State v. Keiser
| Decision Date | 19 April 2002 |
| Docket Number | No. 2001-137-C.A.,2001-137-C.A. |
| Citation | 796 A.2d 471 |
| Parties | STATE v. Clayton KEISER. |
| Court | Rhode Island Supreme Court |
Annie Goldberg, Aaron L. Weisman, Providence.
Paula Rosin, Paula Lynch Hardiman, Providence.
The defendant, Clayton Keiser, has appealed a Superior Court judgment of conviction for carrying a pistol withouta license in a vehicle.This case came before the Supreme Court for oral argument on April 9, 2002, pursuant to an order directing the parties to show cause why the issues raised should not be summarily decided. Having reviewed the record, the memoranda of the parties, and the oral arguments of counsel, it is our opinion that cause has not been shown, and we summarily affirn1 the judgment of the Superior Court.
On December 1, 1999, Warwick police officer Paul Wells (Officer Wells), pursuing a dispatch, found defendant sleeping in the driver's seat of his pickup truck in the parking lot of Toys R Us in Warwick. Officer Wells ascertained that there were two outstanding warrants for defendant, who was placed under arrest. When the officer searched defendant's person, he found a magazine clip for a semiautomatic handgun, two pocket knives, two shotgun shells, and a foot-long wrench.
Warwick police officer Timothy L. Grant anived at the scene, and defendant informed the two officers that he had guns in the truck. Behind the passenger seat, Officer Wells found a Glock semiautomatic handgun in a holster atop a mound of miscellaneous items, along with the barrel ofa shotgun wrapped in a towel. The gun had one round in the chamber.
The defendant testified that he believed he had unloaded the gun, and he stated, "I thought that I had it in its shipping box, but I don't recall clearly."Over defendant's objection, the trial justice refused to instruct the jurythat they should find defendant not guilty if they detennined that he honestly and reasonably, though mistakenly, believed that he had unloaded the gun before transporting it. The jury found defendant guilty of violating § 11-47-8,1 and he has appealed the judgment of conviction on the ground that the trial justice erred in rejecting his proposed jury instruction.
We have regularly held that we shall affinn a trialjustice's jury instructions when, examined in their entirety...
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State v. Linde, 2003-336-C.A.
...when * * * the instructions adequately cover the law and neither reduce nor shift the state's burden of proof." State v. Keiser, 796 A.2d 471, 472 (R.I.2002) (mem.) (citing State v. Marini, 638 A.2d 507, 517 (R.I.1994)). "As long as the trial justice's general charge has fairly covered a re......
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State v. Pineda
...the instructions adequately cover the law and neither reduce nor shift the state's burden of proof.” Id. at 1128 (quoting State v. Keiser, 796 A.2d 471, 472 (R.I.2002) (mem.)). In our jurisdiction, it is well established that a trial justice must present the jury with an instruction on self......
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State v. Grayhurst
...lay people, the instructions adequately cover the law and neither reduce nor shift the state's burden of proof." State v. Keiser, 796 A.2d 471, 472 (R.I.2002) To support this argument, defendant cites to our discussion of disjunctively framed statutes in In re Fiske, 117 R.I. 454, 367 A.2d ......
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State v. Cipriano
...law and neither reduce nor shift the state's burden of proof.” State v. Linde, 876 A.2d 1115, 1128 (R.I.2005) (quoting State v. Keiser, 796 A.2d 471, 472 (R.I.2002) (mem.)); see also State v. Gautier, 950 A.2d 400, 415 (R.I.2008). “The trial justice need not use particular words in the inst......