Reginald Wayne Carter v. State of Mississippi
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IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF THE STATE OF MISSISSIPPI
NO. 2002-KA-01564-COA
REGINALD WAYNE CARTER
APPELLANT
v.
STATE OF MISSISSIPPI
DATE OF TRIAL COURT JUDGMENT:
TRIAL JUDGE:
COURT FROM WHICH APPEALED:
ATTORNEY FOR APPELLANT:
ATTORNEY FOR APPELLEE:
DISTRICT ATTORNEY:
NATURE OF THE CASE:
TRIAL COURT DISPOSITION:
DISPOSITION:
MOTION FOR REHEARING FILED:
CERTIORARI FILED:
MANDATE ISSUED:
APPELLEE
5/7/2002
HON. FRANK G. VOLLOR
WARREN COUNTY CIRCUIT COURT
CLARENCE WHITAKER
OFFICE OF THE ATTORNEY GENERAL
BY: JEFFREY A. KLINGFUSS
G. GILMORE MARTIN
CRIMINAL - FELONY
MANSLAUGHTER: SENTENCED TO SERVE A
TERM OF 20 YEARS IN THE MDOC, WITH 15
YEARS TO SERVE, BALANCE OF 5 YEARS OF
POST-RELEASE SUPERVISION.
AFFIRMED - 10/28/03
BEFORE MCMILLIN, C.J., MYERS AND GRIFFIS, JJ.
MCMILLIN, C.J., FOR THE COURT:
¶1.
Reginald Carter was indicted and tried for murder but was convicted of the lesser-included offense
of manslaughter by a jury in the Circuit Court of Warren County. He has appealed his conviction and
raises two issues which he contends warrant a reversal of his conviction. First, Carter claims that the
evidence of his guilt was insufficient as a matter of law to support the jury’s guilty verdict. Secondly, he
argues that he was prejudiced by the State's failure to provide him with a copy of its proposed jury
instructions twenty-four hours prior to trial in compliance with Uniform Rule of Circuit and County Court
3.0. He contends that, as a result of the late filing of instructions, he was denied a fundamentally fair trial.
We find these contentions to be without merit and affirm the conviction and resulting judgment of sentence.
I.
Facts
¶2.
On April 18, 2001, Carter, along with a number of other individuals, was involved in an incident
at a barbecue cookout in Warren County. The incident began as a verbal confrontation between two
women that escalated to a physical encounter. In the course of helping to break up that altercation, Carter
took a handgun away from one of the women and put it in his pocket. From there, Carter’s brother
became involved in a fight with the victim, James Turner. Finally, active hostilities ended temporarily and
Carter, his brother, and their friends began entering their vehicle to leave. During that process, Turner was
seen rummaging through the trunk of another vehicle. Some witnesses said he retrieved a screwdriver from
the trunk and began approaching Carter as he was getting into his vehicle. There is some dispute as to
exactly what transpired at that point, but the proof shows that ultimately Carter took the gun from his
pocket and fired three shots at Turner. Turner died as a result of his wounds.
¶3.
Carter did not deny firing the fatal shots, but claimed that he acted in necessary self-defense.
II.
Sufficiency of the Evidence
¶4.
At the close of the proof, Carter requested that he be granted a directed verdict of acquittal. His
contention was that he had presented evidence that made self-defense a legitimate issue in the case and that
the State failed in its burden to show beyond a reasonable doubt that he was not acting in self-defense. The
trial court denied the motion based on the conclusion that the proof of exactly what transpired was in
dispute and that, thus, self-defense was an issue to be resolved by the jury. After the jury returned a verdict
of guilty, Carter renewed his contention through a timely JNOV motion. The trial court denied this motion
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also. Carter contends on appeal that these rulings constitute reversible error. He argues, in essence, that
the evidence that he was acting in self-defense was so persuasive and uncontradicted that a verdict of
acquittal was the only one that a reasonable jury fairly assessing the evidence could return. Both of these
motions raise a claim that the State's evidence of guilt was insufficient as a matter of law to support the
guilty verdict for manslaughter.
¶5.
The State does, in fact, have the burden of proving as an element of the crime that the defendant
was not acting in necessary self-defense. Heidel v. State, 587 So. 2d 835, 843 (Miss.1991). That burden
of proof does not shift to the defendant, requiring him to show beyond a reasonable doubt that he was
acting in self-defense. Id. Rather, so long as the evidence, fairly considered, leaves the jury with a
reasonable doubt as to whether the defendant was acting in necessary self-defense, the jury’s obligation
under the law is to return a verdict of not guilty. Sloan v. State, 368 So. 2d 228, 229 (Miss.1979). The
trial court, in considering motions challenging the sufficiency of the State’s proof, must view the evidence
in the light most favorable to the State, giving the prosecution the benefit of all favorable inferences which
may be reasonably drawn from the evidence. McClain v. State, 625 So. 2d 774, 778 (Miss. 1993). The
court is obligated to reverse a conviction and render a judgment of acquittal when it determines that, viewed
in that light, the State’s evidence as to one or more of the critical elements of the crime – in this case, more
particularly, that the defendant was not acting in necessary self-defense based on a reasonable
apprehension of immediate death or serious bodily injury – is so lacking that reasonable jurors could not
have found appellant guilty. Id. If the trial court denies the motions and that denial is raised as an issue on
appeal, this Court is charged to review the evidence by the same standard to determine whether the trial
court erred in so ruling. Id. at 781. It is in that posture that we now consider Carter’s challenge to the legal
sufficiency of the State’s evidence revolving around the issue of self-defense.
