State v. Robles

• Decision Date: 21 March 1995
• Docket Number: CA-CR,No. 1,1
• Citation: 901 P.2d 1200,183 Ariz. 170
• Parties: STATE of Arizona, Respondent, v. Juan F. ROBLES, Petitioner. 94-0615-PR.
• Court: Arizona Court of Appeals

Page 1200

901 P.2d 1200

183 Ariz. 170

STATE of Arizona, Respondent, v. Juan F. ROBLES, Petitioner.

No. 1 CA-CR 94-0615-PR.

Court of Appeals of Arizona Division 1, Department E.

March 21, 1995.

Review Denied Sept. 12, 1995.

Richard M. Romley, Maricopa County Atty. by Diane E.W. Gunnels, Deputy Atty., Phoenix, for respondent.

C. Kenneth Ray II, Phoenix, for petitioner.

OPINION

KLEINSCHMIDT, Presiding Judge.

This is a petition for review from an order of the trial court denying post-conviction relief from the Defendant's conviction for conspiracy to commit murder. The main issue is whether federal jurisdiction preempts state jurisdiction of the charge. We conclude that both the state and the federal government have jurisdiction of the offense, and that the federal jurisdiction is concurrent, not exclusive. Accordingly, we deny relief.

In April 1991, the Defendant attended a party at the home of Celestino Ramirez in Guadalupe, Arizona. At approximately 10:40 p.m., the Defendant left the party with Roger Gonzales and the victim, Raul Ybarra. They were seen leaving in Gonzales' pickup truck. Gonzales was driving, the Defendant was sitting in the passenger seat, and Ybarra was sitting behind the front seat in the extended cab portion of the passenger compartment.

Sometime after four o'clock the next morning, the Defendant and Gonzales returned to the Ramirez home in Guadalupe, where Ramirez met them at the door. Gonzales told Ramirez, evidently referring to Ybarra, "That dude's gone. That vato [dude] is gone," simultaneously making a throat-cutting gesture with his hand. The Defendant corroborated this, saying, "He's gone." The Defendant later told a group of people at the house that they had cut Ybarra's throat. The Defendant left the house, but returned a few hours later. He told one of the people at the house that he had to go meet a man named Gilbert Valle to pick up some money.

About two or three days later, the Defendant told Ramirez that he had pulled Ybarra's head back and cut his throat. About the same time, the Defendant told another friend that he had killed Ybarra by pulling back his head and cutting his throat and that the Defendant and Gonzales had stabbed Ybarra a couple of times and poked him in the eye with a knife. The Defendant also told his friend that Ybarra struggled to get out of the back seat of the pickup. The Defendant said Gilbert Valle had paid them money and drugs to kill Ybarra in revenge for Ybarra having stabbed Valle's brother.

Five days after the party, Ybarra's body was found in the desert in Maricopa County on the Gila River Indian Reservation. Experts testified at trial that Ybarra died from a slash wound to the neck that severed his trachea and carotid artery and that he had also suffered stab wounds to the eye and arm. A search of Gonzales' truck revealed blood stains on the upholstery in the section of the cab behind the front seat. The blood in the truck could have been the victim's but could not have come from either Gonzales or the Defendant.

The jury found the Defendant guilty of conspiracy to commit murder and first-degree murder. He was sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of release or parole for twenty-five years on each count. The sentences were to run concurrently.

The Defendant filed a petition for post-conviction relief in the trial court alleging that the superior court had no jurisdiction of the charges against him. He proved that he was an enrolled member of the Gila River Indian Community, and he asserted that the crimes were committed on an Indian reservation. Given these facts, he argued, and continues to argue, that the federal court has exclusive jurisdiction over the crimes. He relies on the provisions of 18 U.S.C. sections 1152 and 1153, which read:

Section 1152

Except as otherwise expressly provided by law, the general laws of the United States as to the punishment of offenses committed in any place within the sole and exclusive jurisdiction of the United States, except the District of Columbia, shall extend to the Indian country.

This section shall not extend to offenses committed by one Indian against the person or property of another Indian, nor to any Indian committing any offense in the Indian country who has been punished by the local law of the tribe, or to any case where, by treaty stipulations, the exclusive jurisdiction over such offenses is or may be secured to the Indian tribes respectively.

