State v. Sieg

Decision Date20 May 2022
Docket Number121,862
Citation509 P.3d 535
Parties STATE of Kansas, Appellee, v. Orville William SIEG, Appellant.
CourtKansas Supreme Court

Randall L. Hodgkinson, of Kansas Appellate Defender Office, argued the cause and was on the brief for appellant.

Shawn M. Boyd, assistant county attorney, argued the cause, and Todd Thompson, county attorney, and Derek Schmidt, attorney general, were with him on the brief for appellee.

The opinion of the court was delivered by Biles, J.:

A jury convicted Orville William Sieg of possessing methamphetamine and drug paraphernalia. On appeal, Sieg asserted five trial errors: evidence insufficiency, omission of two limiting instructions, prosecutorial error, and cumulative error. A Court of Appeals panel rejected each claim. State v. Sieg , No. 121,862, 2021 WL 2386373 (Kan. App. 2021) (unpublished opinion). We affirm.

FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

At about 10:30 p.m., Leavenworth Police Officer Derek Garver noticed an extended cab pickup truck parked in front of a known drug house in what Garver knew to be a high crime and narcotics area. The officer recognized William Cheatham as a person he knew who distributed narcotics. Cheatham was standing outside the passenger door talking to the occupants but walked away as the vehicle slowly pulled away.

Garver followed the truck as it went down an alley and parked with its lights off. The officer could see two occupants ducking down inside. The car left the alley without its headlights on, which constituted a traffic infraction, so Garver conducted a traffic stop. He shined a spotlight to see inside the car. He noticed a passenger, later identified as Sieg, "reaching forward like either he was putting something under the seat or reaching for something in the floorboard or under the seat area." Garver never saw the driver lean over or make any movements towards the same area.

Neither the driver nor the passenger had identification. Garver recognized the passenger as Sieg and arrested him on an outstanding warrant. While doing so, Garver noticed Sieg looking down toward the passenger floorboard, sweating abnormally, his hands shaking, and his pulse elevated. After taking him into custody, Garver asked the driver, Lisa Clark, if there was anything illegal in the car. She said she did not believe any narcotics were in the vehicle but was aware there were syringes and a spoon.

Garver searched the car and discovered under the passenger seat an eyeglasses case containing a glass smoking pipe and a silver spoon, both with white residue seemingly consistent with methamphetamine, and two bags with a white crystal substance inside, later confirmed to be methamphetamine. The officer did not find any syringes.

Clark said the items in the case were not hers and "made kind of a head gesture to the right [toward the passenger seat] as if she was wanting to tell [him] that they belonged to Mr. Sieg." The truck's owner, Lori Tavis, arrived to retrieve it. Tavis said she lent it to Sieg about a week before.

Sieg explained he and Clark were in the area to pick up a tanning bed. When the vehicle was parked, he was in the driver's seat. They met Cheatham because he planned to help load the tanning bed. When asked if they got the tanning bed, Sieg said it was not ready to be picked up. He said while they were there, Cheatham was inside the truck with them at one point and then got out. Shortly after, Cheatham came back and said there was a police officer nearby, so he needed to go. Cheatham walked away, while Sieg drove off so the officer would not see him driving because his license was suspended. He stopped in the alley and switched seats with Clark. Sieg denied bending down when the patrol car passed by. He also denied owning the eyeglasses case.

The KBI tested the glass pipe's mouthpiece for DNA. Among the three DNA profiles found on the pipe, one belonged to Sieg. Tests on the two bags showed both contained methamphetamine.

The State charged Sieg with possession of methamphetamine under K.S.A. 2016 Supp. 21-5706(a) and possession of drug paraphernalia under K.S.A. 2016 Supp. 21-5709(b)(2). His first trial ended in a mistrial after the jury deadlocked. A jury found him guilty after a second trial.

Sieg appealed, raising five trial-error claims. The panel rejected each and affirmed his convictions. Sieg , 2021 WL 2386373, at *1. He petitioned this court for review, which we granted. Jurisdiction is proper. See K.S.A. 20-3018(b) (providing for petitions for review of Court of Appeals decisions); K.S.A. 60-2101(b) (Supreme Court has jurisdiction to review Court of Appeals decisions upon petition for review).

SUFFICIENCY OF THE EVIDENCE

The State charged Sieg under K.S.A. 2016 Supp. 21-5709(b)(2) : "It shall be unlawful for any person to use or possess with intent to use any drug paraphernalia to ... store, contain, conceal, inject, ingest, inhale or otherwise introduce a controlled substance into the human body." The term "drug paraphernalia" is broadly defined in K.S.A. 2016 Supp. 21-5701(f). It provides a nonexclusive list of items that can be considered drug paraphernalia under the Kansas Criminal Code, including pipes and spoons. The State's charging document against Sieg stated:

"[O]n or about the 4th day of June, 2017, in Leavenworth County, Kansas, Orville William Sieg, then and there being present did unlawfully and knowingly possess, or have under the defendant's control with intent to use, drug paraphernalia, to wit: a glass pipe, silver spoon, used to ingest , inhale, injecting [sic ] or otherwise introduce a controlled substance into the human body." (Emphases added.)

