State v. Mekoshvili
Annotate this Case
The Supreme Court affirmed the judgment of the appellate court affirming the judgment the trial court convicting Defendant of murder, holding that a specific unanimity instruction was not required in this case.
In affirming Defendant's conviction, the appellate court read this Court's precedents to mean that, although a jury must unanimously reject a self-defense claim before it may find a defendant guilty, there is no requirement that jurors agree on which specific factor of Connecticut's four-factor test for self-defense the state has disprove beyond a reasonable doubt. The appellate court affirmed. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding (1) a specific unanimity instruction was not required in this case; and (2) there was no reasonable possibility that Defendant's conviction resulted from the jurors' misunderstanding of the self-defense instruction, which the trial court reiterated several times and in various ways.
Some case metadata and case summaries were written with the help of AI, which can produce inaccuracies. You should read the full case before relying on it for legal research purposes.
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.