State v. Runyan

• Decision Date: 30 April 1999
• Docket Number: No. 97-2135.,97-2135.
• Citation: 599 N.W.2d 474
• Parties: STATE of Iowa, Appellee, v. Michael Ron RUNYAN, Appellant.
• Court: Iowa Court of Appeals

599 N.W.2d 474

STATE of Iowa, Appellee, v. Michael Ron RUNYAN, Appellant.

No. 97-2135.

Court of Appeals of Iowa.

April 30, 1999.

Linda Del Gallo, State Appellate Defender, and John P. Messina, Assistant State Appellate Defender, for appellant.

Thomas J. Miller, Attorney General, Mary Tabor, Assistant Attorney General, Mary E. Richards, County Attorney, and Stephen H. Holmes and Angelina Smith, Assistant County Attorneys for appellee.

Heard by HUITINK, P.J., and MAHAN, and ZIMMER, JJ.

ZIMMER, J.

Defendant Michael Ron Runyan appeals his conviction and sentence of first-degree murder in violation of Iowa Code sections 707.1 and 707.2 (1997). He contends the trial court erred in limiting his cross-examination of former co-defendant and State's witness Luke Abrams regarding the extent of Abrams' plea agreement with the State. We affirm.

On April 20, 1997, youthful revelry took a tragic turn when nineteen-year-old Uri Sellers was fatally stabbed by twenty-year-old Michael Runyan during Iowa State University's annual "Veisha" celebration. The stabbing occurred at approximately 2:30 a.m. outside the Adelante Fraternity house on Welch Avenue in Ames where a party was in progress. Defendant turned himself in to the police a few days later, and on May 5 was formally charged with first-degree murder. Defendant admitted the stabbing but claimed he acted with justification and did not intend to seriously injure the victim. Following trial, a jury found Runyan guilty of first-degree murder as charged.

Prior to defendant's trial, an alleged accomplice, Luke Abrams, was also charged with first-degree murder. Abrams subsequently negotiated a plea agreement with the State. In return for his testimony against Runyan and prior to Runyan's trial, Abrams pled guilty to reduced charges of going armed with intent, a class "D" felony, and accessory after the fact, an aggravated misdemeanor. First-degree murder carries with it life without possibility of parole. The charges to which Abrams pleaded carried a possibility of a maximum seven-year indeterminate term of incarceration (five years for going with intent and two years for accessory after the fact). Abrams was not sentenced until after defendant's trial.

At trial, the jury was informed Abrams had pled guilty to the lesser charges in exchange for his testimony against the defendant. Abrams further testified that although he believed he was not guilty of going armed with intent and accessory after the fact, he pled guilty in order to avoid "taking a chance of getting convicted of life...."

The court, however, refused to allow defendant's attorneys to elicit testimony regarding Abrams' full understanding of the specific penalties applicable to his plea bargain. The defense wanted to use such testimony to demonstrate the magnitude of the difference in the crimes with which Abrams was originally charged and to which he had pleaded guilty. The defense also wanted to present testimony that a sentence of life without parole meant that Abrams would never get out of jail if convicted of first-degree murder. Runyan now appeals.

I. Limitation of Cross-Examination. Defendant claims the trial court erred in failing to allow him to explore the full ramifications of the plea agreement and ask penalty-specific questions of Abrams.

A. Applicable Law. Four Iowa cases have addressed the issue we face today: to what extent should a trial court permit a defense attorney to question an accomplice-turned-state's-witness (originally charged with the same offense as the defendant) regarding the specifics of a plea agreement the witness received in exchange for testifying against the defendant. See State v. Sackett, 499 N.W.2d 312 (Iowa App.1993); State v. Donelson, 302 N.W.2d 125 (Iowa 1981); State v. Horn, 282 N.W.2d 717 (Iowa 1979); State v. Armento, 256 N.W.2d 228 (Iowa 1977).

From these cases, we glean the primary concern for limiting examination into the details of the plea agreement is to prevent the jury from hearing the possible penalties for the same crime with which defendant is charged (and which the witness may avoid by testifying for the state) because penalty issues are not within the province of the jury. It is felt that if a jury is aware of the penalty a defendant may face, the state's case may be prejudiced.

