Williams v. United States
| Decision Date | 10 February 2022 |
| Docket Number | 17-CF-944 |
| Citation | 268 A.3d 1265 |
| Parties | Carrington WILLIAMS, Appellant, v. UNITED STATES, Appellee. |
| Court | D.C. Court of Appeals |
Fleming Terrell, Public Defender Service, with whom Samia Fam and Jaclyn Frankfurt, Public Defender Service, were on the brief, for appellant.
Daniel Lenerz, Assistant United States Attorney, with whom Jessie K. Liu, United States Attorney at the time the brief was filed, and Elizabeth Trosman, John P. Mannarino and David P. Saybolt, Assistant United States Attorneys, were on the brief for appellee.
Before Thompson,* Associate Judge, and Washington and Fisher,** Senior Judges.
Appellant, Carrington Williams, was indicted on eight counts stemming from incidents that took place at his former girlfriend's apartment on the evening of September 26 and into the morning of September 27, 2015. The case first went to trial on November 15, 2016, but before the jury was sworn, one of the complainants in this case, Derrick Brown, was arrested on charges of "domestic violence" against one of the other complainants, Tonica Belton. As a result, the trial was postponed. In March 2017, appellant was convicted after a jury trial of first-degree burglary, first-degree burglary while armed, two counts of destruction of property, assault with significant bodily injury, and two counts of simple assault. In this appeal, appellant argues that the trial court erred by concluding that he could be convicted of two counts of first-degree burglary, first for entering an apartment and again for entering a bedroom within the apartment, both belonging to the same complainant; and by curtailing the defense's impeachment of Mr. Brown.1 Concluding that the burglary statute does not ordinarily permit multiple convictions for breaches of different portions of the same dwelling, we reverse in part. We hold that the trial court did not err in curtailing the impeachment of Mr. Brown, and thus affirm appellant's remaining convictions.
Tonica Belton testified that she is appellant's former girlfriend and the mother of appellant's children. At the time of the incidents at issue here, Ms. Belton was in a relationship with Derrick Brown, who was at her apartment. Ms. Belton lived at the apartment with her children, and was the leaseholder. No other adults lived in the apartment. On September 26, 2015, appellant and Ms. Belton became involved in a dispute via a text message exchange. Appellant then arrived at Ms. Belton's apartment and the two of them argued in person outside of her apartment complex. Ms. Belton returned to her apartment and locked her front door. Appellant texted Ms. Belton to meet him outside, but she refused to meet him. Soon after, appellant began kicking her apartment door and forcibly opened it; he grabbed and pushed Ms. Belton before Mr. Brown became involved in the altercation. While the men were fighting in the kitchen, appellant grabbed a knife and ran after Mr. Brown, who exited the apartment. Ms. Belton ran into her bedroom, where her daughter was sleeping, locked the door, and "got on the floor." She put her "back up against the corner of the bottom of the bed and used [her] feet to keep the door closed." Appellant did not follow Mr. Brown, but instead broke Ms. Belton's bedroom door, cut her shoulder with the knife he was carrying, grabbed her hair, and repeatedly punched her. At one point, appellant stopped and walked out of the bedroom, but then entered again and resumed hitting Ms. Belton.
During the trial, Mr. Brown testified that he had been drinking in Ms. Belton's bedroom since the morning of September 26, 2015. He stated that he had been drinking because he was unable to see his newborn child and consequently was depressed. Mr. Brown added that he had observed appellant choking Ms. Belton before appellant attacked him. He testified that when he was fighting with appellant in the kitchen, appellant had grabbed a knife and swung it at him, cutting his shirt but not wounding him. During cross-examination, Mr. Brown admitted to bragging about his fight with appellant on social media. Mr. Brown also confirmed that when he testified before the grand jury in this case, he had a pending misdemeanor assault case for an incident arising in September 2015, and he eventually pled guilty to the charge. He testified that the charge carried up to six months in jail. Mr. Brown was impeached with his grand jury testimony in which he stated that he had started drinking in the afternoon, and that in fact he had seen his newborn child the night before. During further cross-examination, he stated that he was "upset" and "depressed" but again asserted that it was because he "couldn't see [his] child." Mr. Brown denied being angry with appellant or attacking him with a knife. Mr. Brown was also impeached with his November 2016 charge for destroying Ms. Belton's property, and testified that the government had dropped those charges against him. He confirmed that the day before he destroyed Ms. Belton's property, Ms. Belton informed him that she had talked to the defense team in this case, but he denied threatening Ms. Belton or calling her a "snitch."
