Hinds v. Commissioner of Correction

Supreme Court of Connecticut·Decided May 3, 2016·No. SC19393, SC19394 Dissent·Published

Opinion

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HINDS v. COMMISSIONER OF CORRECTION—SECOND DISSENT

EVELEIGH, J., with whom ZARELLA and ROB- INSON, Js., join, dissenting. I respectfully dissent. I respectfully disagree with the majority that the habeas court properly granted the petitioner, Walter Hinds, a new trial on the charge of kidnapping in the first degree. Specifically, I would conclude that the petitioner has not demonstrated actual prejudice because he has not shown that there is a substantial likelihood that the jury would not have found that the petitioner’s restraint of the victim in the parking lot and subsequent removal to the woods constituted a crime of independent legal significance. I also agree with and join Justice Zarella’s dissent. In particular, I agree with Justice Zarella that the respondent, the Commissioner of Correction, ‘‘did not raise a procedural default defense’’ in Luurtsema v. Commissioner of Correction, 299 Conn. 740, 774, 12 A.3d 817 (2008), and that, therefore, that case ‘‘provides no guidance as to the applicability of the procedural default rule when a petitioner who has not requested a Salamon1 instruction at trial or raised the issue on direct appeal makes a Salamon claim in a subsequent habeas proceeding.’’ (Footnote added.) I also agree with Justice Zarella that, because the petitioner himself does not ‘‘suggest that the procedural default rule should be replaced by an entirely different standard,’’ it is ‘‘improper for the majority to consider [this] issue in the present case without the input of the parties who appealed to this court.’’

In State v. Salamon, 287 Conn. 509, 542, 949 A.2d 1092 (2008), this court concluded that ‘‘to commit a kidnapping in conjunction with another crime, a defendant must intend to prevent the victim’s liberation for a longer period of time or to a greater degree than that which is necessary to commit the other crime.’’ In Salamon, this court cautioned that its holding did ‘‘not represent a complete refutation of the principles established [in its] prior kidnapping jurisprudence.’’ Id., 546. This court further observed that, in order to prove a kidnapping, ‘‘the state is not required to establish any minimum period of confinement or degree of movement .’’ Id. The court noted, however, that when the ‘‘confinement or movement is merely incidental to the commission of another crime . . . the confinement or movement must have exceeded that which was necessary to commit the other crime.’’ Id.

This court explained as follows: ‘‘[I]n other words . . . the test . . . to determine whether [the] confinements or movements involved [were] such that kidnapping may also be charged and prosecuted when an offense separate from kidnapping has occurred asks whether the confinement, movement, or detention was merely incidental to the accompanying felony or whether it was significant enough, in and of itself, to warrant independent prosecution.’’ (Internal quotation marks omitted.) Id., 547. ‘‘[A] defendant may be convicted of both kidnapping and another substantive crime if, at any time prior to, during or after the commission of that other crime, the victim is moved or confined in a way that has independent criminal significance, that is, the victim was restrained to an extent exceeding that which was necessary to accomplish or complete the other crime.’’ Id.

In addition, the Salamon court listed a number of factors to be considered by the fact finder, in its determination of whether a separate crime existed, including the nature and duration of the victim’s movement or confinement by a defendant, whether the movement or confinement occurred during the commission of a separate offense, whether the restraint was inherent in the nature of the separate offense, whether the restraint prevented the victim from summoning assistance, whether the restraint reduced the risk of detection, and whether the restraint created a significant danger or increased the victim’s risk of harm independent of that posed by the separate offense. Id., 548.

On the basis of my review of these factors annunciated by this court in Salamon, I cannot conclude that, had the jury in the present case received the instruction in accordance with Salamon, there is a substantial likelihood that it would not have convicted the petitioner for kidnapping in the first degree. Accordingly, I would conclude that the petitioner has failed to meet his burden of establishing actual prejudice in this case. Therefore , I respectfully dissent.

I agree with the facts and procedural history set forth by the majority. I disagree with the majority that the petitioner’s Salamon claim is not subject to the doctrine of procedural default. Instead, I agree with the Appellate Court that the procedural default rule should apply in the present case. ‘‘In essence, the procedural default doctrine holds that a claimant may not raise, in a collateral proceeding, claims that he could have made at trial or on direct appeal in the original proceeding and that if the state, in response, alleges that a claimant should be procedurally defaulted from now making the claim, the claimant bears the burden of demonstrating good cause for having failed to raise the claim directly, and he must show that he suffered actual prejudice as a result of this excusable failure.’’ Hinds v. Commissioner of Correction, 151 Conn. App. 837, 852, 97 A.3d 986 (2014).

‘‘In Connecticut, the procedural default rule set forth in [Wainwright v. Sykes, 433 U.S. 72, 97 S. Ct. 2497, 53 L. Ed. 2d 594 (1977)], was adopted and applied to state habeas corpus petitions in Johnson v. Commissioner of Correction, 218 Conn. 403, 409, 589 A.2d 1214 (1991). Since Johnson, a habeas petitioner is barred from asserting a claim in a habeas petition that could have been raised in the underlying criminal proceeding unless he is able to demonstrate good cause for having failed to raise such a claim and actual prejudice resulting from the failure to raise the claim in the criminal proceedings.’’ Hinds v. Commissioner of Correction , supra, 151 Conn. App. 852–53.

The majority’s conclusion that the petitioner’s claim in the present case is not subject to the doctrine of procedural default effectively overrules this court’s jurisprudence in Johnson and its progeny. I disagree with such an approach, particularly because no party has asked us to do so in the present case.

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