State v. Trieb

• Citation: 315 N.W.2d 649
• Decision Date: 11 February 1982
• Docket Number: Cr. N
• Parties: STATE of North Dakota, Plaintiff and Appellee, v. Reginald TRIEB, Defendant and Appellant. o. 778.
• Court: United States State Supreme Court of North Dakota

Page 649

315 N.W.2d 649

STATE of North Dakota, Plaintiff and Appellee, v. Reginald TRIEB, Defendant and Appellant.

Cr. No. 778.

Supreme Court of North Dakota.

Feb. 11, 1982.

William G. Goetz, Adams County State's Atty., Hettinger, for plaintiff and appellee State of North Dakota.

Ronald A. Reichert, of Freed, Dynes, Malloy & Reichert, Dickinson, for defendant and appellant.

VANDE WALLE, Justice.

Reginald Trieb was tried in Adams County district court for the crime of murder, a Class AA felony. He was convicted by a jury and sentenced to life in prison. He appealed from the judgment of conviction. We reverse and remand for a new trial.

I

On November 19, 1979, 19-year-old Reginald Trieb confessed to the slaying of 17-year-old Val Scott Blade. On the basis of this statement, the statement of a juvenile participant in the crime, and other corroborating evidence, Trieb was charged with murder in that he "intentionally" and "knowingly" caused the death of another human being. Sec. 12.1-16-01, N.D.C.C. On the night of the murder Blade and Trieb met by chance in a Hettinger bar. Blade bought drinks for several of the patrons, including Trieb. After Blade had purchased two cases of beer, he and Trieb left the bar and drove to Trieb's apartment. They were in the apartment for only a short time before Blade, who was described as "intoxicated," retired to Trieb's bedroom and fell asleep. While Blade was sleeping, Trieb and Timothy Morrissey ¹ stole his wallet and car keys. Trieb, Morrissey, and another young man, a minor, ² then drove Val Blade's car to Lemmon, South Dakota. As Trieb later stated, "we ... got really drunk (and) then we came home." The murder was planned at a Lemmon bar and during the return trip to Hettinger. Trieb killed Val Blade with a jack handle while Blade was still sleeping. Trieb and his companions then took Blade's body to the nearby Grand River. Trieb shot Blade several times and left him lying on the ice.

Trieb's chief defense at trial was "lack of criminal responsibility by reason of mental disease or defect at the time of the alleged crime." To support this defense, Trieb relied on the testimony of people from his past and the expertise of a psychiatrist, Dr. Severson. According to these witnesses, Trieb's youth was marked by turmoil, trauma, and neglect. By the time of the murder, the use of alcohol and other drugs had become a constant factor in Trieb's life. Dr. Severson testified that Trieb was suffering from a mental disease or defect when he killed Val Blade. Severson described the disease as "acute alcohol intoxication, a psychosis with drug intoxication." The State called several expert witnesses in rebuttal. The essence of their testimony was that Trieb was criminally responsible for the death of Val Blade. Trieb's attorney also wanted to argue that Trieb was guilty of a lesser offense of manslaughter; he was thwarted in this effort by the judge's refusal to instruct on the offense.

The instruction "It is presumed, however, that an unlawful act was done with unlawful intent," ³ was included in the charge given to the jury on intent. Trieb now contends that the giving of this instruction constitutes reversible error.

Trieb's objection is based on Sandstrom v. Montana, 442 U.S. 510, 99 S.Ct. 2450, 61 L.Ed.2d 39 (1979), and State v. Sheldon, 301 N.W.2d 604 (N.D.1980), cert. denied 450 U.S. 1002, 101 S.Ct. 1711, 68 L.Ed.2d 204 (1981). In Sandstrom, supra, the Supreme Court held that the jury instruction "The law presumes that a person intends the ordinary consequences of his voluntary acts," violates the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. According to the Court, the question of "whether a defendant has been accorded his constitutional rights depends upon the way in which a reasonable juror could have interpreted the instruction." Sandstrom, supra, 442 U.S. at 514, 99 S.Ct. at 2454, 61 L.Ed.2d at 45. Justice Brennan, writing for a unanimous Court, reasoned that the jury may have interpreted the instruction impermissibly as a conclusive presumption or as shifting the burden of persuasion to the defendant on the critical element of intent. Sandstrom, supra, 442 U.S. at 517-518, 99 S.Ct. at 2456, 61 L.Ed.2d at 46-47. The Court held that the presumption is unconstitutional because either interpretation violates the due-process command that the State prove every element of a criminal offense beyond a reasonable doubt.

