State v. Salt
| Decision Date | 26 March 2015 |
| Docket Number | No. 20130071–CA.,20130071–CA. |
| Citation | 2015 UT App 72,347 P.3d 414 |
| Parties | STATE of Utah, Plaintiff and Appellee, v. Jeffrey Charles SALT, Defendant and Appellant. |
| Court | Utah Court of Appeals |
Herschel Bullen, Salt Lake City, for Appellant.
Sean D. Reyes and Karen A. Klucznik, Salt Lake City, Attorneys for Appellee.
Opinion
¶ 1 Jeffrey Charles Salt appeals from his conviction for aggravated assault, a third degree felony. We affirm.
¶ 2 Shortly after Salt began dating his girlfriend (J.G.), she bought a home in Salt Lake City.2 Salt suggested that she hire him to complete some renovations, and she agreed. J.G. moved in with Salt in April 2006 when her house became unlivable during the remodeling. Over the next couple of years, the renovations became the source of frequent conflict between the two. J.G. moved out of Salt's residence in February 2008 and hired another contractor to finish the work on her home. At that point, Salt ended their relationship. But between February and April 2008, the two continued to see each other and came to a sort of reconciliation. At the end of April, however, J.G. told Salt “this isn't going to work out” and attempted to end their relationship permanently.
¶ 3 Salt continued to contact J.G., eventually convincing her to meet him at his home in early June to talk things through and help him move past their breakup. When J.G. arrived at the scheduled meeting, Salt told her he wanted to “set some ground rules.” He asked J.G. to agree not to leave even if “the questioning got tough.” For nearly an hour, Salt asked her questions about their relationship and her decision to end it. When J.G. eventually told Salt she wanted to leave, he responded with misogynistic verbal abuse and then grabbed J.G. and twisted her head. The two ended up on the ground, and Salt grabbed a piece of pottery from a shelf and hit J.G. on the head with it multiple times. J.G. grabbed a phone from the floor and attempted to call 911, but she misdialed, and Salt knocked the phone away before she could reach anyone.
¶ 4 Salt then grabbed what J.G. thought was a metal pipe and hit her above her eye, drawing blood, before pinning her to the ground. When the two eventually stopped struggling, Salt allowed J.G. to get up. At that point, she saw blood all over the floor and could feel that her head was covered with blood as well. J.G. attempted to leave, but Salt blocked the exit. J.G. said, “[N]o, no, no, just let me out,” and then either she pushed her way past him or he stepped aside. Feeling faint, J.G. lay down on the cement walkway in front of Salt's residence where a passerby stopped to give her aid and called 911. At the hospital, J.G. received sixty-five staples in her scalp to close lacerations that totaled roughly eleven inches in length. She continued to suffer back pain for years and, at the time of trial, still had a “lump on the side of [her] head” that felt as if there was “a little piece of the clay in [it].” Salt was charged with aggravated kidnapping, aggravated assault, and damage to a communication device.
¶ 5 The case was tried to a jury. Salt claimed he acted in self-defense. He admitted using derogatory names to describe J.G. but testified that in response to the name-calling she landed the first blow, hitting him in the left eye. He testified he then put her in a headlock to keep her from further attacking him, and they fell to the ground wrestling. According to Salt, J.G. tried “to gouge [his] face” and then bit his finger and would not let go. In response, he repeatedly struck her head against a bookshelf until she released his finger. He testified that he never hit her with pottery or a metal pipe and that any action he took against J.G. was to protect himself from her attempts to gouge his face, her blows with a phone receiver, and her biting. He said that he was “in fear for [his] safety and [his] life” after J.G. hit him in the face and bit him. Salt also testified that a few months before the incident, J.G. had come to his house to collect some of her belongings. Then, as she was leaving, she “drove her car in reverse and hit [his] car.” He then testified, “And I was in the path of that vehicle and I had to move out of the way to avoid being assaulted by the vehicle.”
¶ 6 The defense called a physician friend of Salt's who practiced emergency medicine as an expert witness. Based on his review of J.G.'s medical records, the physician testified that the nature of her injuries did not support a claim that she had suffered direct blows from a metal pipe or a ceramic object. Rather, in his opinion, J.G.'s injuries were most likely caused by a “glancing blow[ ]” rather than a “direct blow” from an object he did not attempt to describe. The defense also cross-examined law enforcement officers who had responded to the scene. They observed blood all over the apartment, but they neither found a metal pipe nor recovered any pieces of pottery.
¶ 7 The jury convicted Salt of aggravated assault involving domestic violence but acquitted him of two other charges involving domestic violence—aggravated kidnapping and damage to a communication device. Salt moved to arrest judgment and filed an alternative motion to have his conviction reduced to a class A misdemeanor. The trial court denied his motions. After sentencing, Salt moved for a new trial. The court also denied that motion. Salt appeals.
¶ 8 First, Salt argues that the aggravated assault jury instruction was incomplete. “[W]e review jury instructions in their entirety to determine whether the instructions, taken as a whole, fairly instruct the jury on the applicable law.” State v. Malaga, 2006 UT App 103, ¶ 18, 132 P.3d 703 (alteration in original) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted). “Whether a jury instruction correctly states the law presents a question of law which we review for correctness.” State v. Houskeeper, 2002 UT 118, ¶ 11, 62 P.3d 444.
