State v. Sacoman

• Decision Date: 27 September 1988
• Docket Number: No. 17321,17321
• Citation: 762 P.2d 250,1988 NMSC 77,107 N.M. 588
• Parties: STATE of New Mexico, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Ernie SACOMAN, Defendant-Appellant.
• Court: New Mexico Supreme Court

Page 250

762 P.2d 250

107 N.M. 588

STATE of New Mexico, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Ernie SACOMAN, Defendant-Appellant.

No. 17321.

Supreme Court of New Mexico.

Sept. 27, 1988.

[107 N.M. 589] Jacquelyn Robins, Chief Public Defender, Susan Gibbs, Asst. Appellate Defender, Santa Fe, for defendant-appellant.

Hal Stratton, Atty. Gen., Anthony Tupler, Asst. Atty. Gen., Santa Fe, for plaintiff-appellee.

OPINION

RANSOM, Justice.

This is an appeal by defendant Ernie Sacoman from his conviction of first degree murder in which a sentence of life imprisonment has been imposed. Sacoman complains of (1) juror misconduct, (2) denial of discovery of psychological records of a key prosecution witness, and (3) admission of a prior juvenile delinquency adjudication. We affirm.

Sacoman was charged with murder, armed robbery, conspiracy to commit each of those offenses, and tampering with evidence, all arising from the killing of Brian Martinez on February 17, 1986. The first trial ended in a mistrial with a hung jury. Upon retrial, Sacoman was convicted of all charges and moved for a new trial based on allegations of juror misconduct. Following two hearings, the motion for new trial was denied. We first will review the evidence necessary for an understanding of the juror misconduct issue.

The bedroom of one Michael Donald was known, by young adult men who frequented it, as "the dungeon." Life in the dungeon involved drinking and drugs. Sacoman shared the dungeon with Donald. Others who visited the dungeon included trial witnesses Ian Dewing, Beau Mantai and Scott Bloemker.

Donald and Dewing originally were charged as codefendants in the crimes stemming from the killing, but they were allowed to plead guilty to lesser charges in return for their testimony against Sacoman. They testified that they enlisted Sacoman as the driver of a car to be used in a planned robbery of Martinez during a drug purchase on the Albuquerque east mesa the afternoon of Monday, February 17. In the course of the robbery, which progressed not at all as planned, Sacoman grabbed Donald's small caliber rifle from the back seat and jumped out of his car. He fired the rifle, hitting Martinez whom he had ordered from the Martinez car. Sacoman then chased Martinez, firing another shot. He came back to the Martinez car and took a larger caliber pistol belonging to Martinez, and with this pistol Sacoman shot Martinez in the head.

Sacoman asserted an alibi defense. He testified that on Monday, at the time of the killing, he was at his job as a busboy at the Classic Hotel. Work records showed that he had "clocked in" at 7:48 a.m. and had not "clocked out," but was paid as if he had clocked out at 2:47 p.m., the end of his shift.

Sacoman's supervisor testified that no employee is permitted to leave before the end of the shift without checking with the cashier or hostess, that she did not recall Sacoman leaving early on that Monday, and that if an employee fails to clock out, the payroll clerk checks with the cashier to determine when that employee left. The supervisor further stated that in such circumstances the payroll clerk has to verify when the employee departed and cannot "just take their word for it." She also testified that she had supervised Sacoman, and that although sometimes he was tardy, she never had a problem with him "cutting out early."

A waitress testified that the hotel's policy on failing to sign out and to check out is "very stringent." She "got in trouble a few times [herself]" for failing to do both because "they frowned on it heavily." If an employee is absent for as much as fifteen minutes it causes "too much of a problem," and someone begins to look for the missing person. If an employee fails to punch out, the time of departure has to be verified with another employee.

In rebuttal, the State called another waitress who testified that Sacoman told her that he planned to leave early to meet his girlfriend for lunch. She thought that he would be coming back, but he didn't and "they missed a busperson that day." She also stated that one busboy (of two) was present until the end of the shift on Monday. The work records showed that the other busboy was only paid for six hours that day, suggesting that he rather than Sacoman left early.

At the hearings on the motion for a new trial, it was established that one juror injected his personal expertise as a busboy into the deliberations, relating that on many occasions when he wanted to take off work early he would work extra hard, make sure his tasks were accomplished, and then leave without punching out. He would argue with management the next day as to the number of hours he should be paid. These statements arguably contradicted the testimony presented at trial.