In State v. Sheldon, supra, this court held that the presumption contained in North Dakota Pattern Jury Instruction 1313, which is challenged again here, runs afoul of the directive of Sandstrom v. Montana. However, the court deemed the inclusion of the unconstitutional presumption "harmless error" because Sheldon was ultimately convicted of reckless endangerment, an offense which does not require the element of intent. Sheldon, supra, 301 N.W.2d at 613. And see State v. Chyle, 297 N.W.2d 409, 415-417 (N.D.1980) (where defendant was charged with criminal mischief, an offense which did not include intent as an element, the inclusion of the presumption of intent was surplusage, removing the case from the strictures of Sandstrom ).

There can be no question that the jury instruction on "intent," identical to the charge condemned in Sheldon, deprived Trieb of his right to due process of law as explicated in Sandstrom, supra. As in Sandstrom, the element of "intent" was a critical component of the crime charged. Sandstrom was charged with "deliberate homicide" in that he "purposely or knowingly" caused the death of a human being. Trieb was charged with "intentionally or knowingly" causing the death of another human being. Compare State v. Chyle, supra (requisite mental state was recklessly). Like Sandstrom's jurors, the members of Trieb's jury may have been misled by the instruction. They could have regarded the presumption as mandatory-an indisputable direction to find the requisite intent once convinced that the unlawful act had been committed. Like Sandstrom's jurors, the jurors in this case "were not told that they had a choice, or that they might infer that conclusion; they were told only that the law presumed it." Sandstrom, supra, 442 U.S. at 515, 99 S.Ct. at 2454, 61 L.Ed.2d at 45. The possibility that the jurors may have viewed the presumption as shifting the burden of persuasion to the defendant, a possibility condemned in Sandstrom, also exists in this case. Trieb's jurors were not told that the presumption could be rebutted at all. Sandstrom, supra, 442 U.S. at 517, 99 S.Ct. at 2455-2456, 61 L.Ed.2d at 46.

"Given the common definition of 'presume' as 'to suppose to be true without proof' ... and given the lack of qualifying instructions as to the legal effect of the presumption, we cannot discount the possibility that the jury may have interpreted the instruction" (Sandstrom, supra, 442 U.S. at 517, 99 S.Ct. at 2456, 61 L.Ed.2d at 46) in either of the two ways held unconstitutional in Sandstrom.

The State argues that the potential for these impermissible interpretations was removed by the other instructions given at trial. The State relies on the instructions given on the "interpretation of the evidence" and the "lack of criminal responsibility" to support this contention. ⁴

In Sandstrom, a similar argument, that the error in the presumption was cured by correct charges on the presumption of innocence and the burden of proof, was rejected by the Court. As Justice Brennan explained:

"The potential for these interpretations of the presumption was not removed by the other instructions given at the trial. It is true that the jury was instructed generally that the accused was presumed innocent until proven guilty, and that the State had the burden of proving beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant caused the death of the deceased purposely or knowingly.... But this is not rhetorically inconsistent with a conclusive or burden-shifting presumption. The jury could have interpreted the two sets of instructions as indicating that the presumption was a means by which proof beyond a reasonable doubt as to intent could be satisfied. For example, if the presumption were viewed as conclusive, the jury could have believed that although intent must be proven beyond a reasonable doubt, proof of the voluntary slaying and its ordinary consequences constituted proof of intent beyond a reasonable doubt." Sandstrom, supra, 442 U.S. at 518, 99 S.Ct. at 2456, 61 L.Ed.2d at 47, n. 7.

Similarly, we do not think that the instructions on the interpretation of the evidence and the lack of criminal responsibility foreclosed the possibility that Trieb's jurors may have relied on the erroneous presumption in reaching their verdict. The instruction on interpretation of evidence is not inconsistent with a conclusive presumption. If the jury viewed the presumption as conclusive, it could have reasoned that its role in interpreting the evidence was limited to evidence bearing only on the commission of the unlawful act. Once the jurors found that Trieb had committed the unlawful act, they could have relied on the presumption as a means by which proof as to intent could be satisfied.

The State stands on shaky ground in relying upon the criminal-responsibility instruction as an antidote to counteract the potential for improper use of the presumption. In the first place, as Trieb has argued, the instruction on criminal responsibility itself contains an unexplained presumption, i.e., "(a) ll persons, with certain exceptions not pertinent to this case, are presumed responsible for his or her criminal conduct." ⁵ While this presumption of sanity would not run afoul of the Constitution if its legal effect were properly explained, ⁶ nothing but the bare presumption was submitted to Trieb's jury. These instructions relied on by the State neither qualified nor explained how the jurors should interpret the presumption. State v. Amado, 433 A.2d 233 (R.I.1981); contra, Jacks v....