State v. Edwards

Decision Date24 November 2010
Docket NumberNo. 100,457.,100,457.
Citation291 Kan. 532,243 P.3d 683
PartiesSTATE of Kansas, Appellee, v. Edrick EDWARDS, Appellant.
CourtKansas Supreme Court

[243 P.3d 686, 291 Kan. 532]

Syllabus by the Court

1. Pursuant to K.S.A. 22-3402(1), a defendant being held in jail solely by reason of a criminal charge must be brought to trial within 90 days of arraignment on that charge, subject to two exceptions: (1) where the delay beyond 90 days occurs as a result of the application or fault of the defendant; or (2) where the court has ordered a continuance for one of the reasons set forth in K.S.A. 22-3402(5).

2. K.S.A. 22-3402(5)(b) permits the court to extend the time for trial beyond the 90-day limitation period of K.S.A. 22-3402(1) when a proceeding to determine the defendant's competency to stand trial is pending and such competency determination may not be completed within the applicable time limitation.

3. Pursuant to K.S.A. 22-3302(1), a court is required to order the suspension of criminal proceedings when it determines that there is reason to believe that the defendant is incompetent to stand trial. Such a suspension of proceedings functions as a continuance under K.S.A. 22-3402(5)(b), regardless of whether the court's competency inquiry was initiated by a defense motion.

4. Following a court-ordered suspension of the criminal proceedings under K.S.A. 22-3302(1), if the defendant is subsequently found competent to stand trial, K.S.A. 22-3402(5)(b) directs that a trial shall be scheduled within 90 days of the competency finding.

5. The State has the burden to prove, by a preponderance of the evidence, that a defendant's statements during a custodial interrogation were voluntarily made, i.e., that the statements were the product of the defendant's free and independent will.

6. In an appeal, the appellate court is generally not permitted to make factual findings or to render an expert opinion on the defendant's mental state during a police interrogation.

7. An appellant may not assign as error the district court's failure to fully review evidence which was not admitted into evidence by the court.

8. The admission of autopsy photographs to assist in understanding a coroner's report is an accepted practice.

9. The identification of the murder victim has been approved as a legitimate purpose for introducing photographs of the deceased victim.

10. The patterned instruction on aiding and abetting has been deemed sufficient as written, and a district court's refusal to supplement the instruction is not reversible error.

11. An overbroad limiting instruction on K.S.A. 60-455 evidence will be deemed harmless error if the defendant was not prejudiced by the inclusion of more material facts than were warranted by the evidence in the case.

12. Even if the errors alleged on appeal do not individually require reversal, the cumulative effect of those errors will require reversal where the totality of the circumstances substantially prejudiced the defendant and denied the defendant a fair trial.

Rachel L. Pickering, of Kansas Appellate Defender Office, argued the cause and was on the brief for appellant.

Matt J. Maloney, assistant district attorney, argued the cause, and Nola Tedesco Foulston, district attorney, and Steve Six, attorney general, were with him on the brief for appellee.

The opinion of the court was delivered by JOHNSON, J.:

Edrick Edwards appeals his convictions for felony murder and attempted aggravated robbery. Edwards claims that his case should have been dismissed for a statutory speedy trial violation; that the district court should have suppressed his custodial statements as being involuntary; that the district court should have given his requested instruction on aiding and abetting; thatthe district court should not have admitted highlyprejudicial photographs at trial; that the district court erred in denying his request to modify the limiting instruction on K.S.A. 60-455 evidence; and that cumulative trial errors substantially prejudiced his right to a fair trial. Finding no reversible error, we affirm.

Factual Overview

The charges against Edwards, and three others, stemmed from an attempted armed robbery of Donyel Bagsby, during which Bagsby was fatally shot with a small caliber weapon. The incident occurred inside the Bagsby's home, where one of the men, Samuel Toliver, had gained entrance under the guise of purchasing marijuana. The State effected a plea agreement with Toliver whereby he was offered a reduced charge of involuntary manslaughter in exchange for his testimony against Edwards and the two other participants.

