State v. Pan (Order on Motion)

CourtSupreme Court of Connecticut
DecidedNovember 29, 2022
DocketSC210039
StatusPublished

This text of State v. Pan (Order on Motion) (State v. Pan (Order on Motion)) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Connecticut primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
State v. Pan (Order on Motion), (Colo. 2022).

Opinion

*********************************************** The “officially released” date that appears near the beginning of each opinion is the date the opinion will be pub-lished in the Connecticut Law Journal or the date it was released as a slip opinion. The operative date for the beginning of all time periods for filing post opinion motions and petitions for certification is the “officially released” date appearing in the opinion. All opinions are subject to modification and technical correction prior to official publication in the Connecticut Reports and Connecticut Appellate Reports. In the event of discrepancies between the advance release version of an opinion and the latest version appearing in the Connecticut Law Journal and subsequently in the Connecticut Reports or Connecticut Appellate Reports, the latest version is to be considered authoritative. The syllabus and procedural history accompanying the opinion as it appears in the Connecticut Law Journal and bound volumes of official reports are copyrighted by the Secretary of the State, State of Connecticut, and may not be reproduced and distributed without the express written permission of the Commission on Official Legal Publications, Judicial Branch, State of Connecticut. ***********************************************

STATE OF CONNECTICUT v. QINXUAN PAN (SC 210039) The petition of the defendant, Qinxuan Pan, filed August 9, 2021, for review of the trial court’s denial of his motion for modification of bond, having been presented to the court, it is hereby ordered granted, the relief requested is granted in part, and the case is remanded with direction to consider the defendant’s request for a 10 percent bail option pursuant to Practice Book § 38-8. November 22, 2022

PER CURIAM. The defendant, Qinxuan Pan, seeks review1 of the trial court’s denial of his motion for modification of the $20 million bond that was set in connection with murder charges against him. The defendant claims that the trial court, Harmon, J., with murder in violation of General Statutes § 53a-54a, arising from the shooting of the victim, Kevin Jiang, in New Haven on February 6, 2021. In signing the warrant for the defendant’s arrest on February 26, 2021, Judge Harmon set the defendant’s bail at $5 million cash or surety. Following a nationwide manhunt that took sev- eral months and involved multiple federal and state law enforcement agencies, the defendant was arrested in Montgomery, Alabama, on May 13, 2021, and waived extradition to Connecticut. The defendant was arraigned before Judge Fischer in Connecticut on May 20, 2021. At arraignment, the bail commissioner recommended that Judge Fischer keep the defendant’s bond at the $5 million set when Judge Harmon signed the warrant, arguing that the defendant is a Massachusetts resident with no ties to Connecticut who presents ‘‘a serious flight risk’’ insofar as he had fled the state and is ‘‘strug- gl[ing] with mental health issues.’’ The prosecutor, how- ever, asked Judge Fischer to increase the defendant’s bond to $50 million, contending that ‘‘he is an extreme danger to the community and a major flight risk’’ given the violent nature of the shooting and the three month manhunt it took to locate him in Montgomery, Alabama, where he had rented an apartment under a false name and was in possession of approximately $19,000 in cash, along with seven cell phones, a computer, and his father’s passport. The prosecutor represented to Judge Fischer that the defendant’s family has ‘‘very substantial finan- cial assets, going well into the millions of dollars,’’ including the ownership of two houses in Massachu- setts, and that the defendant, although a United States citizen, ‘‘has ties to people in multiple states’’ and ‘‘was born in and has ties to Shanghai, China.’’ In response, defense counsel requested the imposi- tion of ‘‘a reasonable bond’’ of $2 or $3 million, along with electronic monitoring, acknowledging the defen- dant’s ‘‘flight pattern’’ but relying on his waiver of extra- dition, lack of a criminal record, and academic achieve- ment, as well as his parents’ willingness to post their house for bond. The defendant argued that the owner- ship of two houses in Massachusetts ‘‘hardly makes [the defendant’s parents] billionaires.’’ After considering the arguments, Judge Fischer increased the defendant’s bond to $20 million, stating that he ‘‘is extremely trou- bled by the efforts th[e] defendant has made to avoid apprehension and potentially flee th[e] country . . . .’’5 Judge Fischer then ordered the case transferred to the part A docket for the judicial district of New Haven. The defendant subsequently initiated steps to obtain modification and appellate review of the $20 million bond set at arraignment by Judge Fischer. First, on June 1, 2021, the defendant filed his first petition for appellate review of the $20 million bond set by Judge Fischer.6 Second, on July 8, 2021, the defendant filed a motion in the trial court seeking modification of the bond. See Practice Book § 38-14.7 On June 29, 2021, we granted the defendant’s first petition for review and ordered Judge Fischer either (1) to ‘‘articulate the facts . . . and the factors . . . considered in setting bond for the defendant’’ at $20 million pursuant to General Statutes (Supp. 2022) § 54- 64a (b), as amended by Public Acts 2022, No. 22-37, § 38 (P.A. 22-37),8 or (2) to ‘‘hold a hearing to establish such facts and [to] apply such statutory factors.’’ On July 12, 2021, Judge Fischer issued an articulation in response to our order.9 Subsequently, on July 20, 2021, we denied the relief requested in the defendant’s first motion to review ‘‘without prejudice to refiling after the hearing regarding the [July 8] motion for modification of bond . . . . [We] further ordered, sua sponte, that the judge who presides over the motion for modification of bond . . . state on the record or in a memorandum of decision the factors considered under Practice Book § 38-4 (c)10 and the correlation between the reasonable- ness of the amount of the bond set to ensure that the defendant will appear in court and not threaten the safety of himself or another person.’’ (Footnote added.) Subsequently, on July 28, 2021, Judge Harmon held a hearing on the July 8 motion for modification of the defendant’s bond. See Practice Book § 38-17.11 At that hearing, defense counsel first renewed his reliance on the bail commissioner’s initial $5 million recommenda- tion, contending that it was consistent with the bond amount imposed when the warrant was signed by Judge Harmon, who was ‘‘aware’’ that the defendant had already ‘‘been on the run for three weeks’’ and of the ‘‘serious’’ allegations described in the warrant. Addressing the strength of the state’s case, defense counsel also argued that there were 911 telephone calls at the time of the shooting indicating that a black male was the shooter and that there were two people in the sport utility vehicle from which the shots were fired, putting it ‘‘in the realm of possibility that [the defendant] hypo- thetically was present but not the shooter.’’ With respect to his risk of flight, counsel relied on the defendant’s cooperative demeanor when he interacted with North Haven police officers on the night of the shooting and when he was apprehended in Alabama three months later, which, counsel argued, along with his waiver of extradi- tion, ‘‘are indicia of his intent to come back’’ to Connect- icut. Defense counsel also contended that there is no evidence that the defendant has any connections to China, insofar as his parents renounced their Chinese citizenship and had not had contact with people in that country for the last five years.

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State v. Pan (Order on Motion), Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-pan-order-on-motion-conn-2022.