State v. Casaus

STATE OF NEW MEXICO, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. STEPHEN CASAUS a.k.a., STEVE CASAUS, Defendant-Appellant.

No. A-1-CA-35349

COURT OF APPEALS OF THE STATE OF NEW MEXICO

November 21, 2018

This memorandum opinion was not selected for publication in the New Mexico Appellate Reports. Please see Rule 12-405 NMRA for restrictions on the citation of unpublished memorandum opinions. Please also note that this electronic memorandum opinion may contain computer-generated errors or other deviations from the official paper version filed by the Court of Appeals and does not include the filing date.

APPEAL FROM THE DISTRICT COURT OF BERNALILLO COUNTY

Stanley Whitaker, District Judge

Hector H. Balderas, Attorney General

Marko David Hananel, Assistant Attorney General

Santa Fe, NM

for Appellee

Bennett J. Baur, Chief Public Defender

C. David Henderson, Assistant Appellate Defender

Santa Fe, NM

for Appellant

MEMORANDUM OPINION

VARGAS, Judge.

{1} Defendant, Stephen Casaus, appeals his convictions for child abuse, tampering with evidence, and witness intimidation. He contends the district court erred when it denied his motion to continue the trial, excluded evidence, and refused his requested jury instruction. He also challenges the sufficiency of the evidence supporting each of his convictions and asserts that these errors combined to deprive him of a fair trial. We conclude that the district court did not abuse its discretion before or during Defendant's trial. Further, substantial evidence supports his child abuse not resulting in death, tampering with evidence, and intimidation of a witness convictions. However, the State failed to introduce sufficient evidence of causation to support Defendant's conviction for child abuse resulting in death. We therefore remand for the district court to vacate Defendant's conviction for child abuse resulting in death, and we affirm Defendant's other convictions. As this is a memorandum opinion and the parties are aware of the facts and procedural postureof the case, we set forth only the facts and law necessary to our analysis of the issues that Defendant raises.

BACKGROUND

{2} At approximately 4:30 p.m. on December 27, 2013, police responded to a report of an unresponsive child (Child) in Defendant's home. Upon arrival, officers discovered Child lying unresponsive; they were unable to detect breathing or locate a pulse, and Child's skin was cold to the touch. When the paramedics arrived a few minutes later at 4:36 p.m., they initiated CPR, began administering drugs, and transported Child to the hospital, but when he arrived at the hospital at approximately 5:20 p.m., he still had no pulse and was not breathing. Child was pronounced dead at 5:32 pm.

{3} Following Child's death, law enforcement spoke with Defendant regarding the events of December 27, 2013, and what had happened to Child. Defendant made several voluntary statements, including a description of his actions that day that changed throughout the course of the investigation. First he told police that on the day of the incident, he awoke around noon and after about an hour, went to his friend's house to work on his friend's Cadillac. He stated that he was at his friend's house for approximately twenty minutes until around 2:00 p.m., when his wife, Child's mother, called and asked him to come home because Child had fallen off a bouncy horse that was in the house and was unresponsive.

{4} Defendant then changed his story by admitting that he had not left the residence at all that day, but instead woke up around two o'clock in the afternoon and went to the restroom. While in the restroom he heard Child's mother and Child yelling, and by the time he came out of the restroom, Child was lying on the floor, unconscious. Defendant claimed that he instructed Child's mother to call 911, but that she did not do so right away. When asked why he did not call 911 himself, Defendant explained that he thought Child was "faking it," and because he didn't know where any of the phones in the house were.

{5} In a third iteration of the day's events, Defendant claimed that after waking up around noon, he went to the restroom to ingest heroin, and while there, he heard yelling between Child's mother and Child and what he described as "tumbles and stumbles." He came out of the restroom, saw Child's mother yelling at Child, and admonished Child's mother before again returning to the restroom. When he came out of the restroom the second time, he found Child lying on the floor, alternating between being responsive and unresponsive. At that point Defendant panicked, and as a result failed to call 911 himself.

