Drost v. State

• Court: Court of Appeals of Alaska
• Decided: May 6, 2026
• Docket: A-14299
• Status: Unpublished

Opinion

2026 WL 1243512

Only the Westlaw citation is currently available.

NOTICE: UNPUBLISHED OPINION

NOTICE

This is a summary disposition issued under Alaska Appellate Rule 214(a). Summary dispositions of this Court do not create legal precedent. See Alaska Appellate Rule 214(d).

Court of Appeals of Alaska.

Michael Lee DROST, Appellant,

v.

STATE of Alaska, Appellee.

Court of Appeals No. A-14299

May 6, 2026

Appeal from the Superior Court, Third Judicial District, Anchorage, Jack R. McKenna, Judge. Trial Court No. 3AN-18-12341 CR

Attorneys and Law Firms

George W.P. Madeira Jr., Assistant Public Defender, and Terrence Haas, Public Defender, Anchorage, for the Appellant.

Michal Stryszak, Assistant Attorney General, Office of Criminal Appeals, Anchorage, and Stephen J. Cox, Acting Attorney General, Juneau, for the Appellee.

Before: Allard, Chief Judge, and Wollenberg and Terrell, Judges.

SUMMARY DISPOSITION

*1 Michael Lee Drost was convicted, following a jury trial, of second-degree murder for fatally stabbing another man through the heart.¹ For this conviction, Drost was sentenced to 40 years with 15 years suspended (25 years to serve). Drost now appeals his second-degree murder conviction and sentence, raising three arguments.

First, Drost argues that the evidence was insufficient to show that he possessed the culpable mental state for second-degree murder. Drost was convicted of second-degree murder under AS 11.41.110(a)(1), which required the jury to find that Drost caused the death of another person and Drost acted either “with the intent to cause serious physical injury” or knowing that the conduct was “substantially certain to cause death or serious physical injury to another person.” Drost argues that the small size of the knife he used to stab the victim, the chaos of the fight, his purported retreat from the fight after stabbing the victim, and the lack of clear indicia of malice like multiple strikes are all inconsistent with finding either of these mental states.

But when reviewing the sufficiency of the evidence to support a conviction, we are required to consider the evidence in the light most favorable to the verdict.² With this perspective, the record shows that Drost engaged in a heated verbal altercation with the victim, escalated that verbal altercation by approaching the victim and pulling out a knife, stabbed the victim in the chest, and then pursued the victim while continuing to aggressively challenge him to fight. These facts are sufficient for a reasonable juror to infer either of the required mental states. We therefore conclude that there was sufficient evidence to support Drost's second-degree murder conviction.

Second, Drost argues that the superior court erred in admitting body camera footage recorded by an emergency medical technician that showed the victim's medical treatment and death. This video is roughly seventeen minutes long and captures the victim describing when, where, and how he was stabbed; the victim's medical treatment; and, ultimately, the victim's death.

At trial and on appeal, Drost has only objected to admission of the last seven minutes of the video, which do not contain any statements by the victim about what happened and show the victim's death. Drost contends that this portion of the video should have been excluded under Alaska Evidence Rule 403 as more prejudicial than probative because it could engender improper sympathy for the victim or otherwise inflame the passions of the jury. The superior court found that the entire video was “very probative” to disputed issues in the case, particularly the timeline of events and the length of time a person could survive following a stab in the heart, and that the probative value of the video outweighed the danger of unfair prejudice.

*2 After reviewing the video and the full record, we conclude that any error in admitting the last seven minutes of the video is harmless.³ As the superior court found, the unobjected-to portions of the video contained scenes of the victim's suffering that were at least as disturbing and graphic (and thus as likely to engender improper feelings) as the portion Drost sought to exclude. And the evidence against Drost was substantial and included a separate video recording that showed him stabbing the victim in the chest shortly before the victim's death. We therefore conclude that any error from admitting this portion of the video is harmless.

Third, Drost contends that his sentence is excessive. Drost argues that his conduct was essentially reckless because the chaos of the fight and size of the knife meant he did not know that his blows would even wound — let alone kill — the victim. He argues that the superior court erred in not adopting this view of the crime and in not sentencing him accordingly.

But the superior court was not required to adopt this view of the evidence. Instead, the superior court found that Drost engaged in an “unprovoked” stabbing and that Drost's conduct was “in line with most other murders in the second degree.” Having reviewed the record, we conclude that the superior court's factual findings are not clearly erroneous and that the sentence imposed is not clearly mistaken.⁴

The judgment of the superior court is AFFIRMED.

Footnotes

1

AS 11.41.110(a)(1). Drost was also convicted of trespass, but he does not challenge this conviction on appeal. AS 11.46.320(a)(2).

2

Johnson v. State, 188 P.3d 700, 702 (Alaska App. 2008) (requiring an appellate court reviewing the sufficiency of the evidence “to view the evidence, and all reasonable inferences to be drawn from that evidence, in the light most favorable” to the jury's verdict).

3

Pouzanova v. Morton, 327 P.3d 865, 867 (Alaska 2014) (“A superior court's decision whether to admit evidence under Evidence Rule 403 requires it to balance the probative value of the evidence against its unfair prejudice; we review this balancing for abuse of discretion.”); Jeffries v. State, 169 P.3d 913, 924 (Alaska 2007) (“Erroneously admitted evidence is deemed harmless if ‘it did not appreciably affect the jury's verdict.’ ” (quoting Love v. State, 457 P.2d 622, 634 (Alaska 1969))).

4

State v. Hodari, 996 P.2d 1230, 1232 (Alaska 2000) (recognizing that we review an excessive sentence claim under the “clearly mistaken” standard).

End of Document