People v. Hill

335 Mich.App. 1

966 N.W.2d 156

PEOPLE of the State of Michigan, Plaintiff-Appellant,

v.Lyle Howard HILL, Jr., Defendant-Appellee.

No. 351828

Court of Appeals of Michigan.

Submitted October 14, 2020, at Detroit

Decided December 3, 2020, 9:00 a.m.

Dana Nessel, Attorney General, Fadwa A. Hammoud, Solicitor General, Kym L. Worthy, Prosecuting Attorney, Jason W. Williams, Chief of Research, Training, and Appeals, and Brittany Taratuta, Assistant Prosecuting Attorney, for the people.

David R. Cripps, Detroit, for defendant.

Before: Boonstra, P.J., and Markey and Fort Hood, JJ.

Boonstra, P.J.

In this interlocutory appeal, the prosecution appeals by leave granted¹ the trial court's order permitting Taylor Hill (Taylor) to assert spousal privilege and to refuse to testify against defendant, her husband. We reverse and remand for further proceedings.

I. PERTINENT FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

In August 2019, Taylor and defendant held a birthday party at their home for one of their children. Taylor's brother, Daniel Simmons (Simmons), and Taylor's mother, Sonya Harris (Harris), attended the party.

According to testimony presented before a grand jury in this matter, defendant was irritable throughout the party, and at some point, he and Taylor began arguing about the music being played on Taylor's phone. As the argument grew heated, Harris removed the children from the vicinity. At some point during the argument, defendant charged at Taylor and poked her in the face with his fingers. Taylor sought assistance from Simmons because she believed the argument would escalate.² While Simmons was initially reluctant to intervene, he did stand next to defendant and Taylor and told them to relax. His efforts were unsuccessful, however, and defendant and Simmons began to grapple physically, at one point causing Simmons's arm to break through a window. Defendant drew a firearm and shot Simmons. Simmons's wounds were not fatal.

Defendant was charged with assault with intent to commit murder (AWIM), MCL 750.83, assault with intent to do great bodily harm less than murder (AWIGBH), MCL 750.84, discharge of a firearm in a building, MCL 750.234b(3), and two counts of possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony (felony-firearm), MCL 750.227b. Defendant was not charged with an offense against Taylor.

Taylor testified before a grand jury and described the incident. Although she was willing to testify before the grand jury, defendant later moved to permit Taylor to assert spousal privilege under MCL 600.2162(2) and to refuse to testify at trial. At the motion hearing, Taylor informed the trial court that she would assert the spousal privilege if it were available to her. The trial court granted defendant's motion. The effect of that ruling was to deny the admission of Taylor's testimony on grounds of spousal privilege. This appeal followed.

II. STANDARD OF REVIEW

We review for an abuse of discretion a trial court's decision to admit or to deny the admission of evidence, but we review de novo questions of law concerning the admissibility of that evidence, such as whether admission of the evidence is precluded by the assertion of privilege. See People v. Allen , 310 Mich. App. 328, 341, 872 N.W.2d 21 (2015), rev'd in part on other grounds 499 Mich. 307, 884 N.W.2d 548 (2016). We review de novo issues of statutory interpretation. People v. Davis , 310 Mich. App. 276, 286, 871 N.W.2d 392 (2015). "Our overriding goal for interpreting a statute is to determine and give effect to the Legislature's intent." People v. Peltola , 489 Mich. 174, 181, 803 N.W.2d 140 (2011). "The first step in ascertaining the Legislature's intent is to review the specific language of the statute." People v. Szabo , 303 Mich. App. 737, 741, 846 N.W.2d 412 (2014). "The Legislature is presumed to have intended the meaning it plainly expressed and, therefore, clear statutory language must be enforced as written." Id.

III. ANALYSIS

The prosecution argues that the trial court erred by granting defendant's motion because the "spousal wrong" exception to spousal privilege applies in this case. We agree.

"In a criminal prosecution, a husband shall not be examined as a witness for or against his wife without his consent or a wife for or against her husband without her consent, except as provided in subsection (3)." MCL 600.2162(2). Accordingly, in criminal proceedings, the spousal privilege is vested with the witness-spouse unless an exception in MCL 600.2162(3) applies. Szabo , 303 Mich. App. at 748, 846 N.W.2d 412. Under the spousal-wrong exception, "[t]he spousal privilege[ ] established in subsection[ ] ... (2) ... do[es] not apply ... [i]n a cause of action that grows out of a personal wrong or injury done by one to the other ...." MCL 600.2162(3)(d).

