State v. Ward
| Decision Date | 20 June 2016 |
| Docket Number | A15-1000 |
| Parties | State of Minnesota, Respondent, v. Chevaze Darrell Ward, Appellant. |
| Court | Minnesota Court of Appeals |
This opinion will be unpublished and may not be cited except as provided by Minn. Stat. § 480A.08, subd. 3 (2014).
Affirmed
Ramsey County District Court
Lori Swanson, Attorney General, St. Paul, Minnesota; and
John J. Choi, Ramsey County Attorney, Kaarin Long, Assistant County Attorney, St. Paul, Minnesota (for respondent)
Cathryn Middlebrook, Chief Appellate Public Defender, Rochelle R. Winn, Assistant Public Defender, St. Paul, Minnesota (for appellant)
Considered and decided by Worke, Presiding Judge; Reilly, Judge; and Smith, Tracy, Judge.
UNPUBLISHED OPINION
Appellant challenges his second-degree murder conviction on the grounds that (1) the evidence was insufficient to establish that he was not acting in self-defense against an unprovoked attack; (2) the prosecutor committed misconduct during closing argument by impermissibly shifting the burden of proof; (3) the district court abused its discretion by admitting evidence under the excited-utterance exception to the hearsay rule; and (4) appellant's trial counsel was ineffective. We affirm.
The present action arises out of appellant Chevaze Darrell Ward's second-degree intentional murder conviction for the death of L.H. In June 2014, L.H. telephoned appellant's ex-girlfriend to discuss a debt that she owed L.H. Later, appellant called L.H. on the telephone. L.H.'s sister, S.L., was present with L.H. for the phone call and described L.H. as seeming "upset and agitated" because appellant "had threatened to kill [L.H.] . . . over the phone." S.L. did not consider the threat to be serious because the families grew up together and often fought to resolve their differences.
The following day, appellant was riding in a car with R.B., C.C., and T.W., when they noticed L.H. in his car at a gas station. Appellant told the three other men that he was in a dispute with L.H. over the repayment of a debt and intended to fight L.H. when he saw him. Because he could not physically fight, appellant stated that he would have to "shoot someone." The men continued driving to the intersection of Case Avenue and Arcade Street in St. Paul, four or five blocks away from the gas station. C.C. stopped at a red light, and L.H. drove up alongside C.C.'s car. L.H. put his car into park, got out of his car, and ran around to the rear driver's side door of C.C.'s car where appellant was seated. L.H. opened appellant's door and began hitting him and "punching him in his face." C.C. estimated that L.H. punched appellant "[m]aybe six or seven" times. The other three menin the car were neither encouraging nor stopping the fight, and C.C. did not attempt to drive away. Appellant shot L.H. two to three times, and L.H. fell to the ground.
After shooting L.H., appellant jumped out of the car and ran away, discarding some of his clothing as he ran. The other three men helped L.H. into the car and drove him to a nearby fire station. The EMTs at the fire station provided medical assistance to L.H. and called for an ambulance to transport him to the hospital. Medical efforts to revive L.H. were unsuccessful, and L.H. was declared dead at the hospital. The medical examiner testified that L.H. died from exsanguination, or bleeding to death, due to the contact gunshot wound to the chest and classified the death a homicide.
Police officers responded to the scene of the shooting and found appellant walking away from the intersection, carrying a white tank top in his hands, sweating, and breathing heavily. Appellant was taken into custody. Police officers found the gun hidden in a white athletic sock on the ledge of a retaining wall in front of a nearby house, and also recovered cartridge casings, an athletic shoe, and blood samples from the scene. The Bureau of Criminal Apprehension generated DNA profiles from the athletic sock and the gun and concluded that appellant could not be excluded as a contributor to the DNA found in the sock and on the magazine of the gun. The state charged appellant with one count of second-degree intentional murder in violation of Minn. Stat. § 609.19, subd. 1(1) (2012), and one count of second-degree unintentional felony murder in violation of Minn. Stat. § 609.19, subd. 2(1) (2012).
Appellant entered pleas of not guilty and the matter proceeded to a jury trial. The jury found appellant guilty of the charges. At sentencing, the district court adjudicatedappellant guilty of second-degree intentional murder and committed him to the commissioner of corrections for 388 months. This appeal follows.
