State v. Hunt, No. 8-405/07-0181 (Iowa App. 10/15/2008)
| Decision Date | 15 October 2008 |
| Docket Number | No. 8-405/07-0181.,8-405/07-0181. |
| Parties | STATE OF IOWA, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. RAMALE ANTRON HUNT, Defendant-Appellant. |
| Court | Iowa Court of Appeals |
Appeal from the Iowa District Court for Black Hawk County, Stephen C. Clarke, Judge.
Ramale Hunt appeals from his first-degree murder conviction. AFFIRMED.
Mark C. Smith, State Appellate Defender, and David Arthur Adams, Assistant Appellate Defender, for appellant.
Ramale Antron Hunt, pro se.
Thomas J. Miller, Attorney General, Thomas S. Tauber, Assistant Attorney General, Thomas J. Ferguson, County Attorney, and Kimberly Griffith and Sue Swan, Assistant County Attorneys, for appellee.
Heard by Mahan, P.J., and Vaitheswaran and Doyle, JJ.
The shooting and death of a man in Waterloo led to the filing of a first-degree murder charge against Ramale Hunt. A jury found Hunt guilty as charged. On appeal, Hunt and his attorney argue he is entitled to reversal based on the following claimed errors: (1) there was insufficient evidence that he acted with malice aforethought or that his acts were willful, deliberate, and premeditated; (2) the district court erred in overruling his "challenge to the State's peremptory strike of the only minority juror remaining on the jury panel"; (3) the district court erred in denying his motion for new trial based on prosecutorial misconduct; (4) the district court erred in denying his request to present the videotaped statement of a witness; (5) the district court erred in excluding certain impeachment evidence; (6) the district court erred in submitting a jury instruction on multiple theories; (7) the district court erred in refusing to grant a mistrial based on a police officer's testimony; (8) the district court erred in admitting deposition testimony of a witness who was deemed unavailable; (9) the district court erred in admitting hearsay testimony concerning the disposal of a gun; and (10) the district court erred in excluding a videotaped interview of a witness.
The jury was instructed that the State had to prove the following elements of first-degree murder:
1. On or about the 6th day of June, 2004, the defendant shot Rob Robinson.
2. Rob Robinson died as a result of being shot.
3. The defendant acted with malice aforethought.
4. The defendant acted willfully, deliberately, premeditatedly and with a specific intent to kill Robinson.
Hunt contends there was insufficient evidence to establish that he acted with malice aforethought or that his actions were willful, deliberate, and premeditated. A finding of guilt is binding if supported by substantial evidence. State v. Dalton, 674 N.W.2d 111, 116 (Iowa 2004).
With respect to the malice aforethought element, the jury was instructed that the phrase meant "a fixed purpose or design to do some physical harm to another which exists before the act is committed." The jury was further instructed that malice aforethought did "not have to exist for any particular length of time." Finally, the jury was instructed that malice aforethought could be "inferred from the defendant's use of a dangerous weapon," and a gun was a dangerous weapon.
The jury also received definitions of "willful," "to deliberate," and "premeditate." "Willful" was defined as "intentional or by fixed design or purpose and not accidental." "To deliberate" was defined as "to weigh in one's mind, to consider, to contemplate, or to reflect." "Premeditate" was defined as "to think or ponder upon a matter before acting."
For purposes of this argument, Hunt appears to concede that he shot Robinson, but argues he was "attacked and cut by a blow from Rob Robinson" and the attack "was sufficient provocation to excite in a reasonable person an irresistible passion to retaliate." In his view, the evidence supported a finding of guilt on the lesser included offense of voluntary manslaughter but not on first-degree murder. We are not persuaded by this argument.
The record reveals the following facts. A waitress at a bar in the vicinity of the shooting saw Hunt running outside and noticed that his face was bloody and there was an object in his hand. Shots were fired from Hunt's direction towards Robinson. Robinson stumbled. At this point, the waitress went inside the bar. When she came out, she saw Robinson face down on the ground. Based on the shots she heard previously, she came to the conclusion that the object in Hunt's hand was a gun. She had no doubt the shooter was Hunt. Although the waitress's version of events at trial differed from versions she had previously given, it was the jury's prerogative to assess this inconsistency. State v. Frommelt, 159 N.W.2d 532, 535 (Iowa 1968) ().