Section 1153

Any Indian who commits against the person or property of another Indian or other person any of the following offenses, namely, murder, manslaughter, kidnapping, rape, carnal knowledge of any female, not his wife, who has not attained the age of sixteen years, assault with intent to commit rape, incest, assault with intent to commit murder, assault with a dangerous weapon, assault resulting in serious bodily injury, arson, burglary, robbery, and larceny within the Indian country, shall be subject to the same laws and penalties as all other persons committing any of the above offenses, within the exclusive jurisdiction of the United States.

As used in this section, the offenses of burglary and incest shall be defined and punished in accordance with the laws of the State in which such offense was committed as are in force at the time of such offense.

In addition to the offenses of burglary and incest, any other of the above offenses which are not defined and punished by Federal law in force within the exclusive jurisdiction of the United States shall be defined and punished in accordance with the laws of the State in which such offense was committed as are in force at the time of such offense.

While conspiracy to commit murder is not one of the crimes listed in 18 U.S.C. section 1153, the federal courts have jurisdiction of that offense pursuant to the general federal conspiracy statutes, 18 U.S.C. sections 371 and 1117, when the underlying crime of murder occurs on the reservation. See U.S. v. Begay, 42 F.3d 486 (9th Cir.1994).

The trial court, agreeing with the Defendant as to the charge of murder but not as to the charge of conspiracy, ruled:

The court finds Mr. Robles is an Indian and was a member of the Gila River tribe at all relevant times.

There is a presumption that a murder, the act of killing, occurred where the body was found. There is nothing in the record to refute that presumption. Therefore, the court finds an Indian killed a non-Indian on an Indian reservation, which results in exclusive jurisdiction being vested in federal court.

As to the conviction for conspiracy, the court finds there is sufficient evidence from which one can conclude that a conspiracy occurred prior to and at the time the three individuals got into the pick-up truck in Guadalupe, Arizona. The State of Arizona had jurisdiction over the crime of conspiracy to commit first degree murder.

As to the conviction for murder in the first degree only, the court finds the State of Arizona did not have jurisdiction....

The Defendant petitions for review of the trial court's decision. The Defendant also filed a direct appeal from his conviction for conspiracy in the trial court, and we recently affirmed that conviction in State v. Robles, 1 CA-CR 92-0559 (Ariz.App. Jan. 19, 1995).

THE TRIAL COURT HAD JURISDICTION OF THE CHARGE OF CONSPIRACY TO COMMIT MURDER

In State v. Verdugo, --- Ariz.App. ----, 901 P.2d 1165 (App.1995), we held that a defendant charged with a crime in state court who claims that the federal court has exclusive jurisdiction of the offense has the burden of demonstrating that the jurisdiction over a particular crime is vested exclusively in the federal court. Id. at 7. To establish conspiracy to commit murder, under Arizona law, the prosecution must prove that the defendant (1) with intent to promote or aid in a murder (2) agreed with another person that at least one of them would commit murder. Ariz.Rev.Stat.Ann. ("A.R.S.") § 13-1003(A) (1989). Here, reviewing all of the testimony, there was sufficient evidence of an agreement which occurred off the reservation to meet each of these elements. The proof supports the strong inference that when the Defendant and Gonzales left the party with the victim they had already agreed to kill him, and they were taking steps to accomplish that end. Elements of the crime of conspiracy, indeed the completed crime of conspiracy, were committed off the reservation. For that reason, the state had jurisdiction of the conspiracy even though the conspiracy and the murder carried over to the reservation.

There are several cases which support our conclusion. The most directly on point is State v. Lane, 112 Wash.2d 464, 771 P.2d 1150 (1989). In Lane, the defendants, bent on revenge for the victim having testified against them in an earlier case, drove to the victim's home in Tacoma, Washington. Id. at 1151. They seized her and put her in the trunk of a car. Id. They took her to a remote wooded area within the confines of the federal military reservation, Fort Lewis, and there they killed her. Id. at 1151-52.

The defendants were charged with murder in the state court. Id. They argued that the state had no jurisdiction because the offense had occurred on land within the exclusive jurisdiction of the United States. Id. The Supreme Court of Washington expressly found that Fort Lewis was on land within the exclusive jurisdiction of the United States. Id. at 1153. The court rejected the defendant's argument that only the federal court could prosecute him, saying:

The State of Washington may exercise jurisdiction over a criminal offense if an essential element of the offense occurred within the state but outside the land ceded to the federal government (where the offense culminated). Premeditation is an essential element of aggravated first degree murder and the State has made a sufficient showing of facts to establish that this element of the offense occurred within this...