State v. Frazier

• Decision Date: 25 October 1996
• Docket Number: No. 95-1355,95-1355
• Citation: 559 N.W.2d 34
• Parties: STATE of Iowa, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Kenneth Allen FRAZIER, Jr., and Daniel J. Halstead, Defendants-Appellants.
• Court: Iowa Court of Appeals

Page 34

559 N.W.2d 34

STATE of Iowa, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Kenneth Allen FRAZIER, Jr., and Daniel J. Halstead, Defendants-Appellants.

No. 95-1355.

Court of Appeals of Iowa.

Oct. 25, 1996.

Martha M. McMinn, and Shelley A. Horak, Sioux City, for defendants-appellants.

Thomas J. Miller, Attorney General, Robert P. Ewald, Assistant Attorney General, Thomas S. Mullin, County Attorney, and Paul E. Kittredge, Assistant County Attorney, for plaintiff-appellee.

Heard by HABHAB, P.J., and CADY and VOGEL, JJ.

HABHAB, Presiding Judge.

Defendants Kenneth Frazier and Daniel Halstead appeal the judgment and sentence entered upon their convictions of first-degree burglary, assault while participating in a felony, and aggravated assault. We affirm.

Lyndon Hamann lives in the first floor apartment at 119 Center Street in Sioux City. On January 30, 1995, Hamann noticed Daniel Halstead in the entrance hallway of the apartment building and confronted him. Halstead informed Hamann he was on his way to a vacant upstairs apartment to remove some property. Hamann told Halstead to leave and he did; however, Halstead returned later the same evening. Hamann again confronted Halstead and told him to leave. After Halstead left, Hamann had his girlfriend telephone police to report the incidents.

At approximately 6:00 a.m. on January 31, Hamann was awakened by a noise coming from the upstairs apartment. He went to investigate and saw Halstead inside the apartment with his arms full of clothes. Hamann once again told Halstead to leave and Halstead refused. Hamann then went to his own apartment and returned with a baseball bat. When Hamann entered the upstairs apartment's living room, he realized there were two other men with Halstead, Kenneth Frazier and Herbert Davis. Frazier had a gun pointed at Hamann. Hamann was able to escape the apartment unharmed and return to his own apartment. He then witnessed all three men run out of the apartment house and get into an older brown Cadillac. Hamann immediately went to a nearby store and telephoned police.

The police found a car matching Hamann's description parked in the 200 block of Perry Street. After Hamann identified the car, police proceeded to the only lighted apartment unit at the location. The officers knocked on the door and heard scuffling inside. When the police entered, they found Frazier and his brother. Davis was found in the bathroom and Halstead was found hiding crouched down in the back of a closet. Hamann identified Frazier, Davis, and Halstead as the men who had been in the upstairs apartment in his building.

Frazier, Halstead, and Davis were charged with first-degree burglary, assault while participating in a felony, and aggravated assault. Davis entered into a plea agreement with the State and testified as a State's witness at the bench trial of Frazier and Halstead.

At trial, Davis testified he had driven the Cadillac to 119 Center Street with Frazier and Halstead to burglarize the vacant upstairs apartment. Davis also stated while they were in the apartment Hamann came in and Frazier pulled a gun on him. The three then left in the Cadillac and went to the 210 Perry apartment.

During his testimony, Davis stated he had entered into a plea agreement with the State wherein he pled guilty to second-degree burglary and assault while participating in a felony. In exchange, Davis explained he was not charged as an habitual offender or sentenced for the mandatory minimum for use of a firearm. The agreement provided Davis would be sentenced to ten years on the burglary charge and five years on the assault charge and the sentences were to run consecutively. On direct examination, the State specifically asked Davis:

Q: Other than the plea agreement that you have entered into between the State of Iowa and yourself to resolve the charges against you and the State of Iowa, is there any other agreement that you have made with the State of Iowa?

A: No.

Q: So if there was any other kind of charge out there, that would not be part of this agreement, is that correct?

A: That's correct.

Frazier and Halstead waived their right to trial by jury and each presented an alibi defense. The court found them guilty as charged.

After the verdict, the defense learned that prior to trial, while Davis was in jail, he had agreed to bail out another inmate, Tony Davis ¹ (Tony), if Tony would beat up or kill Hamann in order to keep him from testifying. Tony was bailed out of jail with money provided by Davis through his girlfriend. After Tony was released, he did not perform as he had agreed and reported the matter to authorities.

