BRADFORD, J.
Following a jury trial, Appellant-Defendant Larry Ault was convicted of Murder, a felony, and sentenced to fifty-five years in the Department of Correction. [Footnote omitted.] Upon appeal, Ault claims that the trial court abused its discretion in denying him a jury instruction on self-defense, forcing him to testify in violation of his Fifth Amendment rights. Concluding that there was sufficient evidence, without Ault’s testimony, to support a jury instruction on self-defense, we reverse and remand for a new trial.
….
In disputing the necessity of his testimony to establish the requisite evidence of subjective belief, Ault points to Harrington v. State, 413 N.E.2d 622, 624 (Ind. Ct. App. 1980), trans. denied. In Harrington, this court observed, in evaluating jury instructions relating to the entrapment defense, that the defendant had presented no evidence. Id. The court further observed that any evidence of entrapment must come from the State’s witnesses. Id. Ault points out that, like self-defense, the entrapment defense rests upon the defendant’s state of mind. Id. at 625. Ault argues that if a defendant’s state of mind may be established by the State’s case-in-chief for entrapment purposes, it may similarly be established by the State’s case-in-chief for self-defense purposes. Accordingly, Ault claims that the trial court erred in requiring him to testify to establish his state of mind.
Consistent with Ault’s argument, inferences about an individual’s subjective state of mind are routinely drawn from the circumstances, regardless of whether that individual provides personal insight into his actual state of mind. See, e.g., Goodner v. State, 685 N.E.2d 1058, 1062 (Ind. 1997) (“Intent is a mental state, and the trier of fact must often infer its existence from surrounding circumstances when determining whether the requisite intent exists.”); Jernigan v. State, 612 N.E.2d 609, 613 (Ind. Ct. App. 1993), trans. denied. (“Because knowledge is a mental state of the actor, the trier of fact must resort to reasonable inferences based on the examination of the surrounding circumstances to reasonably infer its existence.”); see also, McClain v. State, 675 N.E.2d 329, 331 (Ind. 1996) (observing, with respect to Indiana Rule of Evidence 803(4) statements made for purposes of medical diagnosis, that declarant’s subjective belief may be inferred from the circumstances).
While the precise issue at hand does not appear to have been raised in Indiana, other jurisdictions have concluded that a defendant’s subjective state of mind may be inferred from the circumstances for purposes of establishing self-defense. In Hilbert v. Commonwealth, 162 S.W.3d 921, 924 (2005), the Kentucky Supreme Court addressed a similar challenge to a trial court’s refusal to tender a self-defense jury instruction. Like in the instant case, the defendant in Hilbert had not testified and, in the trial court’s view, had failed to establish his subjective belief that deadly force was necessary to protect himself. [Footnote omitted.] Id. Noting that a criminal defendant was entitled to jury instructions on any defense supported by the evidence, the Hilbert court reversed, observing that a defendant need not testify in order to receive a self-defense instruction. Id. Although the evidence of self defense was not strong, the Hilbert court was satisfied that it was adequate to warrant a self-defense instruction. Id. at 925. This evidence included certain statements by the defendant to police that he had been in an altercation with the victims and that he did not know what to do when they “kept coming,” as well as a welt on the defendant’s head and certain past actions he had taken to arm himself against would-be attackers. Id. at 925.
Similarly, in People v. Hoskins, 267 N.W.2d 417, 418 (1978), the Michigan Supreme Court reversed a trial court’s refusal to instruct a jury on self-defense when the defendant had refused to testify regarding his state of mind. Like in the instant case, the victim in Hoskins was seeking repayment of a debt owed by the defendant; shortly before the victim’s shooting, he and the defendant had argued, with the victim threatening to “whip” the defendant; and the victim was seen advancing toward the defendant. Id. at 418-19. Observing that a defendant may show his state of mind by circumstantial evidence to establish that he acted in self-defense, the Hoskins court concluded that the above evidence was adequate to warrant a self-defense instruction, regardless of the defendant’s failure to testify. Id. In the Hoskins court’s view, requiring a defendant to testify to show his state of mind compromised his right to have the prosecutor prove beyond a reasonable doubt that he was not acting in self-defense. Id. at 419.
Here, the facts at trial established that Parrish had driven to Ault’s house and was standing on his property; that Parrish was shouting, threatening Ault face-to-face with bodily injury; that Parrish had taken the additional action of removing his coat and throwing it inside his vehicle; and that upon removing his coat, Parrish had indicated that his attack on Ault would be “now.” The trial court specifically found that these facts were adequate to establish the objective component of self-defense. Given the broad use in Indiana of circumstantial evidence to show an individual’s state of mind, and in light of Hilbert and Hoskins, we must conclude that these facts were similarly adequate to support a reasonable inference regarding the subjective component of self-defense, namely that Ault believed deadly force was necessary to protect himself. We therefore conclude that the trial court abused its discretion in refusing to instruct the jury on self-defense without Ault’s testimony.
Having found error in the trial court’s refusal to instruct on self-defense without Ault’s testimony, we need not address whether the trial court’s requiring Ault to testify constitutes a Fifth Amendment violation. The State does not argue that there was harmless error in this case, and we cannot conclude that the denial of Ault’s self-defense instruction on these facts was harmless.
The judgment of the trial court is reversed, and the cause is remanded for a new trial.
BAKER, J., and MAY, J., concur.