{6} In all three explanations, Defendant consistently maintained that he tried to revive Child by giving him CPR, putting him in a cold shower, and administering oxygen to him. In addition, though he initially denied having coached Child'ssiblings on what to say about the incident, Defendant later admitted that he told them, "[d]on't say nothing. Everything's going to be okay. Don't say nothing."

{7} Defendant was indicted in April 2014 with six counts of child abuse, one count of tampering with evidence, and two counts of bribery of a witness.

{8} The State subsequently charged Defendant with another count of child abuse by filing an indictment in May 2015, and the district court joined the two cases in July 2015. Shortly after the cases were joined and approximately a month before the trial was scheduled to start, Defendant filed a motion to continue the trial, which the district court denied. A jury convicted Defendant of child abuse resulting in death, child abuse without death or great bodily harm, tampering with evidence, and two counts of bribery of a witness. Defendant was sentenced to eighteen years for the child abuse resulting in death conviction, and three years each for the remaining four convictions of child abuse without death or great bodily harm, tampering with evidence and two counts of bribery. Each conviction was enhanced by one year under the Habitual Offender Act, with the district court suspending five years of Defendant's total sentence for an actual sentence of thirty years. Defendant appeals.

DISCUSSION

{9} On appeal, Defendant makes numerous assertions of error, challenging the denial of a motion to continue the trial, the admission of evidence, the denial of arequested jury instruction, and the sufficiency of evidence supporting each of his convictions. Defendant also argues that cumulative error deprived him of a fair trial. We address each argument in turn.

A. Denial of Motion to Continue

{10} In May 2015, Defendant filed a motion to compel the State to release materials containing information that Defendant claimed was exculpatory, and a motion seeking an independent psychological evaluation of Child's younger sister. The district court ordered in camera review of the materials in early July. Defense counsel filed an objection to the district court's ruling and simultaneously filed a motion to extend the trial date to allow her sufficient time to review the requested materials and consult with her expert witness. At a hearing in early August, the district court acknowledged Defendant's motion for continuance, but denied the motion, reasoning that because the records in question were "not terribly voluminous" the parties could still be ready for trial within "a few weeks."

{11} We review a district court's denial of a motion for a continuance under an abuse of discretion standard. See State v. Salazar, 2007-NMSC-004, ¶ 10, 141 N.M. 148, 152 P.3d 135. Courts evaluate several factors when considering a motion for continuance, "including "the length of the requested delay, the likelihood that a delay would accomplish the movant's objectives, the existence of previous continuances in the same matter, the degree of inconvenience to theparties and the court, the legitimacy of the motives in requesting the delay, [and] the fault of the movant in causing a need for the delay[.]" State v. Torres, 1999-NMSC-010, ¶ 10, 127 N.M. 20, 976 P.2d 20. "In addition to meeting the Torres factors, [a d]efendant must show that the denial of the continuance prejudiced him[,]" by rendering "a potential avenue of defense unavailable[.]" Salazar, 2007-NMSC-004, ¶ 16 (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). When the district court's denial of the motion does not follow a logical application of these factors to the facts of the case, the district court has committed an abuse of discretion. See State v. Gonzales, 2017-NMCA-080, ¶ 32, 406 P.3d 534. "The defendant carries the burden of establishing an abuse of discretion, and that the abuse was to the injury of the defendant." Id.

{12} Defendant did not specify in his motion or at the hearing the length of the requested delay. The likelihood that a delay would have accomplished Defendant's objectives of consulting an expert seems minimal in light of the court's observations that the records themselves were not extensive and could be reviewed in the remaining weeks before trial. There were no other appreciable continuances in the case prior to Defendant's request, and there is nothing to suggest defense counsel's motives in requesting the delay were anything other than legitimate. It does not appear that Defendant created the need for the delay, as it centered on the State's delay in disclosing evidence. Finally, Defendant's prejudice argumentstemmed from his assertion that defense counsel would be ineffective if forced to continue without an extension because defense counsel did not have enough time to consult with an expert witness. Defendant's prejudice argument, however, is unpersuasive in light of the fact that Defendant was able to consult with an expert on the matter in question and presented that expert's testimony at trial. Given the deferential nature of our review, Defendant's failure to demonstrate prejudice, and the relatively equal division of factors weighing for and against the continuance, we conclude the...