State v. Gonzales, 21,584.

• Decision Date: 14 May 2002
• Docket Number: No. 21,584.,21,584.
• Parties: STATE of New Mexico, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Rudy GONZALES, Sr., Defendant-Appellee.
• Court: Court of Appeals of New Mexico

49 P.3d 681

132 N.M. 420

2002 NMCA 71

STATE of New Mexico, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Rudy GONZALES, Sr., Defendant-Appellee.

No. 21,584.

Court of Appeals of New Mexico.

May 14, 2002.

Certiorari Denied June 25, 2002.

Phyllis H. Subin, Chief Public Defender, Sheila Lewis, Assistant Appellate Defender, Santa Fe, NM, for Appellant.

Patricia A. Madrid, Attorney General, Santa Fe, NM, Max Shepherd, Assistant Attorney General, Albuquerque, NM, for Appellee.

Certiorari Denied, No. 27,549, June 25, 2002.

OPINION

ROBINSON, Judge.

{1} This is the State's appeal from the trial court's decision to dismiss charges against Defendant after two trials that resulted in hung juries and a showing of prosecutorial misconduct that the court described as rising "into the realm of perjury or attempts to mislead this court." We hold that because Defendant suffered no prejudice as a result of the State's misconduct, the trial court erred in dismissing based on the misconduct. With respect to the dismissal on due process grounds, we reverse and remand for further determination of whether retrial would violate due process under the Abbati-based standard we adopt below. See State v. Abbati, 99 N.J. 418, 493 A.2d 513, 521-22 (1985)

.

I. FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

{2} The facts in this case are largely undisputed. Rudy Gonzales, Senior (Defendant) and his son, Rudy Gonzales, Junior (Junior) were indicted for first-degree murder in late 1996 and early 1997. Their cases were severed and they were tried separately. Junior was convicted in April 1997. In April 1998, Defendant received a mistrial when the jury failed to agree; six out of twelve jurors favored conviction. In January 1999, the State retried Defendant with the same result.

{3} Following the second hung jury, Defendant filed two motions to dismiss the charges with prejudice, one in February 1999 on due process and double jeopardy grounds, and the other in July 1999 for prosecutorial misconduct. The latter related to the prosecution's failure to disclose its relationship with a witness named Billie Woolstenhulme.

{4} Woolstenhulme was a witness in the trial against Junior and was well known to local law enforcement as an informant. He implicated Junior, reporting that while they were incarcerated together, Junior confessed to the murder of Lisa Duncan. The State did not call Woolstenhulme in Defendant's first trial. The State attempted to call Woolstenhulme in Defendant's second trial, but failed to give adequate notice of its intentions and Woolstenhulme was excluded.

{5} Just days before the January 21, 2000, hearing on Defendant's motions to dismiss, the State filed notice that it would not call Woolstenhulme as a witness in the third trial. At the hearing on Defendant's motions to dismiss, the court heard testimony about the State's clandestine relationship with Woolstenhulme. Woolstenhulme was sentenced on various charges on April 2, 1997, days before Junior's trial. The State offered and Woolstenhulme accepted a plea to six felonies in return for a sentence of probation. The plea agreement also required that Woolstenhulme testify against Junior and Defendant.

{6} Bernalillo County Deputy District Attorney Theodore Raff testified that he made the plea offer at the request of former Sandoval County Assistant District Attorney Joanna Aguilar. Defendant introduced a March 12, 1997, letter from Raff to Aguilar memorializing that arrangement. As a result, Woolstenhulme avoided incarceration despite six arrests on multiple probation violations in 1997 and 1998. Woolstenhulme was before the court eight or nine times for these violations. The prosecuting attorney's office, through Aguilar, and the Sandoval County Sheriff's Department, made a series of requests that the Bernalillo County District Attorney's office enter a lenient plea agreement with Woolstenhulme. Aguilar ultimately arranged for Woolstenhulme to remain out of jail and not subject to habitual offender sentencing in exchange for his continued cooperation in the prosecution of Defendant and Junior. In her hearing testimony, however, Aguilar denied making any efforts on Woolstenhulme's behalf.

{7} The relationship between the district attorney's office and Woolstenhulme was not revealed to Defendant. At a pretrial interview, Woolstenhulme insisted that the State had not offered him anything in return for his promise to testify against Junior and Defendant. Aguilar, who prosecuted Junior and orchestrated the State's cooperation with Woolstenhulme, was present but did not correct this statement. Woolstenhulme testified to this as well at Junior's trial, and no one from the State corrected the testimony.