Another juror injected into the jury deliberations a fabricated story to the effect that over the weekend, intervening between the beginning and conclusion of jury deliberations, she had gone skiing with the payroll clerk of a Santa Fe hotel. In the process of making out the payroll, the clerk commented that it looked like someone had not clocked out but that she assumed that the person had worked and she went ahead and gave the person the benefit of the doubt. At the initial hearing on the motion for a new trial, this latter juror perjured herself by reiterating her story, but she then contacted the trial judge and told him her testimony was untrue. She admitted concocting the story about the Santa Fe hotel and her friend's paperwork. The juror explained to the judge that she had failed to reveal her fabrication at the hearing because of fear of publicity and because she did not want to be responsible for Sacoman getting off or going free.

We begin our analysis by determining whether statements made by the two jurors to their fellow jurors constituted extraneous information, improperly brought to the jury's attention. See State v. Doe, 101 N.M. 363, 683 P.2d 45 (Ct.App.1983), cert. denied, 101 N.M. 276, 682 P.2d 61 (1984). SCRA 1986, 11-606(B) specifically provides that, upon inquiry into the validity of a verdict, a juror may testify on the question of whether extraneous prejudicial information was improperly brought to the jury's attention or whether any outside influence was improperly brought to bear upon any juror. See Doe, 101 N.M. at 365, 683 P.2d at 47; Duran v. Lovato, 99 N.M. 242, 656 P.2d 905 (Ct.App.1982), cert. denied, 99 N.M. 226, 656 P.2d 889 (1983). We are not dealing with an improper attempt to explain the verdict of the jury. See Biebelle v. Norero, 85 N.M. 182, 510 P.2d 506 (1973).

Extraneous information. Communication of specific knowledge from a particular juror to others involves extraneous information. See State v. Thacker, 95 Nev. 500, 596 P.2d 508 (1979) (per curiam) (in reaching verdict, jurors are confined to facts and evidence elicited during trial). Defendant asserts that the communications by the two jurors regarding restaurant procedures for paying employees who fail to clock out constituted extraneous information. He relies upon the following cases to support his argument. See State v. Larue 722 P.2d 1039 (Haw.1986) (juror's communication of personal experience similar to victim's sexual abuse held reversible error); State v. Wisham, 384 So.2d 385 (La.1980) (two jurors see defendant's alibi witness arrested in courthouse hallway for perjury); Rogers v. State, 551 S.W.2d 369 (Tex.Crim.App.1977) (juror, once victim of robbery, tells jury "you never forget a face" in robbery case involving eyewitness identification); State v. Lorenzy, 59 Wash. 308, 109 P. 1064 (1910) (statement made by juror in jury room regarding his personal knowledge that particular hotel was in fact house of prostitution). Moreover, a new trial may result because of the receipt of evidence not admitted at trial, even though under the circumstances of the case no misconduct occurred that resulted in the additional knowledge. Farese v. United States, 428 F.2d 178 (5th Cir.1970).

In Thacker, the defendants stood accused of the larceny of two calves. At trial, they asserted that the calves seized from them by authorities were not the same calves that had been stolen, based on differences in weight and age. During deliberations, a juror, who worked as the foreman of a cattle ranch, made estimates regarding the weight of the cattle that contradicted the theory of defense. Holding these estimates constituted extraneous prejudicial information that tainted the verdict, the Nevada Supreme Court granted a new trial. 95 Nev. at 501, 596 P.2d at 509.

In People v. Huntley, 87 A.D.2d 488, 452 N.Y.S.2d 952 (1982), a juror told others that he had visited the scene of the alleged crime, and he corroborated the State's version of events. At the hearing on the motion for a new trial, the juror admitted that he did not visit the scene but rather reconstructed these "facts" from the trial testimony. The court held that the story about visiting the scene, whether or not fabricated by the juror, turned the juror into an unsworn witness against the defendant and served to deny him due process of law. The court stated:

Most certainly jurors are not precluded from drawing on their wisdom and experience and engaging in a free exchange of ideas and subjective opinions during the course of their deliberations. * * * * The point, however, is that such deliberations must take their content from the record facts before them, not from external facts brought into the jury room by a juror and thus not screened through the judicial process.

87 A.D.2d at 492, 452 N.Y.S.2d at 955.

The defendant's authorities convince us that he is correct in asserting that the juror communications at issue in this case constituted extraneous information.

Information improperly brought to jury's attention. Furthermore, it is undisputed that these communications were received by other jury members during deliberations. The jury is specifically instructed that:

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