State v. Prince
| Decision Date | 06 May 2011 |
| Docket Number | No. CR–09–0019–AP.,CR–09–0019–AP. |
| Citation | 607 Ariz. Adv. Rep. 4,226 Ariz. 516,250 P.3d 1145 |
| Parties | STATE of Arizona, Appellee,v.Wayne Benoit PRINCE, Appellant. |
| Court | Arizona Supreme Court |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Thomas C. Horne, Arizona Attorney General By Kent E. Cattani, Chief Counsel, Criminal Appeals/Capital Litigation Section, Melissa A. Parham, Assistant Attorney General, Phoenix, Attorneys for State of Arizona.Sharmila Roy, Attorney at Law By Sharmila Roy, Laveen, Attorney for Wayne Benoit Prince.
¶ 1 Wayne Benoit Prince, Jr. was convicted of first degree murder of his stepdaughter and attempted first degree murder of his wife. He was sentenced to death for the murder and to a prison term for the attempt conviction. We have jurisdiction over this automatic appeal under Article 6, Section 5(3) of the Arizona Constitution and A.R.S. §§ 13–4031 and 13–4033(A)(1) (2010).1
I. FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND
¶ 2 The pertinent facts are set forth in our first opinion in this case, State v. Prince (Prince I), 204 Ariz. 156, 157–58 ¶¶ 2–3, 61 P.3d 450, 451–52 (2003). In brief, Prince engaged in a heated dispute with his wife, Christine, beating her and repeatedly threatening to kill her and her two children; he ultimately shot and killed his stepdaughter, Cassandra, and then shot and severely injured Christine.
¶ 3 A jury found Prince guilty of first degree murder and attempted murder. The trial judge sentenced him to death for the murder of Cassandra and twenty-one years in prison for the attempted murder of Christine. We affirmed both convictions and the sentence for the attempted murder conviction, Prince I, 204 Ariz. at 161 ¶ 28, 61 P.3d at 455, but in a supplemental opinion vacated the death sentence and remanded the case for resentencing pursuant to Ring v. Arizona (Ring II), 536 U.S. 584, 122 S.Ct. 2428, 153 L.Ed.2d 556 (2002). State v. Prince (Prince II), 206 Ariz. 24, 28 ¶ 15, 75 P.3d 114, 118 (2003).
¶ 4 During the aggravation phase of the ensuing resentencing, the jurors found two aggravating circumstances: (1) Prince committed the murder in an especially cruel manner, A.R.S. § 13–751(F)(6), and (2) Prince was at least eighteen and Cassandra under fifteen years of age when she was killed, § 13–751(F)(9). In the penalty phase, however, the jury could not reach a unanimous verdict on the appropriate sentence.
¶ 5 In accordance with A.R.S. § 13–752(K), a second penalty-phase jury was impaneled. This jury found no mitigation sufficiently substantial to call for leniency and determined that Prince be sentenced to death.
II. ISSUES ON APPEALA. Challenges to Second Penalty Jury Process1. Ex Post Facto Violation
¶ 6 Under the law in effect when Prince murdered Cassandra, the judge decided whether to impose a death sentence and resolved any doubt as to the ultimate sentence in favor of life imprisonment. See former A.R.S. § 13–703(E) (1997). In contrast, § 13–752(K) provides that if the jury cannot reach a verdict at the first penalty phase, “the court shall dismiss the jury and shall impanel a new jury.” Prince claims § 13–752(K) violates the ex post facto clauses of both the United States and Arizona Constitutions by giving the state a second chance to seek a death sentence, which could not occur under the law in effect at the time of the murder.
¶ 7 We rejected an identical ex post facto argument in State v. Cropper, 223 Ariz. 522, 526 ¶ 11, 225 P.3d 579, 583 (2010). Prince acknowledges that decision but claims Cropper violates the spirit of Stogner v. California, 539 U.S. 607, 611, 123 S.Ct. 2446, 156 L.Ed.2d 544 (2003), in which the Supreme Court struck, on ex post facto grounds, a California statute authorizing the prosecution of child sex crimes after the expiration of the statute of limitations. Prince analogizes his situation to Stogner, claiming former § 13–703(E) created “a statute of limitations regarding the death penalty: once a particular sentencer had doubts about the propriety of the death penalty, the limitations period expired.”
¶ 8 The statute in Stogner created new criminal liability when none otherwise existed by resurrecting crimes after their limitation periods had expired. 539 U.S. at 613, 123 S.Ct. 2446. Impaneling a second jury when the first cannot unanimously agree on a sentence creates no new liability unless a hung jury is tantamount to an acquittal. Yeager v. United States, ––– U.S. ––––, 129 S.Ct. 2360, 2366, 174 L.Ed.2d 78 (2009), rejected that characterization in the guilt phase for double jeopardy purposes, and Cropper appropriately extended Yeager's reasoning to the penalty phase for sentencing purposes. Moreover, no analogue to a hung jury exists for judges. See Cropper, 223 Ariz. at 526 ¶ 11, 225 P.3d at 583 (). Because Prince offers no other compelling reason to revisit Cropper, we reject his ex post facto claim.