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¶6.
There was eyewitness testimony from some witnesses tending to indicate that the victim was
rummaging in the trunk of a vehicle. According to one witness, he emerged with an unidentified object in
his hand. Other witnesses testified that he had a screwdriver in his hand. Some witnesses indicated that
the victim then charged Carter in a threatening manner. However, another witness testified that Carter
drew the pistol, pointed it at the victim, made what could be construed as provocative or threatening
remarks, and began walking toward the victim before firing three fatal shots.
¶7.
Self-defense, in order to constitute a successful defense to a criminal prosecution of this nature,
requires that the defendant act in response to an urgent actual threat or on a reasonable belief that such
threat is actual and imminent. Wadford v. State, 385 So. 2d. 951, 955 (Miss.1980). Because the
assessments of the level and imminence of the threat to the defendant’s physical well-being and the
appropriateness of the defendant’s level of response to the perceived danger require interpretation and
analysis of the peculiar set of facts presented in a particular case, it is well settled that the reasonableness
of the defendant’s actions is normally a matter for the jury sitting as finders of fact. Meshell v. State, 506
So. 2d 989, 991-92 (Miss.1987). While it may be true, as an abstract proposition, that there could be a
case where the evidence of the gravity of the threat and the reasonableness of the defendant’s reaction to
it was so persuasive that no reasonable juror could disregard that evidence, we do not conclude this to be
that case.
¶8.
Rather, the case appears to have been vigorously tried on the issue of self-defense, the jury was
properly instructed on the law, and, insofar as the record shows, resolved this issue by concluding that
Carter, beyond any reasonable doubt, was not acting in necessary self-defense when he purposely fired
three gunshots at close range into his victim, causing his death.
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¶9.
The trial court did not err in declining to disturb this verdict based on the contention that the State’s
evidence was insufficient as a matter of law to overcome Carter’s assertion that he was acting in selfdefense. We, therefore, find this issue to be without merit.
III.
Jury Instructions
¶10.
At the close of the presentation of the evidence, Carter for the first time raised the issue that he had
not received proposed jury instructions from the prosecution sufficiently in advance of trial to comply with
Uniform Rule of Circuit and County Court 3.07. That rule requires the filing of proposed instructions at
least twenty-four hours prior to trial, and was plainly violated by the State since it did not serve proposed
instructions on the defense until after both the prosecution and defense had rested.
¶11.
The Mississippi Supreme Court has established that failing to explicitly follow the deadlines of Rule
3.07 does not automatically constitute reversible error, but that, instead, the defendant must show actual
prejudice arising from the delayed service. Shaw v. State, 540 So. 2d 26, 29 (Miss.1989). Carter
attempts to meet this standard by claiming that his trial strategy was detrimentally affected by his lack of
knowledge that the State intended to seek a lesser-included offense instruction on manslaughter.
¶12.
While Carter may have been surprised by the State’s intention to ask for a manslaughter instruction,
the law is plain that a defendant has no recognized right to block the prosecution in such effort:
We recognize in certain cases, as a matter of trial strategy, defense counsel may wish to
have the case put to the jury on an all or nothing basis, the jury's alternatives being to find
the defendant guilty as charged in the indictment or acquitted. Our law, however, allows
the prosecution to request and obtain lesser-included offense instructions, as it does the
defense. The test for whether such an instruction should be granted is the same: is it
warranted by the evidence? Where the answer is affirmative, the defendant has no right to
complain of the circuit court's submission to the jury of a properly phrased lesser-included
offense instruction, either at the request of the prosecution or on its own motion.
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Harveston v. State, 493 So. 2d 365, 375 (Miss. 1986).
¶13.
Carter’s only legitimate defense at trial was his assertion that he was acting in self-defense when
he purposely shot and killed his victim. He made no argument to the trial court nor does he, in his brief to
this Court, set out what other possible alternative theories of defense he might have raised had he known
that the State intended to ask for a manslaughter instruction. Absent any such showing, and based on the
observation that the theory of self-defense on the facts of this case would appear to be substantially
identical whether the jury was deliberating a charge of murder or of manslaughter, we do not conclude that
Carter has made the necessary showing of prejudice to his defense arising from the State’s failure to file
its proposed instructions in a more timely manner.
¶14. THE JUDGMENT OF THE CIRCUIT COURT OF WARREN COUNTY OF
CONVICTION OF MANSLAUGHTER AND SENTENCE OF TWENTY YEARS, FIFTEEN
YEARS TO SERVE IN THE CUSTODY OF THE MISSISSIPPI DEPARTMENT OF
CORRECTIONS AND FIVE YEARS POST-RELEASE SUPERVISION, IS AFFIRMED. ALL
COSTS OF THIS APPEAL ARE ASSESSED TO WARREN COUNTY.
KING AND SOUTHWICK, P.JJ., BRIDGES, THOMAS, LEE, IRVING, MYERS,
CHANDLER AND GRIFFIS, JJ., CONCUR.
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