appellant.

A19-0708

Supreme Court of Minnesota.

Filed: March 31, 2021

OPINION

CHUTICH, Justice.

This case presents the issue of whether Eric Coleman established that the instruction given at his trial for third-degree murder, to which he did not object, materially misstated well-established law and, if so, affected his substantial rights. A Chisago County grand jury indicted Coleman on charges of third-degree depraved mind murder under Minnesota Statutes section 609.195(a) (2020). This statute prohibits a person from "perpetrating an act eminently dangerous to others and evincing a depraved mind, without regard to human life." Id. The indictment alleged that after consuming enough alcohol to raise his alcohol concentration to twice the legal limit, Coleman drove his snowmobile at nearly 60 miles per hour across a populated frozen lake, hitting and fatally injuring an 8-year-old boy, A.G. Coleman pleaded not guilty and a jury trial ensued.

When instructing the jury, the district court used the model jury instruction for third-degree depraved mind murder. The model instruction tells the jurors, among other things, that the underlying act must be "committed in a reckless or wanton manner with the knowledge that someone may be killed." Coleman did not object to this instruction, and the jury found him guilty as charged. He appealed, and the court of appeals affirmed. Having granted review, we now also affirm.

FACTS

A Chisago County grand jury indicted Eric Coleman for several offenses, including third-degree depraved mind murder. See Minn. Stat. § 609.195(a) (2020). Coleman pleaded not guilty and demanded a jury trial.

At trial, the State presented the following evidence. At 7:30 p.m. on January 26, 2018, the family of 8-year-old A.G. was setting up its portable ice-fishing house on South Chisago Lake. Although the sun had set, it was "exceptionally bright" on the lake that night. There were "a lot of other fish houses" in the area.

As A.G.’s father arranged the inside of the icehouse, which was over 6 feet tall and had reflectors on all four corners, A.G. and his mother stood nearby, next to the family's parked pickup truck. When A.G. heard a snowmobile start "a little ways" from the pickup, he "walked down to the end of the truck to watch the snowmobile go by." His mother then observed a snowmobile "coming right towards" them. As she tried to warn A.G., the snowmobile hit the truck and A.G. before driving straight through the icehouse. A.G. and his father were injured.

A.G. was airlifted to a hospital, where he died several days later. A.G.’s injuries included fractured legs

, internal bleeding, and a traumatic brain injury.

When police officers arrived at the scene, they spoke to Coleman, the driver of the snowmobile, who was also injured during the crash. He told an officer that he "didn't see the vehicle[,] ... the ice house[,] ... or the people outside [of] the pick-up truck" and that the truck "came out of nowhere and [he] didn't have time to react." After observing indicia of impairment, including bloodshot and watery glassy eyes, the officers secured a sample of Coleman's blood, which later revealed that he had an alcohol concentration of 0.165 (more than twice the legal limit). The State's expert testified that Coleman's alcohol concentration "could only have been higher" when the accident occurred.

Coleman chose to testify at trial. He told jurors that on the day of the deadly collision, he drank several higher-alcohol-content beers, which he called "grenades," before driving his snowmobile on South Chisago Lake. There, he visited with his son and his daughter's boyfriend. During the visit, he consumed another beer. Coleman testified that he had allowed both his son and his daughter's boyfriend to take his snowmobile for a ride. The boyfriend testified that, about 20 minutes before the accident, he had ridden the same trail that Coleman would later take and had not seen any icehouses on the path. The timeline provided by the family of A.G. suggests that they arrived at the lake and set up their icehouse sometime after Coleman got there.

After the visit, Coleman sped away on his snowmobile, reaching the speed of 58 miles per hour just before hitting the parked pickup truck and A.G. He acknowledged that he had an alcohol concentration of more than twice the legal limit when the crash occurred. Coleman also admitted that he knew that drinking and driving is dangerous and that people die from accidents caused by drunken driving. After acknowledging that these facts were "general, public knowledge," he told the jury that he had "a specific knowledge" of the dangers of drinking and driving because on November 2, 2017 (less than 3 months before the crash at issue here), he was involved in an alcohol-related crash in which the driver of the other vehicle was seriously injured. Coleman testified to being "blacked out" during that accident; the responding officer testified at trial that Coleman had an alcohol concentration of 0.304 after that crash. The other driver was taken to the hospital by ambulance.

