State Of Louisiana v. Michael Lee Jackson

Opinion

NOT DESIGNATED FOR PUBLICATION

STATE OF LOUISIANA

01 COURT OF APPEAL

FIRST CIRCUIT

2019 KA 0067R

STATE OF LOUISIANA

VERSUS

MICHAEL LEE JACKSON

Judgment rendered:

SEP 18 2020

On Appeal from the

Nineteenth Judicial District Court In and for the Parish of East Baton Rouge State of Louisiana

No. 09- 16- 0008, Sec. II

The Honorable Richard D. Anderson, Judge Presiding

Hillar C. Moore, III Attorneys for Appellee, District Attorney State of Louisiana Stacy L. Wright Assistant District Attorney Baton Rouge, Louisiana

Lieu Vo Clark Attorney for Defendant/Appellant Louisiana Appellate Project Michael Lee Jackson Mandeville, Louisiana

BEFORE: McCLENDON, WELCH, AND HOLDRIDGE, JJ.

HOLDRIDGE, J.

Defendant, Michael Lee Jackson, was charged by bill of information with video voyeurism, a violation of La. R. S. 14: 283. He pled not guilty. After a trial by jury, defendant was found guilty as charged by a non -unanimous jury verdict. The trial court adjudicated defendant as a fourth -felony habitual offender and imposed a term of 80 years imprisonment at hard labor. Defendant' s conviction

and sentence are vacated, and we remand to the trial court for a new trial.

This court affirmed defendant' s conviction and sentence on appeal. State v.

Jackson, 2019- 0067 ( La. App. 1st Cir. 9/ 27/ 19), 2019 WL 4739241, at * 4

unpublished). However, the Louisiana Supreme Court granted defendant' s writ

application and remanded the case to this court " for further proceedings in light of

Ramos v. Louisiana, 590 U.S. , 140 S. Ct. 1390, 206 L.Ed.2d 583 ( 2020)."

State v. Jackson, 2019- 02023 ( La. 6/ 12/ 20), So. 3d , 2020 WL 3424906.

In the event the " non -unanimous jury claim was not preserved for review in the

trial court," the Supreme Court ordered this court to " consider the issue as part of

an error patent review." Id.; see La. Code Crim. P. art. 920( 2).

Defendant did not object to the verdict or challenge the constitutionality of the verdict in the trial court below, however, on error patent review, the minutes

reveal the jury verdict was eleven -to -one.'

In Ramos, 140 S. Ct. at 1397, the United States Supreme Court overruled

Apodaca v. Oregon, 2 406 U.S. 404, 92 S. Ct. 1628, 32 L.Ed.2d 184 ( 1972) and

held that the right to a jury trial under the Sixth Amendment of the United States Constitution, incorporated against the States by way of the Fourteenth Amendment

Defendant did raise the claim in his original appeal.

2 Oregon' s non -unanimous jury verdict provision of its state constitution was challenged in Apodaca. Johnson v. Louisiana, 406 U. S. 356, 92 S. Ct. 1620, 32 L.Ed.2d 152 ( 1972), decided with Apodaca, upheld Louisiana' s then -existing constitutional and statutory provisions allowing nine -to -three jury verdicts.

of the United States Constitution, requires a unanimous verdict to convict a

defendant of a serious offense. The Ramos Court further noted that its ruling applied to those defendants convicted of felonies by non -unanimous verdicts whose cases are still pending on direct appeal. Ramos, 140 S. Ct. at 1406. Thus,

given the Ramos Court' s declaration of the unconstitutionality of non -unanimous jury verdicts, defendant' s conviction and sentence based on a non -unanimous jury verdict must be vacated.

CONCLUSION

For these reasons, we vacate defendant' s conviction and sentence and

remand to the trial court for a new trial.

CONVICTION AND SENTENCE VACATED; REMANDED FOR NEW TRIAL.

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