2. Vagueness of § 13–752(K)
¶ 9 Prince argues § 13–752(K) is unconstitutionally vague because it does not establish procedures governing the admission, to a new jury during the second penalty phase, of evidence of the aggravating factors previously found by the aggravation-phase jury.
¶ 10 Before commencing the second penalty phase, the trial court ruled that it would inform the new jury only of Prince's first degree murder conviction and of the descriptive titles and definitions of the two aggravating circumstances found by the aggravation-phase jury. The judge thus precluded either side from presenting any evidence relating to guilt or the aggravating circumstances.
¶ 11 The court of appeals accepted jurisdiction of the State's subsequent special action and vacated the trial court's order, ruling that the facts of the crime and aggravating factors are relevant to determining whether there is mitigation sufficiently substantial to call for leniency. State ex rel. Thomas v. Duncan (Prince), 1 CA–SA 08–0042, 2008 WL 4501925, at *4 ¶ 15 (mem. decision). We denied Prince's petition for review. State ex rel. Thomas v. Prince, 219 Ariz. 127, 194 P.3d 394 (2008).
¶ 12 The State claims Prince is now barred from challenging the constitutionality of § 13–752 because the court of appeals' decision is the law of the case. But we are not precluded from addressing issues in a direct mandatory appeal simply because we declined to review in the same case an interlocutory court of appeals' decision. Our prior “denial of review does not mean we accepted the [c]ourt of [a]ppeals' legal analysis or conclusion” and “has no precedential value.” Calvert v. Farmers Ins. Co., 144 Ariz. 291, 297 n. 5, 697 P.2d 684, 690 n. 5 (1985). Consequently, the law of the case doctrine is inapplicable, and we thus address Prince's argument on the merits.
¶ 13 During the penalty phase, “the defendant and the state may present any evidence that is relevant to the determination of whether there is mitigation that is sufficiently substantial to call for leniency.” A.R.S. § 13–752(G).2 Additionally, “the state may present any evidence that demonstrates that the defendant should not be shown leniency.” Id. The penalty jury “shall consider as [a] mitigating circumstance[ ] any factors proffered by the defendant or the state that are relevant in determining whether to impose a sentence less than death, including any aspect of the defendant's character, propensities or record and any of the circumstances of the offense.” A.R.S. § 13–751(G). Any evidence admitted during the aggravation phase is deemed admitted at the penalty phase, as long as the penalty jury is the same jury that tried aggravation. See A.R.S. § 13–752(I).
¶ 14 As noted earlier, if the jury is “unable to reach a verdict” at the first penalty phase, “the court shall dismiss the jury and shall impanel a new jury.” A.R.S. § 13–752(K). This new jury may not retry “the defendant's guilt or the issue regarding any of the aggravating circumstances that the first jury found by unanimous verdict to be proved or not proved.” Id.
¶ 15 Although no provision comparable to § 13–752(I) addresses the admissibility of aggravation-phase evidence during a second penalty phase, the statutes are not vague or wholly silent on the issue. Section 13–752(G) is framed broadly and generally governs the admission of evidence at the penalty phase. Significantly, that statute prescribes only one criterion for admissibility: relevance “to the determination of whether there is mitigation that is sufficiently substantial to call for leniency.” A.R.S. § 13–752(G). Subject to overarching due process considerations, see State v. Pandeli, 215 Ariz. 514, 527–28 ¶ 43, 161 P.3d 557, 570–71 (2007), any evidence that meets § 13–752(G)'s criterion is admissible, regardless of whether the evidence was admissible at a prior stage of the trial.
¶ 16 Importantly, § 13–752(G) uses the phrase “mitigation that is sufficiently substantial to call for leniency,” rather than simply “mitigating factors.” The former phrase contemplates liberal admission of any evidence relevant not only to the existence of mitigating factors, but also to the jury's ultimate determination of whether those factors call for leniency in sentencing. Thus, the statute's standard for admissibility is framed in terms of the penalty-phase jury's duty to “assess whether to impose the death penalty based upon each juror's individual, qualitative evaluation of the facts of the case, the severity of the aggravating factors, and the quality of any mitigating evidence.” State ex rel. Thomas v. Granville (Baldwin), 211 Ariz. 468, 472 ¶ 17, 123 P.3d 662, 666 (2005). Jurors cannot perform that duty without knowing relevant facts about the circumstances of the murder and the aggravating factors, making aggravation-phase evidence directly relevant to whether the mitigation is “sufficiently substantial to call for leniency.”
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