Gerald v. State

768 A.2d 140, 137 Md. App. 295, 2001 Md. App. LEXIS 40, 2001 WL 220224
CourtCourt of Special Appeals of Maryland
DecidedMarch 7, 2001
Docket596, Sept. Term, 2000
StatusPublished
Cited by25 cases

This text of 768 A.2d 140 (Gerald v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Special Appeals of Maryland primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Gerald v. State, 768 A.2d 140, 137 Md. App. 295, 2001 Md. App. LEXIS 40, 2001 WL 220224 (Md. Ct. App. 2001).

Opinion

SONNER, Judge.

A jury in Baltimore City found Ronald Gerald, appellant, guilty of robbery with a deadly weapon, first degree assault, use of a handgun in the commission of a felony or crime of violence, possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, and lesser included offenses. The jury acquitted him of attempted murder in the first degree and of attempted murder in the second degree. The court then sentenced him to twenty-five years’ incarceration for the first degree assault; twenty years’ incarceration for the armed robbery, to run consecutively to the first degree assault sentence; twenty years’ incarceration for the use of a handgun, to run consecutively to the first degree assault sentence, but concurrently with the armed robbery sentence; and five years’ incarceration for possessing a handgun as a convicted felon, to be served consecutively to all the other sentences. Gerald appealed and presents four questions for our review:

*299 I. Did the trial judge err in permitting appellant’s accomplice to testify that documents imploring and threatening the accomplice to exculpate appellant were written by appellant?
II. Did the trial judge err by admitting an unidentified prisoner’s extra-judicial statements concerning appellant’s criminal past and criminal character?
III. Was the evidence legally sufficient to convict appellant of use of a handgun in the commission of a felony or crime of violence and possession of a handgun by a convicted felon?
IV. Must the conviction and sentence for first degree assault be merged into the conviction and sentence for robbery with a dangerous or deadly weapon?

We conclude that the first degree assault merged into the robbery, although the mandatory twenty-five-year sentence that the court attached to the assault stands, as it must reattach to the surviving robbery conviction. Otherwise, we affirm the judgments.

Background

At approximately 4:00 a.m. on July 17, 1999, Baltimore City Police Officer John Ross met with Paul Cornish at Johns Hopkins Hospital. Cornish told Officer Ross that he was approached by a group of people, pushed off his bicycle, hit in the head with a shotgun, forced to his hands and knees, robbed of forty dollars from his pants pockets, and shot in the buttocks as he tried to stand up and run away. The hospital treated Cornish for a wound to the forehead and buttocks. Officer Ross then took Cornish to a police substation, where he was questioned about the attack. During the interview, Cornish looked out the window and exclaimed, “There goes one of them.”

Officer Ross went outside and spoke with the passerby, Anthony Everhart. Although, initially, Everhart denied any knowledge of the attack, he eventually admitted that he “was there,” but was not the person who actually shot Cornish. *300 Officer Ross placed Everhart under arrest and transported him to the Baltimore City Police Department Homicide Unit. Once there, he provided a statement, in which he explained that, in the early morning hours of July 17, 1999, he, Gerald, and three other people, were walking home from a night club when they came upon Cornish riding a bicycle. Gerald confronted Cornish, and they exchanged harsh words. Everhart began to walk away from the scene, towards his home, when he saw Gerald walk over to a black “school bag,” pull out a sawed-off shotgun, and point it towards Cornish. Cornish began to run and Gerald chased him with the gun across the street. At that point, Everhart left the scene. As he approached his home, however, he heard a loud gunshot blast.

Everhart was charged with the armed robbery of Cornish. Pursuant to a plea agreement, he testified on behalf of the State at Gerald’s trial. The agreement provided that, in exchange for his testimony, he would plead guilty to armed robbery and receive a suspended ten-year sentence and a three-year term of probation. Without the agreement, Ever-hart could have received a sentence of twenty years.

At trial, the State offered the testimony of Officer Ross, Everhart, and Cornish. It also presented Detective Ray Laslitt, who testified that Cornish picked Gerald out of a photographic array, and Tammy Williams, Gerald’s former girlfriend, who testified that Gerald asked her to give false alibi testimony on his behalf. Additional facts will be provided below.

Discussion

I.

Gerald’s first point of error concerns the authentication of two letters offered by the State and admitted into evidence. Gerald purportedly wrote the letters to Everhart while they were both in prison, awaiting trial. To introduce the first letter, the prosecutor asked Everhart if he recognized it, which he did, and then asked how he knew that Gerald wrote it. Everhart responded that the handwriting matched that of *301 a prior letter he had received from Gerald. 1 Over objection, Everhart then read the letter to the jury, in which Gerald declared, “We go to court in a week and a half and these people are trying to mash me because of you. You are not going to get any time at all because I talked to my lawyer and she told me so.” He urged Everhart not to sign a Hicks waiver and to stop seeking protective custody. He also warned:

We are alright son. They got nothing. But, if you do get some time, I’ll take care of you and you know I’ve got money. There is no use for both of us going down. Especially me ... Just don’t testify against me and tell your lawyer, I’m not the one you were talking about, and I was not there ... Do not tell people. It’s a code we should go by. Telling on people can get a lot of people killed ... Tear this letter up after you read it. Don’t give it to the State’s Attorney.

This first letter was not signed. It came in an envelope addressed to Everhart at prison, but with an incorrect identification number. The return address contained the name “Ronald Gerald” and his address at prison, including his correct identification number. When asked, “Do you know what the Defendant was talking about when he wrote you this [letter],” Everhart replied, “Yes.”

In the second letter, which, over defense objection, Ever-hart also read to the jury, Gerald asked him to sign, notarize, and return an enclosed affidavit by the end of the week. By signing the affidavit, Everhart essentially would have retract *302 ed his earlier statement identifying Gerald as the shooter. The second letter was signed “Ronald” and was addressed to Everhart with his proper identification number.

The court denied defense counsel’s request to voir dire Everhart regarding the letters, although, on cross-examination, Everhart conceded that he had never seen Gerald's handwriting or signature outside of the three letters. Defense counsel then inquired: “In fact, those letters or those envelopes could have been written by anybody, couldn’t they have?” Everhart answered, “Yes.” Defense counsel then moved for a mistrial, arguing that the letters were not authenticated and lacked trustworthiness. The court denied the motion, stating:

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Bluebook (online)
768 A.2d 140, 137 Md. App. 295, 2001 Md. App. LEXIS 40, 2001 WL 220224, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/gerald-v-state-mdctspecapp-2001.