Our Supreme Court has on several occasions interpreted the scope of the spousal-wrong exception. In People v. Love , 425 Mich. 691, 694-695, 391 N.W.2d 738 (1986) (opinion by CAVANAGH , J.), the defendant, Abner Love, suspected his wife of having an affair with a friend. Love shot the friend, killing him, and then drove around with his (Love's) wife at gunpoint. Id. at 695, 391 N.W.2d 738. Love was convicted of murder and felony-firearm regarding his conduct against the friend and was convicted of kidnapping regarding his conduct against his wife. Id. at 693-694, 391 N.W.2d 738. At trial, Love moved to suppress his wife's testimony, asserting spousal privilege.³ Id. at 695, 391 N.W.2d 738. The trial court denied the motion, and Love's wife was compelled to testify. Id. at 695-696, 391 N.W.2d 738. The parties agreed on appeal that the spousal privilege did not apply to the kidnapping charge because it clearly grew out of a personal wrong done to her by Love and thus was subject to the spousal-wrong exception. Id. at 696, 391 N.W.2d 738. The issue before the Court was whether the murder and felony-firearm charges were also subject to the spousal-wrong exception.

The Supreme Court issued three opinions in Love , each joined by only two justices.⁴ Two opinions (encompassing a total of four justices) held, albeit for different reasons, that the spousal-wrong exception did not apply to the murder and felony-firearm charges. In the lead opinion, Justice CAVANAGH (joined by Justice LEVIN ) concluded that the spousal-wrong exception only applied if the particular offense charged was for the injury inflicted on one spouse by the other. Love , 425 Mich. at 702-706, 391 N.W.2d 738. Therefore, because Love's murder and felony-firearm charges were not for injury inflicted on Love's wife, the exception was not applicable. Id.

Chief Justice WILLIAMS (joined by Justice BRICKLEY ) reached the same result, but for the reason that "a cause of action cannot ‘grow[ ] out of a personal wrong or injury done by one to the other’ that did not occur at the time of the ‘cause of action’ (murder). Something cannot ‘grow[ ] out of’ something that did not exist." Id. at 709, 391 N.W.2d 738 (opinion by WILLIAMS , C.J.) (alterations in original). Therefore, the two opinions agreed that the spousal-wrong exception was not implicated with respect to the murder (and related felony-firearm) charge but disagreed about whether that was because the murder charge was not for an injury inflicted on Love's wife or because Love kidnapped his wife after completing the murder.⁵

Subsequently, in People v. Vann , 448 Mich. 47, 52, 528 N.W.2d 693 (1995), our Supreme Court seemingly approved of Chief Justice WILLIAMS ’s position in Love, noting that "[i]n Love , the kidnapping of the defendant's wife occurred after the murder of the third party. Accordingly, the third party's cause of action did not ‘grow out of’ the personal injury or wrong to the wife." The defendant in Vann , Lawrence Vann, was convicted of felonious assault and felony-firearm after Vann's wife was permitted to testify at trial. Id. at 48-50, 528 N.W.2d 693. Both offenses related to Vann's conduct toward a third-party victim; Vann was not charged with an offense against his wife. Id. at 53, 528 N.W.2d 693 ( CAVANAGH , J., dissenting). However, Vann's wife was present for the third-party assault, and Vann assaulted his wife contemporaneously with his assault of the third party. Id. at 49, 528 N.W.2d 693 (opinion of the Court). Distinguishing the case from Love , the Supreme Court stated:

Here, however, the prosecution's evidence indicated that there was an assault on the defendant's wife, and that it occurred contemporaneously with the assault on the third party. In other words, unlike the situation in Love , the offense committed against the third party in the instant case did "grow out of" the personal wrong or injury done by the defendant to his wife. [ Id. at 52, 528 N.W.2d 693.]

The Court in Vann did not discuss the competing rationales of the various opinions in Love and appears to have errantly characterized Chief Justice WILLIAMS ’s position as that of the Love majority. Nonetheless, by affirming the trial court's decision to permit Vann's wife to testify against Vann, the Supreme Court appears to have put to rest Justice CAVANAGH ’s assertion in Love that the spousal-wrong exception applies only when a defendant is charged with crimes committed against a spouse. Instead, the spousal privilege was found to be unavailable even though the charges were not for injuries to Vann's wife.

In People v. Warren , 462 Mich. 415, 427, 615 N.W.2d 691 (2000), the Supreme Court noted that " Love lacks a majority holding. It does not serve as binding precedent." It explained that the opinions of Justice CAVANAGH and Chief Justice WILLIAMS in Love "cannot be reconciled; they have no common denominator except in result." Id. The Court also noted that Vann ’s comments regarding Chief Justice WILLIAMS ’s temporal-sequence test were dicta because the defendant's offenses against his wife and the third party in Vann occurred simultaneously and as part of a single criminal act, such that the Vann Court "did not employ...