Our review of a sufficiency-of-the-evidence challenge is "limited to a painstaking analysis of the record to determine whether the evidence, when viewed in a light most favorable to the conviction, was sufficient to permit the jurors to reach the verdict which they did." State v. DeRosier, 695 N.W.2d 97, 108 (Minn. 2005) (quotation omitted). We assume "the jury believed the state's witnesses and disbelieved any evidence to the contrary." State v. Moore, 438 N.W.2d 101, 108 (Minn. 1989). Inconsistencies in testimony go to witness credibility, which is an issue for the jury. State v. Pendleton, 706 N.W.2d 500, 511-12 (Minn. 2005).
Appellant asserted a claim of self-defense. Minnesota law provides that "reasonable force may be used upon or toward the person of another without the other's consent" in certain circumstances, including "when used by any person in resisting or aiding another to resist an offense against the person." Minn. Stat. § 609.06, subd. 1(3) (2012). The intentional taking of the life of another person is not authorized under section 609.06, "except when necessary in resisting or preventing an offense which the actor reasonably believes exposes the actor or another to great bodily harm or death." Minn. Stat. § 609.065 (2012). The defendant bears the burden of presenting evidence to support a claim of self-defense. State v. Johnson, 719 N.W.2d 619, 629 (Minn. 2006). Once the defendant satisfies this burden, the state has the "ultimate burden" of disproving one or more of theseelements beyond a reasonable doubt. State v. Radke, 821 N.W.2d 316, 324 (Minn. 2012). The elements of self-defense are:
(1) the absence of aggression or provocation on the part of the defendant; (2) the defendant's actual and honest belief that he or she was in imminent danger of death or great bodily harm; (3) the existence of reasonable grounds for that belief; and (4) the absence of a reasonable possibility of retreat to avoid the danger.
Johnson, 719 N.W.2d at 629 (quotation omitted).
The first and fourth elements are not in dispute. The crux of the dispute turns on whether the state disproved the second and third factors: that appellant had an actual and honest belief that he was in imminent danger of great bodily harm or death, and that there was a reasonable basis for that fear.
A defendant's actual and honest belief that he faces imminent danger "is subjective and depends upon the defendant's state of mind." Id. at 630. Appellant did not testify that he believed himself to be in imminent danger of great bodily harm or death. However, a defendant need not testify and provide direct evidence of his state of mind, as such evidence may be established circumstantially. Id. at 630-31 (). Appellant contends that the state failed to disprove this factor because there was a "stark disparity" between the physical attributes of L.H. and of appellant. L.H. was approximately six and a half feet tall and muscular and weighed about 230 pounds, while appellant was described as "[f]at" and "bowlegged." However, the jury also heard testimony that appellant was "healthy," andhad threatened to kill L.H. And there is evidence that appellant and L.H. frequently physically fought to resolve their differences, despite their physical differences. The jury heard these varying accounts and credited the state's evidence. Upon review, we regard the evidence in the light most favorable to the jury's verdict, and we assume the jury believed the state's witnesses and disbelieved any evidence to the contrary. State v. Doppler, 590 N.W.2d 627, 635 (Minn. 1999). The jury evaluated the credibility of the witnesses and concluded that the state disproved the second element of appellant's self-defense claim. The evidence is sufficient to support that determination.
The third element of self-defense considers the existence of reasonable grounds for the defendant's belief that he is in imminent danger of great bodily harm or death. Johnson, 719 N.W.2d at 629. "This is an objective test." Id. at 631 (citing State v. Boyce, 284 Minn. 242, 256, 170 N.W.2d 104, 113 (1969)). The state was required to disprove that appellant used a degree of force that was necessary to a reasonable person in similar circumstances. State v. Basting, 572 N.W.2d 281, 286 (Minn. 1997). Several witnesses testified about the brief time between the initial attack and the shooting. C.C., T.W., and an eyewitness testified that L.H.'s attack lasted a matter of seconds before appellant fired the gun. Additionally, the state presented evidence that appellant prepared for the fight by carrying a loaded firearm with him in the car and telling his friends that he would "shoot someone" if confronted. With this evidence, the jury concluded that it was not reasonable, under the circumstances, for appellant to believe that he was in imminent danger of death or great bodily harm. When viewed in the light most favorable to the jury's verdict, State v. Pieschke, 295 N.W.2d 580, 584 (Minn. 1980), the evidence in the record was sufficient tosupport the jury's decision that the state dispro...
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