State v. Hall, Minn.S.Ct., 5/7/2009. A jury convicted Mr. Hall of first degree murder for the shooting death of his girlfriend's brother, Mr. Moore. Mr. Moore didn't approve of his sister's relationship with Mr. Hall; the two men squabbled fairly regularly about it. On the night of the shooting, Mr. Moore stepped outside of his apartment for a smoke. Mr. Hall's girlfriend, who happened to be visiting her brother, heard two loud pops while Mr. Moore was outside; a friend of Moore's, who was also outside, heard two gunshots, then saw Mr. Hall run to his car and drive away. Meanwhile, Mr. Moore staggered back into his apartment to tell his sister that "They got me." He then thought it best to clarify who "they" was, so he added that it was Mr. Hall.
Police arrested and interrogated Mr. Hall, giving him a Miranda advisory. Mr. Hall made no admissions, stating fairly early on that “I’m not admitting to anything and I’m just talkin’ to you about a story you’re tellin’ me, so, I’m not, until I have a lawyer, you know, I’m not really gonna break down anything. You know?” At about the midpoint of the interrogation, Mr. Hall asked, “So what’s the deal man? You gonna give me a lawyer or what?” The response from the police was to keep interrogating him for another forty minutes.
Mr. Hall testified at trial that he did, indeed, shoot Mr. Moore, but that he did so in self defense. (Other evidence suggested rather convincingly that Mr. Moore was shot in the back through a glass door.) Mr. Hall raised numerous evidence rulings on appeal.
First: Admitting the interrogation up to and including Mr. Hall's question,“So what’s the deal man? You gonna give me a lawyer or what?” The appellate court said that admitting this last question was error, but the error was harmless.
Second: In the admitted portion of Hall's interrogation he told the police that he had a fifth degree assault conviction. The appellate court ducks the question whether admitting this statement was error and says that even if it were it was harmless.
Third: The trial court, on the state's rather vague motion, said that Hall could not inquire about the circumstances under, and the manner in which the police interrogated him. This motion is becoming something of a standard in Ramsey County, so it's worth stating it; the motion asks that the defense be prohibited:
from inquiring, offering evidence, or commenting upon in the presence of the jury or prospective jurors, the constitutionality of . . . the manner in which statements were taken from the defendant.
This motion, of course, completely ignores the U.S. Supreme Court's decision twenty-three years ago in Crane v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 683 (1986), where the Court unanimously ruled that the defendant’s right to present a defense was violated when the trial court excluded competent, reliable evidence bearing on the credibility of a confession—specifically, evidence about the setting in which the confession was obtained. Here, the appellate court makes a rather feeble effort to distinguish Crane, saying that Hall, unlike Mr. Crane, did not actually confess, and that Mr. Hall, unlike Mr. Crane, was not a juvenile; but ultimately abandons that effort, assumes that it was error and decides that it was harmless.
Fourth: The trial court said that the prosecutor could refer to Mr. Moore as "the victim." Mr. Moore said that this undermined his claim of self defense. The appellate court rejects this claim, suggesting that the use of the phrase would have to amount to appeals to the passions and prejudices of the jury to be error. Cf., Rairdon v. State, 557 N.W. 2d 318 (Minn. 1996).
Fifth: Should the trial court have allowed Mr. Hall to introduce evidence of Mr. Moore's prior convictions, to impeach his dying declaration? Mr. Hall cites numerous opinions from other states that permit such impeachment, but this research failed to move the appellate court, which again ducked the issue, assumed it was error and decided that the error was harmless.
So, for those keeping score: the appellate court decides two of the five evidence questions - don't admit the part of the interrogation where the defendant asks for a lawyer, and it's okay to call the victim the victim so long as you don't overdo it - and ducks the remaining three. It's an easy job, said Fox.
Lastly, Mr. Hall complained of the trial court's duty to retreat instruction, which the trial court gave twice. It first gave the retreat instruction as part of the general self defense instruction, CRIMJIG 7.05; it then repeated the retreat instruction in a separate instruction that self defense requires compliance with the duty to retreat, CRIMJIG 7.08. The appellate court said that both instructions accurately stated the law, and that the second retreat instruction did not unfairly emphasize one instruction over another. State v. Peterson, 673 N.W.2d 482 (Minn. 2004).
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