Toliver testified that the four men had spent the day driving around and smoking marijuana. At some point, the men hatched a plan to rob Bagsby, who they knew to be a small-time marijuana dealer. At the Bagsby residence, Toliver took the point. Mrs. Bagsby answered Toliver's knock and Bagsby came to the door, where he and Toliver began negotiating the price of the marijuana Toliver asked to purchase. Edwards then pushed the door open and entered the residence, carrying a shotgun. Bagsby and Edwards wrestled, and during the struggle, Bagsby was shot. Bagsby was able to shove Edwards out of the house, prior to collapsing and dying of massive blood loss before Mrs. Bagsby's 911 call could be answered. Toliver remained in the residence, at Mrs. Bagsby's request, and he was present when law enforcement arrived.

Edwards was subsequently arrested, Mirandized, and interrogated. Initially, Edwards denied even being present at the Bagsby house. Eventually, he related a version of events that had him at the Bagsby house with the others to buy drugs, but without any knowledge of a plan to rob the dealer. He also denied being in possession of a firearm when he entered the house.

Edwards was charged with felony murder and attempted aggravated robbery and was arraigned on March 7, 2007. The applicableprocedural history will be related under the pertinent issues below. Ultimately, Edwards was convicted of both charges and sentenced to a hard-20 life sentence, and he filed this direct appeal. We have original jurisdiction under K.S.A. 22-3601(b)(1).

Statutory Speedy Trial

For his first issue, Edwards claims he was denied his right under K.S.A. 22-3402(1) to be brought to trial within 90 days after arraignment, and, therefore, he must be discharged. The State does not challenge the applicability of the 90-day limit, but asserts that under the provisions of K.S.A. 22-3402(1), (3), (5)(b), and (5)(d), Edwards was brought to trial in a timely manner. K.S.A. 22-3402 provides, in relevant part:

"(1) If any person charged with a crime and held in jail solely by reason thereof shall not be brought to trial within 90 days after such person's arraignment on the charge, such person shall be entitled to be discharged from further liability to be tried for the crime charged, unless the delay shall happen as a result of the application or fault of the defendant, or a continuance shall be ordered by the court under subsection (5).
....
"(3) If any trial scheduled within the time limitation prescribed by subsection (1) or (2) is delayed by the application of or at the request of the defendant, the trial shall be rescheduled within 90 days of the original trial deadline.
....
"(5) The time for trial may be extended beyond the limitations of subsections (1) and (2) for any of the following reasons:
....
(b) A proceeding to determine the defendant's competency to stand trial is pending and a determination thereof may not be completed within the time limitations fixed for trial by this section. If the defendant is subsequently found to be competent to stand trial, the trial shall be scheduled within 90 days of such finding;....
(d) Because of other cases pending for trial, the court does not have sufficient time to commence the trial of the case within the time fixed for trial by this section. Not more than one continuance of not more than 30 days may be ordered upon this ground."

Edwards was arraigned on March 7, 2007, which started the 90-day speedy trial clock. A trial date was set for April 30, 2007. At Edwards' requests, the trial was continued to June 4, and then latercontinued to June 18, 2007. On June 18, Edwards requested and the district court ordered that Edwards be evaluated by Comprehensive Community Care of Sedgwick County (COMCARE) to determine his competency to stand trial. The order suspended the proceedings until further order of the court and directed COMCARE to report back to the district court with its opinion as to the defendant's competency to stand trial within 60 days. COMCARE submitted its evaluation, dated August 6, 2007, and the district court issued an order on August 10, 2007, that found Edwards to be competent to stand trial, that ordered the proceedings which had been suspended to be resumed, and that placed the case on the jury trial docket for October 1, 2007.

On September 20, 2007, defense counsel prepared a motion to discharge Edwards for a violation of his statutory speedy trial rights, which motion was file-stamped the next day. In the motion, Edwards acknowledged that the delays between April 30 and August 10, 2007, resulted from the application or fault of the defendant and were excluded from the statutory speedy trial computation. However, he argued that the remaining 107 days between the March 7 arraignment and the October 1 trial date were attributable to the State, thus requiring his discharge under K.S.A. 22-3402(1). In the motion's prayer, Edwards alludes to the State's "failure to proceed by the alternative as provided in K.S.A. 22-3402(3)," albeit the motion contains no explanation of such an alternative argument.

The court heard the motion on September 28, 2007. At stake for the State, i.e., for all of the citizens of this sovereignty, was the question of whether a person charged with first-degree murder would be set free without ever having a jury determine if he was guilty. At stake for the...

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