The plea agreement reached between the State and Davis' counsel provided if Davis agreed to the plea no other charges would be filed against him relating to Hamann. A portion of the plea agreement provided:

This agreement disposes of all possible state criminal charges against the defendant arising out of the facts referred to in the minutes of testimony or circumstances surrounding acts of the defendant relating to this matter and including Lyndon Hamann.

Although the State disclosed the plea agreement to the defense, it failed to inform them the agreement included Davis' attempted solicitation of Tony to beat up or kill Hamann. The prosecutor maintained that although he knew of these allegations against Davis at the time the plea agreement was drafted, a full police report requesting a formal charge had not yet been submitted to the county attorney's office, so no disclosure was made.

Frazier and Halstead filed a joint motion for a new trial and motion in arrest of judgment arguing, among other things, the State's failure to disclose the extent of Davis' plea agreement prejudiced them. They also maintained the court had erred in refusing to allow them to present evidence of Hamann's drug dealing and Davis' possession of gun-related items, in support of their theory of defense. The State argued the undisclosed information was not material, defendants were given adequate notice of the matter in the plea agreement, and defense counsel knew or should have known of the matter, as both defendants were in contact with Davis and Tony while in jail.

Following a hearing, the court denied defendants' motion for a new trial. In addressing defendants' claim regarding the State's failure to disclose exculpatory evidence, the court found there was "no reasonable probability the court would have reached a different result should the State have disclosed such information to the Defendants." It further found the exclusion of evidence of Hamann's drug dealing and Davis' possession of gun-related items was correct.

Defendants appeal. They argue the court should have allowed evidence of Hamann's motive to make false claims against them in support of their theory of defense. Specifically, they argue they should have been allowed to present evidence that Halstead had bought bad drugs from Hamann and threatened to make it known to the neighborhood that Hamann was a police informant. Defendants maintain they should have also been allowed to present evidence that Davis had possession of a gun and certain gun-related items. Furthermore, defendants contend the court used an incorrect standard when evaluating their claim of prejudice due to Davis' perjured testimony and the State's failure to correct it. Finally, defendants argue the State's failure to disclose the exculpatory evidence prejudiced them.

I. Exclusion of Evidence. At trial, defendants alleged Hamann fabricated the charges in this case to deter Halstead from exposing his sale of bad drugs as well as the fact he was a police informant. Defendants also maintained that Davis had committed the charged crimes and had entered into a plea agreement to testify against defendants in order to avoid additional legal consequences of other pending criminal charges.

The defense argues the trial court's limitation of its cross-examination of Hamann and Davis, as well as its exclusion of testimony from defense witnesses, Sabasta and Buddi, denied defendants their constitutional right to present a defense. The defense further argues evidence regarding Davis' ownership of a gun or gun-related items found inside the Cadillac should have been admitted by the trial court.

At trial, the court generally sustained the State's objections to the admission of evidence that Hamann was a drug dealer pursuant to Iowa Rules of Evidence 608(b) and 609, except where it directly related to allegations of prior drug dealing involving Halstead. The trial court also precluded two defense witnesses, Buddi and Sabasta, from testifying as to Hamann's past drug dealing.

To the extent defendants raise constitutional issues, our review is de novo. State v. Swaim, 412 N.W.2d 568, 570 (Iowa 1987). Our review of a trial court's ruling under 608(b) will be disturbed on appeal only on abuse of discretion. State v. Smith, 522 N.W.2d 591, 593 (Iowa 1994).

Iowa Rule of Evidence 608(b) provides:

(b) Specific Instances of Conduct. Specific instances of the conduct of a witness, for the purposes of attacking or supporting his credibility, other than conviction of crime as provided in Iowa Evid.R. 609, ² may not be proved by extrinsic evidence. They may, however, in the discretion of the court, if probative of truthfulness or untruthfulness, be inquired into on cross-examination of the witness (1) concerning his character for truthfulness or untruthfulness, or (2) concerning the character for truthfulness or untruthfulness of another witness as to which character the witness being cross examined has testified.

From our review of the record, we find the trial court did not err in limiting the cross-examination of Hamann nor in excluding the testimony of Buddi and Sabasta pursuant to Iowa Rules of Evidence 608(b) and 609. ³ The court explained to the defense that for such evidence to be admissible it would have to "connect it up" to the crime for which defendants were...