Morgan v. State

416 P.3d 212
CourtNevada Supreme Court
DecidedMay 3, 2018
DocketNo. 70424
StatusPublished
Cited by15 cases

This text of 416 P.3d 212 (Morgan v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Nevada Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Morgan v. State, 416 P.3d 212 (Neb. 2018).

Opinion

By the Court, DOUGLAS, C. J.:

*217In this appeal, we consider whether the district court made multiple errors from the time it held the competency hearing for appellant John Demon Morgan to when it entered a judgment of conviction. In particular, after first considering whether the district court erred with respect to Morgan's competency hearing, we consider whether the delay in Morgan's subsequent transfer to a psychiatric facility for the purpose of restoring competency to stand trial warranted dismissal of the charges. Next, we consider whether the district court erred with respect to jury selection and closing arguments. Finally, we consider whether there was sufficient evidence for Morgan's conviction. We conclude that the district court did not commit any error during the time frame at issue and there was sufficient evidence for Morgan's conviction.1 Furthermore, with respect to jury selection, although the district court properly overruled Morgan's challenge to the State's strike of a prospective juror, we take this opportunity to hold that striking a prospective juror based on sexual orientation is impermissible under the United States and Nevada Constitutions. Accordingly, we affirm Morgan's conviction.

FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

On October 30, 2014, Maria Verduzco was working as a manager at an AM/PM convenience store when she saw a man grab a package of mixed nuts and put them into his pocket. Maria approached the man while he was at the checkout counter trying to pay for another item and asked him if he could please take out what he had placed into his pocket. The man told Maria to "get the f ___ out of [his] face," and as she backed up in response, he approached and hit her in the chest.2 Maria fell to the ground, got up, and hit the man's backpack with a stick as he left the store. The man's backpack ripped and containers of soup fell out. Maria called the police and indicated where the man departed. Police detained the man and identified him as Morgan. The State then charged Morgan by way of criminal complaint and information with one count of robbery and one count of battery with intent to commit a crime.

On December 1, 2014, Morgan was removed from his initial arraignment hearing for spitting, and a competency hearing was set for later that month. However, because the two court-appointed competency examiners reached opposite conclusions, the district court ordered a third evaluation and continued the competency hearing. After the third examiner found Morgan competent, he challenged his competency by requesting another hearing.

In February 2015, at the competency hearing, Morgan called only one witness to testify-the single examiner who had found him incompetent. Although the other two examiners who had found Morgan competent did not testify at the hearing, neither Morgan nor his counsel requested their presence. The district court relied on the evaluations from the two court-appointed examiners who were not present at the hearing to find Morgan competent to proceed with trial proceedings.

Thereafter, Morgan pleaded not guilty to both counts. Morgan's counsel subsequently requested another competency evaluation, and thus, the matter was sent back to competency court. Because two examiners then found Morgan incompetent to proceed with adjudication, the district court ordered that he be transferred to Lake's Crossing Center for the purposes of treatment and restoring competency to stand trial.

While waiting over 100 days in the Clark County Detention Center for his scheduled transfer to Lake's Crossing Center, Morgan filed a motion to dismiss due to the delay of his transfer. The district court denied his motion, despite the fact that all agreed that *218the time frame to transfer Morgan to Lake's Crossing Center had not been met.

In February 2016, a three-day trial ensued. During jury selection, Morgan moved to strike the jury venire and requested an evidentiary hearing because there were only 3 African-Americans in the 45-person venire. The district court denied Morgan's motion. Morgan renewed his motion for an evidentiary hearing after the district court discovered that one of the African-American veniremembers was ineligible to serve on the jury. The district court initially denied Morgan's renewed motion but subsequently held a hearing to determine the merits of his motion, and the district court again denied Morgan's motion.

In conducting voir dire, the district court explained that it would first ask the jury panel general questions before the parties could request to strike jurors for cause. The district court further explained that it would then seat 13 of the remaining individuals from this panel inside the jury box and the parties would take turns asking questions. If both parties passed for cause after questioning, a party could chose to exercise a peremptory challenge on their turn. However, the district court stated that the parties would lose their peremptory challenge if they decided not to use it. Morgan opposed this "use or lose" method of exercising peremptory challenges, to no avail. Subsequently, the State used a peremptory challenge to strike juror no. 24, one of the two identifiable gay veniremembers.3 Morgan challenged the State's strike based on sexual orientation because the State asked juror no. 24 whether he said "boyfriend, girlfriend or married," in response to the juror's reply when asked about relationship status. The State justified its strike by explaining that juror no. 24 expressed an approval of the media's criticism towards police. Morgan contended that other jurors shared the same view on police criticism in the media, but that these individuals served on the jury because they were heterosexual. The district court, however, denied Morgan's challenge.

In the opening statements, Morgan asked the jury to find him guilty of misdemeanor battery only, but not robbery. The defense theory was that, although Morgan inexcusably hit Maria, he had no intent to rob the convenience store because he tried to pay. During closing arguments, the district court required Morgan to correct his statement that Maria was still a manager at the AM/PM convenience store because of the lack of evidence validating his statement of fact.

Ultimately, the jury found Morgan guilty of robbery and misdemeanor battery. The district court sentenced Morgan to serve his two counts concurrently for a maximum of 120 months with a minimum parole eligibility of 26 months and 533 days' credit for time served. Morgan now appeals.

DISCUSSION

The district court did not err with respect to Morgan's competency hearing

Morgan contends that the district court violated his constitutional right to due process and his statutory right to cross-examine the two examiners who had initially found him competent.4 We disagree. We point out that the district court subsequently found Morgan incompetent prior to trial and conviction, as he desired, and we further conclude that because Morgan failed to object below, the court-appointed competency examiners were not required to testify at the competency hearing.

Because Morgan never objected at his competency hearing that the two examiners who had found him competent were not present, we review the alleged error for plain error. See

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

STATE v. DESAVIO (MATTHEW)
141 Nev. Adv. Op. No. 25 (Nevada Supreme Court, 2025)
Morga v. Daniels
D. Nevada, 2024
State v. Gonzalez
Nevada Supreme Court, 2023
Perez Vs. Talley
Nevada Supreme Court, 2021
State Vs. Farmer, Jr. (Rigdell)
486 P.3d 1289 (Nevada Supreme Court, 2021)
Woods (Leonard) Vs. State
475 P.3d 397 (Nevada Supreme Court, 2020)
Gilliland (Devin) Vs. State
474 P.3d 335 (Nevada Supreme Court, 2020)
Hemingway (Peyton) Vs. State
471 P.3d 754 (Nevada Supreme Court, 2020)
Alcantar (Jaime) Vs. State
Nevada Supreme Court, 2020
Sanchez (Franklin) Vs. State
Nevada Supreme Court, 2020
Latorre (Jorge) Vs. State
Nevada Supreme Court, 2020
Sevier (Alexander) v. State
Nevada Supreme Court, 2019

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
416 P.3d 212, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/morgan-v-state-nev-2018.