Summary
The Connecticut Appellate Court reviewed Rodney Harvey’s convictions arising from the stabbing of two victims during an attempted drug robbery. The court held that convictions for assault in the second degree as both a principal and an accessory violated double jeopardy because the stabbings constituted a single continuous course of conduct, and it vacated the accessory conviction. The court affirmed the judgment in all other respects, rejecting challenges to the sufficiency of the evidence, victim identifications, and alleged Brady violations.
Topics
Practice areas
Questions Presented
- Whether Harvey's convictions and punishments for assault in the second degree as a principal and assault in the second degree as an accessory violated the constitutional prohibition against double jeopardy.
- Whether the evidence was sufficient to support Harvey's conviction for assault in the first degree as an accessory based on Hedley's assault of DeSantis.
- Whether the trial court improperly admitted Mongero's out-of-court and in-court identifications of Harvey under due process and evidentiary principles.
- Whether the trial court improperly determined that Mongero's identification evidence was reliable despite the suggestive newspaper identification procedure.
- Whether the prosecution's suppression of evidence concerning Detective Williams's disciplinary history warranted a new trial under Brady v. Maryland.
Holdings
- Harvey's convictions and punishments for assault in the second degree as a principal and assault in the second degree as an accessory violated the constitutional prohibition against double jeopardy because the offenses arose from a single, continuous course of conduct involving the same victim and the same unit of prosecution. The court vacated the accessory conviction.
- The evidence was sufficient to support Harvey's conviction for assault in the first degree as an accessory because the jury reasonably could find that he intentionally aided Hedley in assaulting DeSantis and shared Hedley's intent to cause serious physical injury.
- The trial court properly denied suppression of Mongero's out-of-court identification because the identification resulted from a private person's sharing of a newspaper article, not from state action, and therefore did not violate federal due process.
- The trial court properly admitted Mongero's in-court identification because it was not a first-time identification: Mongero had previously identified Harvey from the newspaper article. The prescreening procedures for first-time in-court identifications under State v. Dickson therefore did not apply, although the trial court independently prescreened the identification and found the prior identification reliable.
- The trial court did not err in finding Mongero's out-of-court and in-court identifications reliable. The findings concerning Mongero's opportunity to view Harvey, attention, prior description, lighting, lack of material obstruction, and consistency were supported by the evidence, and the contrary circumstances did not require suppression.
- The trial court properly denied Harvey's motion for a new trial. Although the prosecution suppressed favorable evidence concerning Detective Williams's falsification of training records and discipline, Harvey did not establish that the evidence was material or that its suppression deprived him of a fair trial.
Key quotations
“The defendant’s state- ment, “[g]et him the fuck off me,” did not occur during a break in the action, but was a reaction in the heat of an uninterrupted physical struggle that transpired in one location and lasted for approximately one minute.” (Part I)
“This is not a situation, as the defendant argues, in which he was a mere bystander to a crime committed by another person.” (Part II)
“Contrary to the defendant’s characterization of Mon- gero’s in-court identification, it was not a first-time identification.” (Part III B)
Factual background
Harvey, Diego Trejo, and Collin Hedley went to Richard Mongero's Danbury residence during a planned drug transaction. In Mongero's bedroom, Harvey stabbed Mongero while Hedley attacked Thomas DeSantis; the coordinated assault lasted approximately one minute, and both victims sustained serious injuries. Nearly two years later, Mongero viewed a newspaper article containing photographs of Harvey, Hedley, and Trejo and identified them as the perpetrators. The police later obtained a written statement from Mongero memorializing the identification, and the defense subsequently learned that lead detective Justin Williams had been disciplined for falsifying police training records.
Procedural history
The state charged Harvey by substitute information with attempted robbery in the first degree, assault in the first degree as an accessory, assault in the second degree as an accessory, assault in the second degree as a principal, and conspiracy to commit assault in the first degree. The Superior Court, Pavia, J., denied a motion to suppress identification evidence, conducted a jury trial, entered guilty verdicts and judgment, and later denied Harvey's motion for a new trial based on allegedly suppressed evidence. The Appellate Court affirmed the judgment in all respects except that it vacated the conviction for assault in the second degree as an accessory.
Remand instructions
No remand for resentencing was required because vacating count three did not alter the total effective sentence or the sentencing court's apparent original intent. The trial court retained authority to restructure the sentence if it later determined that doing so was necessary to preserve that intent.