Blake Layman & Levi Sparks v. State of Indiana

CourtIndiana Supreme Court
DecidedSeptember 18, 2015
Docket20A04-1310-CR-518
StatusPublished

This text of Blake Layman & Levi Sparks v. State of Indiana (Blake Layman & Levi Sparks v. State of Indiana) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Indiana Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Blake Layman & Levi Sparks v. State of Indiana, (Ind. 2015).

Opinion

ATTORNEYS FOR APPELLANT ATTORNEYS FOR APPELLEE BLAKE LAYMAN Gregory F. Zoeller Cara Schaefer Wieneke Attorney General of Indiana Joel C. Wieneke Wieneke Law Office, LLC Ian McLean Plainfield, Indiana Deputy Attorney General

ATTORNEY FOR APPELLANT Joseph Ho Deputy Attorney General LEVI SPARKS Indianapolis, Indiana Vincent M. Campiti Nemeth Feeney Masters & Campiti, P.C. South Bend, Indiana

ATTORNEYS FOR AMICI CURIAE JUVENILE LAW CENTER, CENTER ON WRONGFUL CONVICTIONS OF YOUTH AND CHILDREN’S LAW CENTER, INC. Scott F. Bieniek Sep 18 2015, 10:06 am Jeffrey A. Boggess, P.C. Greencastle, Indiana

Marsha Levick Juvenile Law Center Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

ATTORNEYS FOR AMICI CURIAE INDIANA PUBLIC DEFENDER COUNCIL Joel M. Schumm Indianapolis, Indiana

Matthew Hayes Danielle Teagarden Shea Thompson Certified Legal Interns Indianapolis, Indiana

Larry Landis Indiana Public Defender Council Indianapolis, Indiana ______________________________________________________________________________

In the Indiana Supreme Court _________________________________

No. 20S04-1509-CR-548 BLAKE LAYMAN, Appellant (Defendant below),

v.

STATE OF INDIANA, Appellee (Plaintiff below). __________________________________

LEVI SPARKS, Appellant (Defendant below),

STATE OF INDIANA, Appellee (Plaintiff below).

_________________________________

Appeal from the Elkhart Circuit Court No. 20C01-1210-MR-7 20C01-1210-MR-5 The Honorable Terry C. Shewmaker, Judge _________________________________

On Petition To Transfer from the Indiana Court of Appeals, No. 20A04-1310-CR-518 _________________________________

September 18, 2015 Corrected

Rucker, Justice.

In this consolidated appeal juvenile cohorts Blake Layman and Levi Sparks challenge their convictions for felony murder in the perpetration of a burglary. We remand this cause to the trial court for further proceedings.

Facts and Procedural History

On the morning of October 3, 2012 sixteen-year-old Blake Layman and seventeen-year- old Levi Sparks were present at the home of sixteen-year-old Jose Quiroz. At some point, the

2 trio discussed committing burglary in the neighborhood. They decided to search for a house where the residents were away because they were aware that the presence of a homeowner during a burglary could result in injuries and more severe legal consequences. Sparks knocked on the door of the first house targeted. When the juveniles heard dogs barking they ran away. Someone was home at the second house they targeted.

Believing no one was home at the time, the juveniles finally settled on the house across the street from where Quiroz lived, which belonged to Rodney Scott. They then contacted their friends, eighteen-year-old Anthony P. Sharp, Jr., and twenty-one-year-old Danzele Johnson, to “help to get into the house.” Tr. at 925. Unbeknownst to them, however, Scott was actually asleep in an upstairs bedroom. Unarmed, the group proceeded to break into Scott’s house. While Sparks stayed at Quiroz’s house serving as a lookout, Layman, Johnson, Sharp, and Quiroz entered Scott’s home by kicking in the rear door to the kitchen. Scott was awakened when he heard a “boom, and [his] whole house just shook.” Tr. at 1058. After hearing a second loud boom, Scott immediately grabbed his handgun and cell phone and ran loudly downstairs to scare away any intruders. When Scott reached the bottom of the stairs he saw Sharp run out the back door. He then saw three of the intruders standing near a downstairs bedroom door. Scott began firing his weapon and Layman, Johnson, and Quiroz ran into the bedroom closet. Scott then held the young men at bay in the closet and called 911. While Scott was on the phone the closet door opened and Scott saw Johnson fall to the floor. Quiroz, whom Scott recognized as a neighbor, told Scott that Johnson had been shot. Shortly thereafter Layman yelled that he also had been shot.

When the police arrived, Quiroz attempted to flee. He ran out of the closet and crashed through a glass window. One of the officers pursued Quiroz on foot and he was soon after taken into custody. In the meantime other officers entered the house and arrested Layman who was treated for a gunshot wound to his leg. Johnson’s body was found on the bedroom floor just outside the closet. He died at the scene from a gunshot wound. Scott’s wallet and watch, which were previously located on the kitchen counter, were retrieved from the closet in which Layman, Johnson, and Quiroz had been hiding.

3 The State charged Layman, Sparks, Quiroz, and Sharp with felony murder in the perpetration of a burglary. And although Layman, Sparks, and Quiroz were juveniles 1 the State filed the charges directly in the criminal court because the “juvenile court does not have jurisdiction over an individual for an alleged violation of . . . murder” where “the individual was at least sixteen (16) years of age at the time of the alleged violation.” I.C. § 31-30-1-4(a) (2012). Over defense objections, Layman, Sparks, and Sharp were tried jointly. Quiroz pleaded guilty as charged and received a fifty-five-year sentence with ten years suspended to probation. He testified at the co-defendants’ jury trial which began August 19, 2013, at the conclusion of which the jury found each of the defendants guilty as charged. Thereafter the trial court sentenced Layman and Sharp to fifty-five years and sentenced Sparks to fifty years.

In a consolidated appeal, Layman and Sparks raised several constitutional claims. 2 In addition they also contended: (1) the felony murder statute was incorrectly applied in this case; and (2) their sentences were inappropriate. Separately, Sparks argued that because he never entered the house the evidence was insufficient to support his conviction. Concluding the felony murder statute was properly applied and rejecting Sparks’ separate claim, the Court of Appeals, in a divided opinion with each judge writing separately, affirmed the convictions but revised the sentences such that ten years of Layman’s sentence was suspended to probation and five years of Sparks’ sentence was suspended to probation for executed terms of forty-five years—the same

1 “A juvenile court has exclusive original jurisdiction . . . in the following: (1) Proceedings in which a child, including a child of divorced parents, is alleged to be a delinquent child under IC 31-37.” Ind. Code § 31-30-1-1(1). Indiana Code section 31-37-1-1 provides: “A child is a delinquent child if, before becoming eighteen (18) years of age, the child commits a delinquent act described in this chapter.” 2 Specifically Layman proposed: (1) “Is Indiana’s direct-filing statute unconstitutional on its face because it violates a juvenile defendant’s state and federal constitutional right to due process of law? If not on its face, is Indiana’s direct-filing statute unconstitutional as applied in this case, given that the boys’ intent and their actions constituted unarmed burglary, an offense that requires a hearing be held before waiver to adult court[;]” (2) “Based on what is now known about adolescent brain development and its effect on juvenile criminal activity, is Indiana’s direct-filing statute unconstitutional because it denies juveniles equal protection provided under the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S.

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Blake Layman & Levi Sparks v. State of Indiana, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/blake-layman-levi-sparks-v-state-of-indiana-ind-2015.