Summary
The Supreme Court of Wyoming considered whether the trial court erred by refusing to instruct the jury on the meaning of "presence" under Wyoming's child-endangering statute and by admitting certified judgments documenting the defendant's prior convictions. The court upheld the refusal to provide the proposed instruction but held that admitting the prior conviction documents did not establish a proper Rule 404(b) purpose and constituted prejudicial error. The conviction was reversed and the case remanded for a new trial.
Topics
Practice areas
Questions Presented
- Whether the district court abused its discretion by refusing to give a requested jury instruction defining "presence" under Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 6-4-403(b)(iii), after initially indicating that it would give the instruction.
- Whether the district court abused its discretion by admitting certified copies of two prior judgments and sentences as evidence of prior bad acts under W.R.E. 404(b), and whether any error was prejudicial.
Holdings
- The district court did not abuse its discretion by refusing to give the proposed definition of "presence" after the companion case that had prompted the initial ruling was dismissed.
- The district court abused its discretion by admitting certified copies of Dougherty's prior judgments and sentences to prove motive, intent, or lack of mistake because the documents contained no facts connecting the prior convictions to those permissible purposes and therefore operated only as propensity evidence.
- The error was prejudicial, requiring reversal and remand for a new trial.
Key quotations
“Without such facts, the exhibits could not make the issues of motive, intent or lack of mistake more or less probable. Here, the evidence existed solely to show that Mr. Dougherty had a propensity for committing bad acts only because he had done so before.” (¶21)
“As a result, this Court can only conclude that the error in admitting the judgment and sentence documents was not harmless. We must reverse and remand for a new trial.” (¶23)
Factual background
Dougherty was accused of exposing himself and masturbating within two to four feet of an eleven-year-old girl at a Cheyenne park. He denied wrongdoing and claimed he was rubbing himself because of sciatic pain. At trial, the State introduced certified copies of two prior judgments and sentences for child-endangering/obscene-act convictions, but presented no evidence describing the underlying conduct. The jury convicted Dougherty.
Procedural history
A jury convicted Dougherty of one count of child endangering/obscene act under Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 6-4-403(b)(iii), and the district court sentenced him to four to five years in prison. The Wyoming Supreme Court held that the refusal to give the proposed jury instruction was not an abuse of discretion, but that admitting the prior conviction documents as Rule 404(b) evidence was an abuse of discretion and prejudicial. The court reversed and remanded for a new trial.
Remand instructions
Reverse the conviction and remand for a new trial.