People v. Lane

2014 COA 48, 343 P.3d 1019, 2014 WL 1647659, 2014 Colo. App. LEXIS 685
CourtColorado Court of Appeals
DecidedApril 24, 2014
DocketCourt of Appeals No. 09CA1351
StatusPublished
Cited by8 cases

This text of 2014 COA 48 (People v. Lane) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Colorado Court of Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
People v. Lane, 2014 COA 48, 343 P.3d 1019, 2014 WL 1647659, 2014 Colo. App. LEXIS 685 (Colo. Ct. App. 2014).

Opinion

Opinion by

JUDGE GABRIEL

T1 Defendant, Jason Lee Lane, appeals the judgment of conviction entered on a jury verdict finding him guilty of second degree murder. He also appeals the trial court's restitution order. We conclude that the trial court did not abuse its discretion in (1) rejecting Lane's tendered instruction regarding [1022]*1022deadly foree and in instructing the jury regarding self-defense; (2) exeluding certain expert and lay testimony regarding prior abuse that Lane had suffered; and (8) limiting the cross-examination of a prosecution witness. We further conclude that the court did not err in awarding restitution to all three of the victim's siblings. Accordingly, we affirm.

I. Background

2 Lane met the victim at a bar in Denver. After consuming several drinks, Lane and the victim went to Lane's motel room in Aurora. There, Lane arranged for the vice-tim to obtain some crack cocaine, and the victim and a neighbor of Lane's smoked the crack in Lane's room. Afterward, Lane permitted the victim to spend the night.

{8 According to Lane, he awoke in the middle of the night to find the vietim groping his chest and genitals over his clothing. In response, he stabbed the victim with a steak knife thirteen times in the chest, killing him. At trial, Lane asserted that he had acted in self-defense against a sexual assault and that he was too intoxicated to form the necessary intent to commit first degree murder.

T4 The jury convicted Lane of second degree murder, and the trial court sentenced him to forty-five years in prison. The trial court also ordered Lane to pay restitution to all three of the vietim's siblings.

1 5 Lane now appeals.

IL Jury Instructions

16 Lane contends that the trial court erred in (1) rejecting his proffered jury instruction on the relationship between intoxication and the use of deadly force, and (2) giving the jury certain instructions pertaining to self-defense. We are not persuaded.

A. Standard of Review

17 "We view jury instructions as a whole to determine whether the jury was adequately informed of the applicable law." People v. Bondurant, 2012 COA 50, 11 66, 296 P.3d 200, 218. If the jury is adequately instructed on the law, we will not disturb a trial court's ruling concerning a jury instruetion absent a showing of an abuse of discretion. Id. at 296 P.8d at 218; see also People v. Chavez, 190 P.8d 760, 769 (Colo.App.2007) ("It is within the sound discretion of the district court to determine whether additional jury instructions which properly state the law should be submitted."). A trial court abuses its discretion when its ruling is manifestly arbitrary, unreasonable, or unfair. People v. Williams, 2012 COA 165, 1 18, 297 P.3d 1011, 1014.

18 We review preserved, nonconstitu-tional trial errors for harmless error. See Crim. P. 52(a); Hagos v. People. 2012 CO 63, 12, 288 P.3d 116, 119. Under this standard, we will reverse only if the error affected the substantial rights of a party. Hagos, 288 P.3d at 119.

B. Intoxication and Deadly Force Instruction

19 Lane argues that the trial court should have given the following instruction to the jury: '

The prosecution has the burden of proving all the elements of deadly physical force beyond a reasonable doubt. If you find the defendant was intoxicated to such a degree that he did not intend to cause the death of [the victim], which is a required element of Deadly Physical Force, you should apply the principles of ordinary physical force self-defense rather than the principles of deadly physical force self-defense.

110 We reject Lane's argument for the reasons stated in People v. Vasquez, 148 P.3d 326, 330 (Colo.App.2006) (opining that because the reasonable person standard requires a defendant to appraise the situation as would a reasonable sober person, evidence of voluntary intoxication is irrelevant to the issue of whether general, as opposed to deadly physical force, self-defense principles should apply).

C. Reasonable Person Instruction

{11 Lane further argues that the trial court erred in giving the following self-defense instruction:

[1023]*1023The affirmative defense of use of physical force in defense of a person takes into account the actual belief or state of mind of the defendant. However, it ultimately requires that a reasonable person would have believed and acted as the defendant did under the cireumstances. You must weigh all of the relevant cireumstances to determine whether the defendant acted as a reasonable person would have acted in similar cireumstances. The reasonable person standard requires a defendant to appraise the situation as would a reasonable sober person.

112 Specifically, Lane contends that the second sentence of this instruction, which was taken almost verbatim from Vasquez, 148 P.8d at 330, conveyed that although there may be a subjective component to self-defense, it bears no weight because the question is "ultimately" an objective one.

13 As our supreme court has made clear, a trial court's use of an excerpt from a judicial opinion in a jury instruction is generally an unwise practice because opinions and instructions serve very different purposes. See, e.g., Evams v. People, 706 P.2d 795, 800 (Colo.1985). Nonetheless, we perceive no reversible error here for the following reasons:

©@Contrary to Lane's assertion that the instruction conveyed a message that is "simply not the law," the Vasquez division expressly stated that self-defense "ultimately requires that a reasonable person would have believed and acted as the defendant did." See Vasquez, 148 P.3d at 3830.
© Contrary to Lane's assertion that the instruction may have misled the jury into ignoring the totality of the cireumstances and his perceptions of the encounter, the instruction expressly told the jurors to "weigh all of the relevant cireumstances to determine whether the defendant acted as a reasonable person would have acted in similar cireumstances." (Emphasis added.)
@The applicable self-defense statute emphasizes the reasonableness of a defendant's use of self-defense. See § 18-1-704, C.R.S.20183 (using the words "reasonable" or "reasonably" six times but referring to a defendant's actual or subjective belief only once); see also People v. Rodriguez, 888 P24 278, 286 (Colo. App.1994) ("The touchstone of self-defense is whether, from the standpoint of the defendant, his belief that danger was imminent is reasonable.").
©The trial court understood Lane's concern at trial and informed defense counsel, "[If you have a different way that you want me to draft [the instruction] or if there's a different way so as not to emphasize the objective standard so much over the subjectiveness or the subjective aspect of it, then, you know, I'm all ears." Lane's counsel, however, did not tender an alternative instruction or raise a further objection.

{14 For these reasons, we reject Lane's contention that reversal is required on this issue.

D. Self-Defense Burden of Proof Instruction

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Bluebook (online)
2014 COA 48, 343 P.3d 1019, 2014 WL 1647659, 2014 Colo. App. LEXIS 685, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/people-v-lane-coloctapp-2014.