Justia Civil Rights Opinion Summaries

Alesia Warrior was convicted by a jury of the premeditated first-degree murder of her husband and conspiracy to commit first-degree murder. Warrior received a controlling hard 50 life sentence. The Supreme Court affirmed Warrior's convictions and sentence, holding (1) statements Warrior made to law enforcement officers while she was hospitalized were not custodial but were rather investigatory; (2) the trial court did not abuse its discretion in denying Warrior's motion for a new trial on the basis that the State failed to disclose exculpatory evidence pertaining to a juvenile burglary adjudication of a key prosecution witness, as, under the reasonable probability test, the jury's verdict was not compromised; (3) the admission of hearsay testimony regarding statements made by the victim, Warrior's husband, indicating his belief that his marriage was in trouble, assuming it was error, was harmless; (4) the trial court did not clearly err in giving a deadlocked jury instruction prior to deliberations; (5) Kansas' hard 50 sentencing scheme was constitutional; and (6) in light of the record as a whole, there was not a reasonable probability that the combined errors affected the outcome of the trial.

Michael Mitchell was convicted of aggravated robbery based entirely on the victim's eyewitness identification. The victim picked Mitchell out of a photo lineup a few days after the robbery and indicated with 100 percent certainty that Mitchell was the assailant. At trial, the victim testified he had known Mitchell for several months before the attack but did not know his name. On appeal, Mitchell argued that the district court should have deleted the degree of certainty factor from those listed in the cautionary eyewitness identification instruction. Mitchell contended that this factor improperly focused the jury on expressions of certainty when evaluating the accuracy of eyewitness identification. The Supreme Court affirmed Mitchell's conviction, holding (1) the witness certainty factor in the instruction should no longer be used because it prompts the jury to conclude that eyewitness identification evidence is more reliable when the witness expresses greater certainty; but (2) the instruction could not have misled the jury since the eyewitness knew his attacker and was subjected to a thorough cross-examination.

Vernon Gilliland was convicted by a jury of one count of aggravated criminal sodomy with a child under fourteen years of age. Because Gilliland was over the age of eighteen at the time of the offense, his conviction was for an off-grid person felony. Under Jessica's Law, the prescribed sentence for Gilliland's conviction was life imprisonment. Although the sentencing court denied Gilliland's motion for a departure sentence, the court did not impose a life sentence. Instead, the court imposed a sentence under the Kansas Sentencing Guidelines Act for a specific term. Thus, the effect of the sentence was contrary to the explicit finding of the sentencing court. The Supreme Court affirmed Gilliland's conviction but vacated Gilliland's sentence, holding that the sentence was illegal because of the ambiguity created by a finding that contradicted the sentence. Remanded for resentencing.

A jury convicted Rashawn Anderson of intentional second-degree murder and reckless aggravated battery for shooting two men on a downtown street following a rap concert. There were several eyewitnesses. The court of appeals affirmed. The Supreme Court affirmed Anderson's convictions, holding (1) it was error to instruct the jury to consider the degree of certainty expressed by an eyewitness when determining if an identification was reliable; (2) the State committed prosecutorial misconduct during closing argument; but (3) the jury could not have been misled by the instruction under the facts in this case, and the prosecutor's comments were harmless. Moreover, any cumulative impact from these errors was harmless.

Bryan Sprung was convicted by a jury of one count of aggravated criminal sodomy, two counts of aggravated indecent liberties with a child, and one count of criminal threat. The court of appeals affirmed. The Supreme Court affirmed in part and reversed in part, holding (1) Sprung's aggravated indecent liberties convictions were multiplicitous because the charges arose from the same act or transaction, and the plain language of the charging statute provided only one unit of prosecution rather than two; (2) the State demonstrated beyond a reasonable doubt that the prosecutor's statements regarding the credibility of the victim, Sprung's expert witness, and Sprung's investigator, even if improper, did not affect the outcome of the trial in light of the entire record; (3) the district court did not abuse its discretion in denying Sprung's motion to compel a psychological examination of the victim; and (4) the court of appeals correctly dismissed Sprung's sentencing claim for lack of jurisdiction. The Court reversed one of Sprung's aggravated indecent liberties convictions and vacated Sprung's sentence in part.

