Summary
The Montana Supreme Court held that Kasey Lee Secrease received ineffective assistance of counsel when trial counsel failed to object to an incorrect jury instruction defining the mental state required for obstructing a peace officer. The instruction addressed only whether Secrease was aware of his conduct rather than whether he was aware that his conduct would obstruct, hinder, or impair enforcement of the criminal law. The court reversed the obstruction conviction and remanded for a new trial.
Topics
Practice areas
Questions Presented
- Whether trial counsel provided ineffective assistance by failing to object to or propose the correct results-based knowingly instruction for the charge of obstructing a peace officer.
- Whether the erroneous jury instruction prejudiced Secrease by lowering the State's burden of proof on the obstruction charge.
- Whether the court needed to reach Secrease's alternative plain-error challenge to the jury instruction.
Holdings
- For an obstruction charge under section 45-7-302(1), MCA, the jury must be instructed on the results-based definition of knowingly: the defendant must be aware that his conduct would obstruct, impair, or hinder enforcement of the criminal law. The conduct-based instruction given here was incorrect.
- Secrease established ineffective assistance of counsel because counsel's failure to seek the correct knowingly instruction was deficient and lacked a plausible justification.
- Secrease was prejudiced because the erroneous instruction lowered the State's burden of proof and created a reasonable probability of a different verdict on the obstruction charge.
Key quotations
“It is the duty of the court to instruct the jury on the law, and that duty cannot be delegated to counsel.” (¶ 16)
“Closing arguments are not evidence, neither do they substitute for proper jury instructions” (¶ 16)
Factual background
Trooper Charles Burton stopped Secrease after observing multiple signaling and lane-change violations and developed suspicion that Secrease was impaired by alcohol or drugs. Secrease refused preliminary breath and blood testing, and Burton obtained a telephonic search warrant for a blood draw; Secrease nevertheless refused at the hospital, where no blood sample was obtained. At trial, the court instructed the jury that a person acts knowingly when aware of his or her conduct, rather than when aware that the conduct would obstruct, hinder, or impair enforcement of the criminal law.
Procedural history
The First Judicial District Court for Lewis and Clark County entered judgment and commitment on September 6, 2019, after a jury convicted Secrease of felony DUI and misdemeanor obstructing a peace officer. Secrease appealed. The Montana Supreme Court reviewed the ineffective-assistance claim on direct appeal, reversed the obstruction conviction, and remanded for a new trial.
Remand instructions
Reverse Secrease's conviction for obstructing a peace officer and remand to the First Judicial District Court for a new trial on that charge.