During the trial, the defense sought to introduce specific facts of Mr. Brown's September 2015 assault (which resulted in a conviction), arguing that the facts of the assault were necessary for the jury to assess "whether ... the witness [Brown] might be biased[.]" The defense counsel conveyed to the trial court that the September 2015 assault charge resulted from Mr. Brown slapping his girlfriend, Lauren Hickson ("Hickson assault"), who had just given birth to their newborn child. The defense theory was that Mr. Brown had "an independent self-interest in avoiding prosecution ... [and] a motive to curry favor with the [g]overnment ... [as well as] a separate ... area of bias." It was also asserted that "Mr. Brown [was] the person who assaulted Ms. Belton, not [appellant]." As to the bias issue, the defense argued that when Mr. Brown testified before the grand jury, "he was ... wrapped up in a possible domestic violence love triangle kind of case having his own pending DV case."
The trial court ruled that the defense could inquire about Mr. Brown's probation resulting from his guilty plea, and about how he could face 60 days of incarceration if he were to violate the probation. The court also permitted the defense to ask questions related to Mr. Brown's potential belief that "he should curry favor with the government in the event that he did violate his probation[.]" The court found, however, that introducing specific facts underlying the Hickson assault or other matters of domestic violence would be more prejudicial than probative.
The defense moved for a judgment of acquittal on all counts after the government rested its case. According to the defense, the government could not charge appellant with two counts of first-degree burglary for the entry into Ms. Belton's apartment and again for the entry into her bedroom because the bedroom did not qualify as a separate dwelling or a room used as a sleeping apartment under the statute, and the charges were duplicitous.
We address the issue of the two burglary convictions first. The crime of burglary is defined in relevant part as:
Whoever shall ... break and enter, or enter without breaking, any dwelling, or room used as a sleeping apartment in any building, with intent to ... commit any criminal offense, shall, if any person is in any part of such dwelling or sleeping apartment at the time of such breaking and entering, or entering without breaking, be guilty of burglary in the first degree.
D.C. Code § 22-801(a) (2012 Repl. & 2021 Supp.). At issue in this case is the proper unit of prosecution for burglary—specifically, whether a defendant may be convicted of burglary twice for first entering a dwelling, and then a locked bedroom within that larger dwelling that is occupied by the same individual. Appellant argues that his conviction for first-degree armed burglary of Ms. Belton's bedroom must be vacated because the phrase "room used as a sleeping apartment" refers to rooms that can be burgled separately from the larger structure, such as a hotel room or a dormitory room. The government recommends an expansive interpretation of § 22-801(a) in which any locked bedroom inside a dwelling qualifies as a room used as a sleeping apartment. We reject the government's broad interpretation. See Swinson v. United States , 483 A.2d 1160, 1162 (D.C. 1984) ( ); United States v. Evans , 30 App. D.C. 58, 62 (D.C. Cir. 1907) ().
This court reviews questions of statutory interpretation de novo , including questions regarding the proper unit of prosecution. Whylie v. United States , 98 A.3d 156, 162 (D.C. 2014) (citing Hammond v. United States , 77 A.3d 964, 967 (D.C. 2013) ). "When it becomes necessary to determine [w]hat [the legislature] has made the allowable unit of prosecution ... under a statute which does not explicitly give the answer[,] doubt will be resolved against turning a single transaction into multiple offenses[.]" Whylie , 98 A.3d at 162 (internal quotation marks omitted). In this case, the evidence was sufficient to support both convictions for burglary, but that does not mean that both convictions can stand.
We find the recent opinion in People v. Garcia , 62 Cal.4th 1116, 199 Cal.Rptr.3d 164, 365 P.3d 928 (2016), informative in determining when multiple convictions for burglary are permitted. In Garcia , the Supreme Court of California analyzed whether a defendant could be...
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