Jury instruction defining “dwelling” element of B-felony burglary was misleading and invaded the province of the jury. Burglary convictions therefore had to be reduced to Class C felonies.
M. Massa
Beasley v. State, No. 49S02-1601-CR-20, ___ N.E.3d ___ (Ind. Jan. 14, 2016).
Trial court acted within its discretion under Evid. R. 804(b)(3) to admit murder victim’s hearsay statement that he shot at defendant the night before as a “statement against interest”; statement was unambiguous and had a great “tendency … to expose the declarant to civil or criminal liability,” even though declarant believed he had acted in self-defense.
Tiplick v. State, No. 49S04-1505-CR-287, ___ N.E.3d ___ (Ind., Oct. 7, 2015).
Synthetic-drug (aka “spice”) and “look-alike drug” statutes are not unconstitutional for vagueness or delegating legislative authority to administrative agency. But synthetic-drug charging informations were insufficient, requiring dismissal without prejudice, for failing to reference the emergency administrative rule criminalizing the “XLR11” drug on which the charges were based.
Gibson v. State, No. 22S00-1206-DP-359, ___ N.E.3d ___ (Ind. Sept. 24, 2015).
Six prospective jurors’ exposure to information that defendant was separately charged with two other murders did not warrant striking entire venire or declaring mistrial; trial court’s extensive small-group and individual voir dire identified the affected jurors, and all were immediately dismissed for cause.
SCI Propane, LLC v. Frederick, No. 55S04-1508-PL-501,__ N.E.3d __ (Ind., Aug. 27, 2015).
Attorneys’ fees are not recoverable under the General Wrongful Death Statute as a form of damages when the decedent is survived by a spouse and/or dependents.