A Waterloo police officer testified he investigated gunfire at the home of Hunt's girlfriend three days before the shooting of Robinson. At least six or seven bullets struck the girlfriend's vehicle and house. The officer interviewed Hunt, who told him he believed a gang called L-Block was behind the gunfire. Hunt also mentioned the name of Robinson's nephew. Hunt talked generally about his theory of retaliation, stating it should occur within a day or a few days.
On the night of Robinson's shooting, a woman who knew both Hunt and Robinson saw Hunt chasing Robinson around a building. After the men turned the corner of the building, she heard approximately three gunshots, saw the flash from a gun, and smelled gunfire. She stated she saw Hunt shoot Robinson. The defense impeached her with a prior statement in which she said she could not see who was shooting or who was shot but, again, it was the jury's prerogative to determine what weight to give her trial testimony. Id.
Another witness testified he saw Robinson two days before the shooting. Robinson told him he was having problems with Hunt and he felt as if something was going to happen to him. The witness watched a fight between Hunt and Robinson three months earlier. He testified there was bad blood between the two.
Many other witnesses also testified to events on the night of the shooting. We find it unnecessary to detail that additional evidence. Suffice it to say that, together with the testimony summarized above, it amounted to substantial evidence in support of the challenged elements of first-degree murder.
The State used a peremptory challenge to strike an African-American man from the jury. Hunt, who is also African-American, objected to the strike. At a reported hearing, the prosecutor stated the potential juror was struck because he knew several potential witnesses. She continued:
And my family being a member of the African-American community, the small, tight-knit community, and everybody basically knows one another or of one another and I guarantee he's going to know a great number of these witnesses . . . .
She added that the State also struck two members of the jury panel because those members knew Hunt.
Hunt's attorney responded that the State's perception of the "close-knit" nature of the African-American community in Waterloo would foreclose any member of that community from serving on a jury involving an African-American defendant or witness. At this point, the prosecutor added reasons for striking the potential juror. She mentioned that the juror said he was "like an adopted brother" to certain witnesses. She also mentioned that another African-American individual on the panel would have been on the jury had he not been excused for a family emergency. The prosecutor discounted the juror's assertion that he could be fair and impartial.
After considering these assertions and counter-assertions, the court rejected Hunt's objections to the peremptory strike. The court stated:
The fact that a juror is struck because he knows potential witnesses is not unusual and so I am going to find that the reasons the State has elucidated are sufficiently race neutral to allow the strike. And that's the ruling of the court.
On appeal, Hunt maintains that the "district court erred in accepting the prosecutor's statements as a race neutral reason for exercising a peremptory challenge on the only minority remaining on the jury panel." His challenge implicates Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79, 106 S. Ct. 1712, 90 L. Ed. 2d 69 (1986). There, the Supreme Court held that, under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution, a prosecutor may not purposefully discriminate by using peremptory strikes to challenge potential jurors solely on the basis of their race. Batson, 476 U.S. at 89, 106 S. Ct. at 1719, 90 L. Ed. 2d at 83. Because the issue is of constitutional magnitude, our review is de novo. State v. Keys, 535 N.W.2d 783, 785 (Iowa Ct. App. 1995).
A three-part test is used to establish purposeful discrimination. First, the defendant must establish membership in "a racial group capable of being singled out for differential treatment." Batson, 476 U.S. at 94, 106 S. Ct. at 1722, 90 L Ed. 2d. at 86.1 This prima facie showing may be made "by relying solely on the facts concerning [the jury's] selection in his case." Id. at 95, 106 S. Ct. at 1722, 90 L. Ed. 2d. at 87. Second, "the burden shifts to the State to come forward with a neutral explanation for challenging black jurors." Id. at 97, 106 S. Ct. at 1723, 90 L. Ed. 2d. at 88. This second step "does not demand an explanation that is persuasive, or even plausible." Purkett v. Elem, 514 U.S. 765, 767-768, 115 S. Ct. 1769, 1771, 131 L. Ed. 2d. 834, 838 (1995). If a prosecutor provides a combination of discriminatory and race-neutral reasons for the strike and the district court only relies on the race-neutral reason, we may affirm on the basis of the race-neutral reason. See Rice v. Collins, 546 U.S. 333, 341, 126 S. Ct. 969, 975, 113 L. Ed. 2d. 824, 833 (2006) (...
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