At trial, the district court gave two jury instructions that Sieg uses as a springboard for his first trial-error claim.

Instruction No. 3 stated in part:

"The defendant is charged with unlawfully using or possess with intent to use drug paraphernalia. The defendant pleads not guilty.
"To establish this charge, each of the following claims must be proved:
"1. The defendant used or possessed with the intent to use a pipe and spoon as drug paraphernalia to introduce into the human body methamphetamine." (Emphasis added.)

Instruction No. 4 stated:

"Drug paraphernalia means materials of any kind which are used or primarily intended or designed for use in inhaling a controlled substance.
"Drug paraphernalia includes pipes.
"Drug paraphernalia means materials of any kind which are used or intended for use in injecting a controlled substance.
"Drug paraphernalia includes spoons ." (Emphases added.)

Sieg interprets these instructions to require a finding that he possessed a spoon for injecting a controlled substance to find him guilty of possessing drug paraphernalia. He argues the evidence against him is insufficient because the only testimony was that "spoons are often used to ingest narcotics into the human body." (Emphasis added.) In other words, he embraces a distinction between "injecting" and "ingesting." He also asserts that since the instructions required the jury to find he possessed the pipe "and " spoon with intent to use—as opposed to "and/or "—the State failed to prove the spoon was paraphernalia used to inject drugs even if it proved the pipe were paraphernalia.

Before the panel, Sieg claimed the evidence's sufficiency must be measured against the jury instructions given at trial, relying on State v. Warren , 295 Kan. 629, 634, 285 P.3d 1036 (2012) ("[E]vidence would ... have been insufficient to prove that charge [because] the evidence did not support the elements of the charge as outlined in the jury instruction ." [Emphasis added.]). Without responding directly to Sieg's claim under Warren , the State basically contended the evidence was sufficient to sustain the paraphernalia conviction because the instructions allowed the jury to use their common knowledge and experience when reviewing evidence, and what could be considered drug paraphernalia was common knowledge.

The panel agreed the evidence was sufficient. Sieg , 2021 WL 2386373, at *3. But in doing so, it relied on State v. Valentine , No. 199,164, 2019 WL 2306626, at *4-6 (Kan. App. 2019) (unpublished opinion), which determined sufficiency must be judged from the charging document—not the jury instructions. The panel held: "The jury could have found Sieg possessed the spoon with the intent to use it to ingest a controlled substance," as written in the information. (Emphasis added.) Sieg , 2021 WL 2386373, at *3.

Now before this court, Sieg adjusts his argument, claiming the panel erred because "a sufficiency analysis proceeds from both the charging document and the jury instructions." He relies on State v. Laborde , 303 Kan. 1, 6, 360 P.3d 1080 (2015) (State must prove the crime it charges), and Warren , 295 Kan. at 634, 285 P.3d 1036 (evidence must "support the elements of the charge as outlined in the jury instruction").

Standard of review

The Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution requires proof beyond a reasonable doubt of every element of the crime charged. It also requires fact-finders to rationally apply the proof-beyond-a-reasonable-doubt standard to the facts in evidence. So when a criminal defendant challenges the evidence's sufficiency, a reviewing court must examine the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution and decide whether "any rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt." Jackson v. Virginia , 443 U.S. 307, 317-19, 99 S. Ct. 2781, 61 L. Ed. 2d 560 (1979) ; State v. Ta , 296 Kan. 230, 236, 290 P.3d 652 (2012). "All that a defendant is entitled to on a sufficiency challenge is for the court to make a ‘legal’ determination whether the evidence was strong enough to reach a jury at all." Musacchio v. United States , 577 U.S. 237, 244, 136 S. Ct. 709, 193 L. Ed. 2d 639 (2016) (quoting Jackson , 443 U.S. at 319, 99 S.Ct. 2781 ["Once a defendant has been found guilty of the crime charged, the factfinder's role...

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  • State v. Cardona-Rivera
    • United States
    • Kansas Court of Appeals
    • 1 Diciembre 2023
    ... ... applicable here. Because K.S.A. 2022 Supp. 60-455 was not ... implicated by the State's admission of Y.M.'s ... statement that Cardona-Rivera held a knife to her daughter, ... the district court did not err by not giving a limiting ... instruction. See State v. Sieg , 315 Kan. 526, ... 533-34, 509 P.3d 535 (2022) (holding that K.S.A. 2020 Supp ... 60-455 does not prohibit the admission of evidence of other ... crimes and civil wrongs if the evidence relates to acts ... committed as part of the events surrounding the crimes or ... ...
  • State v. May
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    • Kansas Court of Appeals
    • 22 Diciembre 2023
    ... ... prosecutorial misconduct or error during his ... cross-examination at trial. The appellate court uses a ... two-step process to evaluate claims of prosecutorial error: ... error and prejudice. State v. Sieg , 315 Kan. 526, ... 535, 509 P.3d 535 (2022) ... "To determine whether prosecutorial error has occurred, ... the appellate court must decide whether the prosecutorial ... acts complained of fall outside the wide latitude afforded ... prosecutors to conduct the State's ... ...

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