After Coleman and all other witnesses testified, the district court instructed the jury on the standard to apply to determine Coleman's guilt. Before doing so, the district court discussed the proposed jury instructions with the parties on several occasions. Regarding the third-degree depraved mind murder charge, the court proposed the following language to describe the third element of the offense:

The defendant's intentional act which caused the death of [A.G.] was eminently dangerous to human beings and was performed without regard for human life.

Such an act may not be specifically intended to cause death and may not be specifically directed at [A.G.], but it was committed in a reckless or wanton manner with the knowledge that someone may be killed and with a heedless disregard of that happening.

(Emphasis added.) The proposed language essentially inserted A.G.’s name into the model jury instruction, see 10 Minn. Dist. Judges Ass'n, Minnesota Practice—Jury Instruction Guides, Criminal , CRIMJIG 11.38 (6th ed. 2015). Coleman's attorney did not object to the final instructions proposed by the district court, and this instruction was read to the jury. The jury found Coleman guilty on the third-degree murder charge, and the district court imposed a presumptive 150-month prison sentence.

On appeal, Coleman argued that the district court committed plain error when it instructed the jurors that Coleman need only have acted "with the knowledge that someone may be killed." According to Coleman, the above-quoted phrase incorrectly defined recklessness, which he claimed was the required mental state for third-degree depraved mind murder.¹

Quoting State v. Zupetz , 322 N.W.2d 730, 733–34 (Minn. 1982), Coleman explained that "a person acts ‘recklessly’ when he consciously disregards a substantial and unjustifiable risk that the element of the offense exists or will result from the conduct." (Emphasis added.) Because the phrase "someone may be killed" allowed the jurors to find him guilty of third-degree depraved mind murder if they found that he disregarded "some or any level of risk," as opposed to a "substantial and unjustifiable risk," Coleman argued that the district court misstated the law.

Quoting State v. Barnes , 713 N.W.2d 325, 331 (Minn. 2006), the State conceded that the mental state "for depraved mind is equivalent" to the mental state "for recklessness."² Nevertheless, it claimed that Coleman was arguing that a defendant must know that his reckless act would cause death. According to the State, such a heightened standard of proof would effectively change third-degree depraved mind murder from an unintentional crime to an intentional crime.

The court of appeals affirmed Coleman's conviction of third-degree depraved mind murder. State v. Coleman , 944 N.W.2d 469 (Minn. App. 2020). The court said, "[A]s both parties recognize, the supreme court has held that the mental state required for third-degree depraved-mind murder is ‘equivalent to a reckless standard.’ " Id. at 478 (quoting Barnes , 713 N.W.2d at 332 ). Given that standard, the court of appeals concluded that because the district court's instruction allowed the jury "to find Coleman guilty if it found that Coleman acted in a careless manner, and knew only that his conduct may result in someone being killed," the instruction did not "properly explain an element of the charged offense." Coleman , 944 N.W.2d at 479. According to the court, the district court was required "to instruct the jury that it could find Coleman guilty only if it found that Coleman was aware that his conduct presented a substantial and unjustifiable risk of causing the death of another and he consciously disregarded that risk." Id. at 477 (emphasis added).

In assessing whether the error was plain, the court of appeals shifted its focus from the district court's use of the phrase "someone may be killed" to the district court's failure to use the phrase "substantial and unjustifiable risk of death to another person." See id. at 480. Citing State v. Milton , 821 N.W.2d 789, 806 (Minn. 2012), the court of appeals reasoned that a failure to provide a specific explanation of an element of the offense is not plain if an appellate court has not yet clearly required such an explanation. Coleman , 944 N.W.2d at 480. Because no appellate court had ever required a district court to define "recklessly" as a "conscious disregard of a substantial and unjustifiable risk" in the context of a charge of third-degree depraved mind murder, the court concluded that the failure to include that phrase in the jury instruction was not plain error. Id.

The State filed a petition for review and Coleman filed a cross-petition for review. We granted both petitions.

ANALYSIS

On appeal, the State contends that the jury instruction,...