¶ 9 Second, Salt argues that the trial court erred when it denied his motion to reduce his sentence to a class A misdemeanor. We review a trial court's denial of a motion to reduce the degree of a conviction for abuse of discretion. State v. Boyd, 2001 UT 30, ¶ 31, 25 P.3d 985.
¶ 10 Third, Salt argues that the trial court should have granted his motion for a new trial because the jury's not-guilty verdict on the charge of aggravated kidnapping conflicted with its guilty verdict on aggravated assault. “[W]e review the decision to grant or deny a motion for a new trial only for an abuse of discretion.” State v. Loose, 2000 UT 11, ¶ 8, 994 P.2d 1237. “When considering a defendant's argument that the verdicts are inconsistent, we ... will not overturn a jury's verdict of criminal conviction unless reasonable minds could not rationally have arrived at the verdict of guilty beyond a reasonable doubt based on the law and on the evidence presented.” State v. LoPrinzi, 2014 UT App 256, ¶ 30, 338 P.3d 253 (citation and internal quotation marks omitted), petition for cert. filed, Dec. 24, 2014 (No. 20141168).
¶ 11 Fourth, Salt contends that the definition of “cohabitant” as used in the Cohabitant Abuse Act is unconstitutionally overbroad and vague. Constitutional challenges are matters of law reviewed for correctness. State v. Pullman, 2013 UT App 168, ¶ 6, 306 P.3d 827.
¶ 12 Finally, Salt argues that his counsel was constitutionally ineffective for failing to request an additional element in the jury instruction related to self-defense. We consider claims of ineffective assistance of counsel raised for the first time on appeal as questions of law. State v. Clark, 2004 UT 25, ¶ 6, 89 P.3d 162.
¶ 13 At trial, the jury was instructed that to find Salt guilty of aggravated assault, it must find beyond a reasonable doubt that he used a dangerous weapon or “other means or force likely to produce death or serious bodily injury” in the course of acting “with unlawful force or violence, that causes bodily injury to another or creates a substantial risk of bodily injury to another.” Salt contends that this instruction was erroneous because it failed to “require the jury to find that he acted with intent, or knowledge, or recklessness with respect to the result of his conduct.” Instead, Salt argues, the instruction required the jury to find only that he used means likely to produce death or serious bodily injury. In other words, Salt argues that the instruction was missing a “vital” mens rea element, i.e., that he must have specifically intended to cause death or serious bodily injury, not simply that he used means likely to do so.
¶ 14 In support of his argument, Salt relies on State v. O'Bannon, 2012 UT App 71, 274 P.3d 992. We held in O'Bannon that the State was required to prove that the defendant acted with intent to cause the victim serious physical injury before a jury could convict him of second degree felony child abuse. Id. ¶ 31. We determined that it was not enough “to prove only that [the defendant] intended to be, or knew that he was, engaged in certain conduct without the requisite intent or knowledge that a serious physical injury would likely result.” Id. Salt argues that we should come to the same conclusion in this case because the aggravated assault instruction did not require jurors to determine that he intended to cause serious bodily injury, but to determine only that his actions were “likely to produce death or serious bodily injury” without ever taking his specific intent into account as he claims O'Bannon requires. We conclude that O'Bannon does not apply here because our holding in that case was based on a different crime requiring a different mens rea.
¶ 15 O'Bannon involved a charge of second degree felony child abuse, not third degree felony aggravated assault. Id. ¶¶ 1, 24. Under the child...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
United States v. Fagatele
..."knowledge" that his or her conduct was "likely" to cause serious bodily injury. Aplt. Br. 28. In support, he cites State v. Salt , 347 P.3d 414 (Utah. Ct. App. 2015). There, the Utah Court of Appeals indicated that "specific intent to inflict serious bodily injury—or knowledge that such in......
-
State v. Montplaisir
...(9th Cir.1989) (“serious bodily injury” language in federal assault statute, 18 U.S.C. § 113(f), not unconstitutionally vague); State v. Salt, 2015 UT App 72, ¶¶ 23–25, 347 P.3d 414 (holding aggravated assault statute, which uses the phrases “substantial bodily injury” and “serious bodily i......
-
State v. Blais
...felonies. "We review a [district] court’s denial of a motion to reduce the degree of a conviction for abuse of discretion." State v. Salt , 2015 UT App 72, ¶ 9, 347 P.3d 414. ¶12 Finally, Blais contends he received an illegal sentence when the district court sentenced him to one year in pri......
-
State v. Brotherson
...of his convictions. "We review a trial court's denial of a motion to reduce the degree of a conviction for abuse of discretion." State v. Salt , 2015 UT App 72, ¶ 9, 347 P.3d 414. "Under this standard, we will affirm the court's decision absent a showing that it failed to consider all legal......
-
Utah Law Developments
...of electronic documents receives the same treatment as paper documents in the context of excusable neglect. State v. Salt 2015 UT App 72, 347 P.3d 414 (March 26, 2015) Defendant was convicted of aggravated assault involving domestic violence. The victim of the assault was defendant’s ex-gir......