State v. Hunter

176 So. 3d 530, 2015 La.App. 4 Cir. 0306, 2015 La. App. LEXIS 1709, 2015 WL 5273656
Louisiana Court of Appeal·Decided September 9, 2015·No. No. 2015-KA-0306·Published·Cited by 3 cases

Opinion

PAUL A. BONIN, Judge.

11 Kristin Hunter appeals his manslaughter conviction for the intentional killing of his lover and roommate, Marcel Ivory. He also appeals the sentence of forty years at hard labor imposed upon him following his adjudication as an habitual offender.

With respect to his conviction, he first assigns as error that the evidence is insufficient to support the jury’s necessary finding beyond a reasonable doubt that his killing of Mr. Ivory was not justified as self-defense. He second assigns as error that the trial judge erred in admitting evidence at the request of the prosecution of an earlier violent encounter and, once having admitted the evidence, in failing to instruct the jury regarding such evidence. We have reviewed the. first assignment under the well-known Jackson v. Virginia standard and conclude that any rational fact-finder could find beyond a reasonable doubt that the killing of Mr. Ivory by Mr. Hunter was not justified. We have reviewed the ruling admitting the other bad-act evidence under an abuse-of-discretion standard and find no abuse; we have reviewed the complaint regarding the jury instruction and find that Mr. RHunter, having failed to object to the jury instructions, did not preserve that complaint for our review. Accordingly, we affirm Mr. Hunter’s conviction for manslaughter.1

With respect to his sentence, Mr. Hunter primarily assigns as error that the trial judge erred as a matter of law in finding that he had been previously convicted of a felony in Florida based upon documentation showing that the adjudication of guilt on the charge of burglary was withheld. He additionally assigns as error that the sentence of forty years at hard labor imposed as a result of his adjudication as an habitual offender is excessive and, alternatively anticipating the vacating of his adjudication as a second-felony "offender, that the original sentence of thirty-five years at hard labor is excessive. We have reviewed the habitual offender adjudication as a question of law and, in accord with the prosecution’s confession of error, conclude that the trial judge incorrectly adjudicated Mr. Hunter as a second-felony offender. Accordingly we vacate that ruling. Thus, his complaint about the excessiveness of' the forty-year sentence is moot. Because he failed to file a motion to reconsider the original sentence, he failed to preserve the issue of excessiveness for our review. And, because the thirty-five-year sentence is a legal sentence, we accordingly reinstate the original sentence.

We explain our decision in greater detail below.

[533] Ji

In this Part, we begin by addressing the evidence which the jury considered in reaching its verdict that Kristin Hunter intentionally killed Marcel Ivory and that the killing was not justified. And because we are undertaking a sufficieney-of-evi-dence review under Jackson v. Virginia2, we consider the entirety of the evidence before the fact-finder, including even evidence which may have been erroneously admitted in the trial .court. See State v. Hearold, 603 So.2d 731, 734 (La.1992).

In his taped statement to police investigators, the defendant referred to the decedent as his “lover,” “roommate,” and “partner.” They had been living together, for about four months in an apartment which Mr. Hunter rented.' Hiving in an adjoining apartment were Alex Bernard and Susan Miller, both of whom testified that they were able to hear through the common interior wall when Mr. Hunter and Mr. Ivory were arguing or shouting with each.

Mr. Hunter, who did not testify at trial, did freely admit in his statements to police that he stabbed Mr. Ivory near his collarbone with a kitchen knife. Mr. Hunter is clear that he intended to stab Mr. Ivory but stated that he did not intend to kill him. Mr. Hunter also admitted that at no time during their final confrontation was Mr. Ivory armed with any weapon or any other dangerous instrumentality.

l/The offense of manslaughter includes the killing -of a human being “[w]hen the offender has the specific intent to kill or inflict great bodily harm” but the killing “is . committed in sudden passion or heat of blood immediately caused by provocation sufficient to deprive an average person of his self-control and cool reflection.” La. R.S. 14:30.1A(1), 31 A(1). Noteworthy, however, is that “sudden passion” and “heat of blood” are not elements of the offense of manslaughter; they are only mitigating factors lessening the culpability of a defendant. See State v. Lombard, 486 So.2d 106, 110 (La.1986). Mr. Hunter does not, of course, contest the sufficiency of the evidence with respect to the jury’s findings regarding the essential elements of the offense of manslaughter.

Instead his défense is that his killing of Mr. Ivory is justifiable because it was committed under the circumstances described in La. R.S. 14:20. See La. R.S. 14:18(7). “A homicide is justifiable*[] [w]hen cdm-mitted in self-defense by one who reasonably believes that he is in imminent danger of losing his life or receiving great bodily harm and that the killing is necessary to save himself from that danger.” La. R.S. 14:20 A(1) (emphasis added). Invocation of the justification defense is not unqualified, however. “A person who is the aggressor or who brings on a difficulty cannot claim the right of self-defense unless he withdraws from the conflict in good faith and in such a manner that his adversary knows or should know that he desires to withdraw and discontinue the conflict.” La. R.S. 14:21.

UWhen a defendant in . a homicide prosecution claims self-defense, the burden is on the prosecution to prove, beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant did not act in self-defense. See State v. Taylor, 03-1834, p. 7 (La.5/25/04), 875 So.2d 58, 63, citing to State v. Brown, 414 So.2d 726, 728 (La.1982). And it is on this point that Mr. Hunter stakes his claim of legal [534] insufficiency of the evidence to support his conviction. See, e.g., State v. Rubens, 10-1114, p. 7 (La.App. 4 Cir. 11/30/11), 83 So.3d 30, 38. See also State v. Smith, 11-0664, pp. 11-12 (La.App. 4 Cir. 1/30/13), 108 So.3d 376, 384-85.

A

Mr. Hunter offered his version of the events which resulted in the lethal stabbing. Mr. Ivory had gone to a nearby store with their neighbor, Mr. Bernard, and returned home intoxicated. He and the defendant spent time abed, drinking wine. They were alone in their apartment. Claiming that he was still under the effects of alcohol and that the prescription medications he took affected his memory, Mr. Hunter could not at first specifically recall what set Mr. Ivory into a rage. When pressed by the detective questioning him, Mr. Hunter remembered an argument about a piece of jewelry he was wearing which was a gift from a former lover who was then imprisoned. Mr. Hunter explained that Mr. Ivory was extremely jealous of that former lover and of other former lovers, including (according to Mr. Hunter) the neighbor Mr. Bernard.

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

State v. Hunter, 176 So. 3d 530, 2015 La.App. 4 Cir. 0306, 2015 La. App. LEXIS 1709, 2015 WL 5273656 (La. Ct. App. 2015).

176 So. 3d 530 (State v. Hunter) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.

Related

State of Louisiana v. Raymond George Johnson
Louisiana Court of Appeal, 2019
State v. Colby
244 So. 3d 1260 (Louisiana Court of Appeal, 2018)
State v. Ross
207 So. 3d 511 (Louisiana Court of Appeal, 2016)