Taylor v. Commonwealth

585 S.E.2d 839, 41 Va. App. 429, 2003 Va. App. LEXIS 462
CourtCourt of Appeals of Virginia
DecidedSeptember 2, 2003
Docket3410012
StatusPublished
Cited by6 cases

This text of 585 S.E.2d 839 (Taylor v. Commonwealth) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Virginia primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Taylor v. Commonwealth, 585 S.E.2d 839, 41 Va. App. 429, 2003 Va. App. LEXIS 462 (Va. Ct. App. 2003).

Opinions

COLEMAN III, Judge.

Keith M. Taylor was convicted in a bench trial of attempted malicious wounding, shooting at an occupied dwelling, and using a firearm in the commission of a felony. Taylor contends the Commonwealth committed a Brady violation that [431]*431deprived him of a fair trial. He argues that the undisclosed investigatory notes of the two detectives who interviewed witnesses at the crime scene contained accounts that were exculpatory and inconsistent with the witnesses’ trial testimony. Specifically, he claims that several of the witnesses’ accounts did not mention that Taylor was “out there shooting at the scene of the crime” and that the failure to mention Taylor as one of the shooters was inconsistent with their testimony. The trial court ruled that the investigatory accounts contained in the detectives’ notes were not inconsistent with the witnesses’ trial testimony arid, therefore, the trial court denied the motion for a new trial. Finding no error, we affirm the convictions.

I.

Taylor was indicted for attempted malicious wounding, Code § 18.2-51, maliciously shooting at an occupied building, Code § 18.2-279, and using a firearm while committing a felony, Code § 18.2-53.1. Prior to trial, Taylor’s attorney filed a discovery motion, requesting exculpatory information and evidence affecting the credibility of any of the prosecution witnesses. The prosecutor responded she was unaware of any evidence tending to exculpate Taylor or affecting the credibility of the Commonwealth’s witnesses.

At trial, James Hill, one of the Commonwealth’s witnesses, testified that following a confrontation between himself and Taylor and James Nash, during which Hill displayed a handgun, Taylor and Nash drove to his residence in separate vehicles. According to Hill, they exited their vehicles and both began firing handguns at him while he stood on his front porch. Hill and his wife, Vicky Hill, resided at the house with their adult children, Felicia and Sentel Hill. Vicky and Felicia Hill testified that appellant was one of the two “guys” involved in the shooting at their home. Felicia Hill repeatedly testified that she “saw them shooting.” (Emphasis added.) Sentel Hill did not testify that Taylor was one of the shooters; nor did Florissa Banks testify to that effect. At trial there was a discrepancy between the testimony of James, Felicia and [432]*432Sentel Hill as to which of two cars the appellant and Nash exited.

Detective McTernan’s notes recorded the events that preceded the shooting and notes that “Nash ... starts firing.” She also records the statement that a “burgundy Cadillac pulled up [and the] guy got out [and] started walking toward [the] house [and] starts firing.” However, specific statements were not attributed to particular witnesses.

Detective Thompson’s notes of his interview with James Hill disclose that Hill identified both Keith Taylor and James Nash as armed with guns and shooting. His notes recounting his interview with Sentel Hill included descriptions of appellant and Nash and statements that they “started fighting.” The notes, however did not reflect any comment from Sentel Hill on the shooting that ensued. Thompson’s notes of Felicia Hill’s pretrial interview state “guy got out of car and walked toward house started shooting randomly.” Thompson’s notes of the interview with Florissa Banks, a neighbor of the Hills, state, “Keith [Taylor] started shooting walked toward house.”

After the convictions, Taylor’s attorney filed a motion to set aside and vacate the verdicts. Following an evidentiary hearing, the trial judge found that “[n]ot one person has said anything inconsistent with the fact that your client [was] out there shooting.” The trial judge denied Taylor’s motion for a new trial, and this appeal followed.

II.

“[T]he suppression by the prosecution of evidence favorable to an accused upon request violates due process where the evidence is material either to guilt or to punishment, irrespective of the good faith or bad faith of the prosecution.” Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83, 87, 83 S.Ct. 1194, 1197, 10 L.Ed.2d 215 (1963). The Supreme Court reasoned that:

[a] prosecution that withholds evidence ... which, if made available, would tend to exculpate [the accused] or reduce the penalty helps shape a trial that bears heavily on the defendant. That casts the prosecutor in the role of an [433]*433architect of a proceeding that does not comport with standards of justice, even though ... his action is not “the result of guile.”

Id. at 87-88, 83 S.Ct. at 1197-1198 (citation omitted).

The Supreme Court has held that “[i]mpeachment evidence ..., as well as exculpatory evidence, falls within the Brady rule.” United States v. Bagley, 473 U.S. 667, 676, 105 S.Ct. 3375, 3380, 87 L.Ed.2d 481 (1985) (citing Giglio v. United States, 405 U.S. 150, 154, 92 S.Ct. 763, 766, 31 L.Ed.2d 104 (1972)). The Bagley Court stated:

The present case ... does not involve any direct restriction on the scope of cross-examination. The defense was free to cross-examine the witnesses on any relevant subject, including possible bias or interest____ The constitutional error, if any, in this case was the Government’s failure to assist the defense by disclosing information that might have been helpful in conducting the cross-examination.... [S]uch suppression of evidence amounts to a constitutional violation only if it deprives the defendant of a fair trial. Consistent with “our overriding concern with the justice of the finding of guilt” a constitutional error occurs, and the conviction must be reversed, only if the evidence is material in the sense that its suppression undermines confidence in the outcome of the trial.

Id. at 678, 105 S.Ct. at 3381 (citation omitted).

Explaining Bagley’s materiality analysis, the Supreme Court has said:

Although the constitutional duty is triggered by the potential impact of favorable but undisclosed evidence, a showing of materiality does not require demonstration by a preponderance that disclosure of the suppressed evidence would have resulted unlimitedly in the defendant’s acquittal (whether based on the presence of reasonable doubt or acceptance of an explanation for the crime that does not inculpate the defendant). Bagley’s touchstone of materiality is a “reasonable probability” of a different result, and the adjective is important. The question is not whether the [434]*434defendant would more likely than not have received a different verdict with the evidence, but whether in its absence he received a fair trial, understood as a trial resulting in a verdict [worthy] of confidence. A “reasonable probability” of a different result is accordingly shown when the government’s evidentiary suppression “undermines confidence in the outcome of the trial.”

Kyles v. Whitley, 514 U.S. 419, 434, 115 S.Ct. 1555, 1565, 131 L.Ed.2d 490 (1995) (citations omitted).

III.

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Bluebook (online)
585 S.E.2d 839, 41 Va. App. 429, 2003 Va. App. LEXIS 462, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/taylor-v-commonwealth-vactapp-2003.