This desire to avoid prejudice, however, must be balanced against the competing constitutional right of cross-examination secured by the Sixth Amendment of the federal constitution and made applicable to the states through the Fourteenth Amendment. See Douglas v. Alabama, 380 U.S. 415, 418, 85 S.Ct. 1074, 1076, 13 L.E.2d 934, 937 (1965) (Sixth Amendment); Pointer v. Texas, 380 U.S. 400, 403, 85 S.Ct. 1065, 1067-68, 13 L.E.2d 923, 926 (1965) (Fourteenth Amendment); State v. Carney, 236 N.W.2d 44, 46 (Iowa 1975) (Sixth Amendment).

The right of a criminal defendant to impeach a witness by showing bias or interest is well established. "[E]xposure of a witness' motivation in testifying is a proper and important function of the constitutionally protected right of cross-examination." United States v. Klauer, 856 F.2d 1147, 1149 (8th Cir.1988). The Iowa Supreme Court has accordingly recognized a "defendant should be permitted wide latitude in seeking to show bias of an alleged accomplice who testifies for the prosecution." State v. Armento, 256 N.W.2d at 229. Such latitude is especially important where the accomplice's testimony "may be influenced by a promise of, or hope or expectation of, immunity or leniency with respect to his case as a consideration for testifying against the defendant." Id. In State v. Donelson the Iowa Supreme Court stated:

The rule is unquestioned that a defendant may inquire about the concessions the accomplice hopes to receive or has been promised for his testimony, and where the State has gone so far as to enter into a bargain with the accomplice the defendant must be allowed to inquire about the terms of the bargain so that the jury may better understand the possible motivations of the accomplice as he sits on the stand.

State v. Donelson, 302 N.W.2d 125, 131 (Iowa 1981).

Thus, this case asks us to strike a balance between the requirements of cross-examination and the desire to prevent undue prejudice. In State v. Armento, a trial court prohibited a defendant charged with first-degree murder from eliciting testimony from an accomplice as to the penalty for that crime. Specifically, defendant sought to show the accomplice (who had also been charged with first-degree murder) knew the penalty for first-degree murder was life imprisonment and that the accomplice's motivation in testifying for the State was to avoid this penalty. The Iowa Supreme Court held the trial court should have allowed the defendant to elicit this information, but nonetheless held the error was not reversible. According to the court, the jury would obviously have known "first-degree murder carries a most serious burden." See State v. Armento, 256 N.W.2d at 230. Therefore, that they did not actually hear testimony regarding the penalty did not matter because what the accomplice believed the penalty to be would not have materially affected the jury's impression of his motivation in testifying for the State. Id. The court noted that while the jury did not hear the specifics of the penalty, they were told through cross-examination of the accomplice that he was aware of the penalty for murder in the first degree and that it was defendant's position—though denied by the accomplice—that the accomplice's awareness of this penalty had led him to color his testimony for the State. Id. at 229. The court also noted the witness's role as accomplice was disclosed to the jury and that defendant was allowed to extensively question the accomplice and other witnesses regarding plea negotiations and leniency expectations. Id., at 229.

In State v. Horn, the Iowa Supreme Court was presented with a similar factual situation. In that case, however, the trial court did allow testimony regarding the accomplice's belief as to the penalty for first-degree murder. See State v. Horn, 282 N.W.2d at 727. The trial court only prevented defendant from questioning the witness about the penalties for lesser-included offenses in an attempt to show the witness may have been testifying in an attempt to receive leniency from the State. Id. at 727-28. Essentially, the jury was allowed to hear what the accomplice might avoid by testifying for the State, but was not allowed to hear what penalty the accomplice might actually receive. The court held that cross-examination was broader than allowed in State v. Armento, and that while it would have been within the discretion of the trial court to permit testimony about lesser included offenses, there was no reversible error in not allowing the testimony. See State v. Horn, 282 N.W.2d at 728.

Reversible error was found in State v. Donelson, however. In that case, defendant wanted to reveal the full facts concerning a plea agreement an accomplice had entered into in exchange for testifying for the State. That agreement reduced the charge against the witness from first-degree sexual abuse, a felony carrying a life imprisonment penalty, to an aggravated misdemeanor carrying a two-year imprisonment penalty plus a $5000 fine. See State v. Donelson, 302 N.W.2d at 128-29. The trial court prohibited nearly all questioning of this issue, only permitting defense counsel to show that in exchange for the accomplice's testimony, the State agreed to reduce his charge from a felony to a misdemeanor. Id. Defense counsel was not allowed to elicit testimony about the penalties for either offense. In essence, the jury was neither allowed to hear the potential penalty avoided nor the penalty which might actually be received. Nor did the Supreme Court impute to the jury knowledge of the penalty for first-degree sexual abuse as it had with first-degree murder in Armento. The court held ...