{8} The trial court dismissed the charges against Defendant, finding, inter alia, that: Defendant's witnesses, other than Aguilar, were credible; and the State made efforts on Woolstenhulme's behalf in exchange for his testimony against Junior and Defendant and did not disclose this to the defense. Furthermore, there were ongoing State efforts to assist Woolstenhulme after his testimony against Junior and prior to his proposed testimony in the third trial against Defendant.

{9} On the motion to dismiss based on prosecutorial misconduct, the trial court concluded that the State committed extreme prosecutorial misconduct with respect to Woolstenhulme and that this misconduct warranted dismissal of the charges against Defendant. On the motion to dismiss for denial of due process, the court concluded that there was no reasonable expectation of a different result based on the State's lack of showing of any new or different evidence it would present and that the prosecutorial misconduct weighed heavily against the State in the due process analysis. Therefore, the court also granted the motion to dismiss for denial of due process.

II. STANDARD OF REVIEW

{10} Defendant urges that we review the dismissal of the charges against him under an abuse of discretion standard, whereas the State maintains that the proper standard is de novo, with deference to the court's factual findings as in prosecutorial vindictiveness cases. We review the dismissal of charges de novo, deferring to the trial court's findings of fact where they are supported by substantial evidence. See State v. Armijo, 118 N.M. 802, 811, 887 P.2d 1269, 1278 (Ct.App.1994)

(reviewing dismissal for prosecutorial misconduct under de novo standard). Moreover, because the misconduct at issue did not happen in the context of trial, but rather required a separate review of events that occurred outside the courtroom, and because the misconduct is egregious in nature and implicates due process considerations, de novo review is appropriate. See State v. Brule, 1999-NMSC-026, ¶¶ 3-6, 127 N.M. 368, 981 P.2d 782.

III. DISCUSSION

{11} The trial court granted its dismissal on the grounds raised in each of Defendant's two motions to dismiss: prosecutorial misconduct and a due process violation based on the argument that retrial in this case would violate principles of fundamental fairness. We address the propriety of each in turn.

A. Prosecutorial Misconduct

{12} The State, primarily through Aguilar, made deals with Woolstenhulme in exchange for his testimony, but failed to disclose this information to Junior or Defendant. The State had the obligation to do so, as this was exculpatory evidence which Defendant had a right to know. See, e.g., United States v. Bagley, 473 U.S. 667, 678-83, 105 S.Ct. 3375, 87 L.Ed.2d 481 (1985)

(eliminating any analytical difference between impeachment evidence and other exculpatory evidence, all of which must be disclosed to the defendant). Not only did the State fail to disclose, it stood silently by as Woolstenhulme informed the court and the defense at Junior's trial that no deals had been made. The trial court found that the prosecution's conduct "journey[ed] into the realm of perjury." Such conduct violates the due process rights of Defendant, as well as the Rules of Professional Responsibility governing attorney conduct. See State v. Bartlett, 109 N.M. 679, 680, 789 P.2d 627, 628 (Ct.App.1990) (describing due process concerns and discovery violations as intertwined); Rule 16-804(C), (D), (H) NMRA 2002 (regarding attorney misconduct).

{13} The issue in this appeal, however, is not whether prosecutorial misconduct occurred. The trial court found that it did, and there was a sufficient evidentiary basis for the court's findings and conclusions in that regard. The question that this Court must address is whether the misconduct formed a basis for the dismissal of charges against Defendant. We hold that it did not.

{14} The law in New Mexico recognizes that a court can dismiss criminal charges based on severe prosecutorial misconduct. See generally State v. Breit, 1996-NMSC-067, 122 N.M. 655, 930 P.2d 792

. The dismissal of criminal charges for prosecutorial misconduct is an extreme sanction that should be reserved for the most severe prosecutorial transgressions. See Mathis v. State, 112 N.M. 744, 747, 819 P.2d 1302, 1305 (1991); Bartlett, 109 N.M. at 680,

789 P.2d at 628.

{15} While the conduct here was egregious, its impact on Defendant's trials was not. Woolstenhulme did not testify in either of the trials that resulted in hung juries. With respect to Defendant's trial, we are unable to discern any prejudice that resulted from the prosecutorial misconduct. There is no precedent in New Mexico for such a dismissal absent prejudice to the defendant. Defendant urges us to uphold the trial court, but fails to offer any legal support for the proposition that prejudice is not an essential part of the analysis. Indeed, all of the cases Defendant cites for such sanctions involve situations in which the evidence in dispute was held to be prejudicial.

{16} For example, in Bartlett, this Court expressly held that dismissal is not an available remedy for a discovery violation absent prejudice to the defendant. 109 N.M. at 680, 789 P.2d...