Defendant Antwan Peppers was convicted of first-degree premeditated murder and attempted first-degree murder. The Supreme Court affirmed Peppers' convictions and sentences, holding (1) the district judge did not abuse her discretion by admitting gang affiliation evidence with a limiting instruction; (2) the jury instructions on the gang affiliation evidence and the instruction that another trial would be a burden on both sides were not error; and (3) although the prosecutor committed misconduct during closing argument by straying into impermissible expressions of the prosecutor's personal opinion on Peppers' guilt, there was no reasonable possibility that the prosecutor's expressions of personal opinion about Peppers' guilt affected the jury's verdict.

Anthony Frye was convicted of aggravated battery at a bench trial. Frye appealed, claiming that (1) the district court failed to insure a valid waiver of Frye's right to a trial by jury, and (2) the evidence was insufficient to support Frye's conviction for severity level seven aggravated battery. The State appealed. The court of appeals reversed on the jury trial issue and declined to decide the sufficiency of the evidence challenge. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding (1) the court of appeals had jurisdiction to consider the validity of Frye's jury trial waiver; (2) the district court did not advise Frye of his right to a jury trial or effectively accept a jury trial waiver; and (3) the evidence was sufficient to support the district court's verdict of guilty of severity level seven aggravated battery.

Jose Portillo appealed his conviction for one count of rape of a child under age fourteen. At sentencing, recognizing that it had failed to properly charge Portillo with the off-grid version of the crime, the State filed a motion to amend the presentence investigation report to indicate that Jessica's Law applied and that Portillo was subject to a mandatory minimum hard-twenty-five life sentence. Ultimately, the district court found that the State's failure to charge Portillo with the off-grid offense version of the crime was mere clerical error and did not prejudice his defense and held that Portillo had been convicted of an off-grid felony. The Supreme Court (1) affirmed Portillo's conviction, holding that there was sufficient evidence to support a conviction for the on-grid version of the crime; but (2) vacated Portillo's sentence, holding that because the information did not contain the essential element of the off-grid version of the crime, the omission rendered the information fatally defective and deprived the trial court of jurisdiction to convict Portillo of the off-grid version of rape. Therefore, the district court's sentence, based upon a conviction for the off-grid offense, was error. Remanded for resentencing.

After a jury trial, Steven Hernandez was found guilty of aggravated indecent liberties with a child and the lesser included offense, attempted aggravated indecent liberties with a child. Hernandez moved for a mistrial, claiming there was a fundamental error in the jury verdicts, but the trial court denied the motion. In an unrelated case, Hernandez pleaded guilty to aggravated sexual battery. On Hernandez' motion, the trial court consolidated the two cases for appeal. The Supreme Court (1) reversed and remanded the aggravated indecent liberties conviction, holding that the trial court abused its discretion in denying Hernandez' motion for a mistrial based on the inconsistent verdicts; and (2) affirmed the trial court's use of criminal history for sentencing on the aggravated sexual battery conviction.

Kansas One-Call System (One-Call) managed and operated a centralized notification center for diggers working on underground utility infrastructure to use before they started excavating pursuant to the Kansas Underground Utility Damage Prevention Act (KUUDPA). The Kansas Legislature later amended the KUUPDA, which financially affected One-Call. One-Call sued to enjoin enforcement of the amendments on the grounds that the amendments violated (1) the original purpose provision of the Kansas Constitution, (2) the one-subject rule, (3) the separation of powers doctrine, and (4) the Equal Protection Clause and the Taking Clause of the U.S. Constitution. The trial court granted summary judgment in favor of the State. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that the challenged amendments were valid.