Thornton v. State

375 So.3d 1282

Cedricka Jacole THORNTON

v.STATE of Alabama

CR-19-0506

Court of Criminal Appeals of Alabama.

July 8, 2022

Rehearing Denied September 30, 2022

Certiorari Denied November 10, 2022

Alabama Supreme Court SC-2022-0919

J.D. Lloyd and Robert Matthews of The Law Office of J.D. Lloyd, LLC, Birmingham, for appellant.

Steve Marshall, att’y gen., and Chris Howell, asst. att’y gen., for appellee.

PER CURIAM.

Cedricka Jacole Thornton was convicted of murder for intentionally killing Devontay Davis, a violation of § 13A-6-2, Ala. Code 1975, and the Houston Circuit Court sentenced her to 50 years’ imprisonment.

On appeal, Thornton argues that her conviction and sentence must be reversed and that she is entitled to a new trial because the circuit court refused to instruct the jury on self-defense when, she says, the "evidence presented at trial cleared the extremely low threshold required for a jury instruction on self-defense." (Thornton’s brief, p. 10.) The State, on the other hand, argues that this Court should affirm Thornton’s conviction and sentence because the circuit court was not required to instruct the jury on self-defense when "the facts, as set forth by Thornton, present no reasonable, rational, or plausible theory of self-defense." (State’s brief, p. 8.) Although Thornton is correct that the circuit court erred when it failed to instruct the jury on self-defense, under the circumstances in this case, the circuit court’s error was harmless.

[1–4] It has long been the law in Alabama that "[a] trial court has broad discretion when formulating its jury instructions." Williams v. State, 795 So. 2d 753, 780 (Ala. Crim. App. 1999) (citing Williams v. State, 611 So. 2d 1119, 1123 (Ala. Crim. App. 1992)). That discretion, however, is not unlimited.

" ‘ "The general rule is that ‘every accused is entitled to have charges given, which would not be misleading, which correctly state the law of his case, and which are supported by any evidence, however weak, insufficient, or doubtful in credibility.’ Chavers v.State, 361 So. 2d 1106, 1107 (Ala. 1978). If there is ‘any evidence, however slight, tending to support’ that the defendant acted in self-defense, the issue should be submitted to the jury. King v. State, 71 Ala. 1, 4 (1881). In most cases, the issue of self-defense is one of ultimate fact solely for determination by the jury, Domingus v. State, 94 Ala. 9, 11 So. 190 (1892), however ‘unsatisfactory and inconclusive to the judicial mind’ the evidence of self-defense may appear. Burns v. State, 229 Ala. 68, 70, 155 So. 561, 562 (1934).

" ‘ "However, the court should not instinct on the law of self-defense where there is no evidence to sustain the plea. Raines v. State, 455 So. 2d 967, 974 (Ala. Cr. App. 1984); Tarver v. State, 137 Ala. 29, 34 So. 627 (1903); C. Gamble, McElroy’s Alabama Evidence, 457.02(5) (3d ed. 1977). ‘[I]n the absence of all evidence having a tendency to show that at the time of the killing the accused was in imminent peril of life, or grievous bodily harm, or of the existence of circumstances creating in his mind a reasonable belief of such peril, … these instructions [are] abstract.’ King, 71 Ala. at 4-5. A trial judge may properly refuse to charge the jury on self-defense where he determines that ‘the defendant could not set up self-defense under the facts.’ Consford v. State, 15 Ala. App. 627, 634, 74 So. 740, 743, cert. denied, 200 Ala. 23, 75 So. 335 (1917).

Diggs v. State, 168 So. 3d 156, 160-61 (Ala. Crim. App. 2014) (quoting King v. State, 478 So. 2d 318, 319 (Ala. Crim. App. 1985) (emphasis added in King).

At the close of all the evidence in her trial, Thornton asked the circuit court to instruct the jury on self-defense. The State objected to Thornton’s request. The State argued that Thornton had not presented any "testimony regarding self-defense to justify an instruction." (R. 658.) In response, Thornton argued that, although she gave conflicting accounts of how Davis died, her "last story" was that Davis was holding scissors and threatening her with them; that, while Davis was raping her, she kicked him to get away from him; and that the scissors that he was threatening her with went into his chest.

In denying Thornton’s request for a selfdefense jury instruction, the circuit court relied upon this Court’s holding in Lovell v. State, 521 So. 2d 1346 (Ala. Crim. App. 1987). The request was denied because Thornton’s evidence of self-defense established that she accidentally killed Davis when she kicked him to stop him from raping her, not because she failed to present any evidence of self-defense.

As set out above, on appeal, Thornton argues that the circuit court erred when it denied her request for a self-defense instruction because, she says, the evidence presented at trial "cleared the extremely low threshold" for such an instruction and because the circuit court’s reliance on Lovell v. State, 521 So. 2d 1346 (Ala. Crim. App. 1987), to deny her request, "was misplaced." (Thornton’s brief, pp. 10, 16.) The State does not address the circuit court’s reliance on Lovell to deny Thornton’s request because, it says, "assuming, arguendo, that the … court erroneously relied on that decision, the court nonetheless correctly rejected Thornton’s request for a self-defense instruction." (State’s brief, p. 17.) In the State’s view, Thornton simply presented "no evidence to support [her] claim that she acted in self-defense against Davis," regardless of whether the circuit court correctly applied Lovell to Thornton’s case. (State’s brief, p. 10.)

[5] We start our analysis by examining whether the evidence presented at trial, when viewed in a light most favorable to Thornton, supported a jury instruction on self-defense. Here, the evidence at trial showed that Thornton and Davis had a volatile relationship. Thornton’s neighbors told police that Thornton and Davis "regularly had loud arguments that can be heard inside the apartments through the walls" and that, about two weeks before Davis’s death, one of Thornton’s neighbors heard a female yell, "Bring the bitch to me, and I’ll beat her ass." (R. 397, 398.) "[I]t was [one neighbor’s] understanding [that] the male resident cheated regularly on the female." (R. 401.) Cellular-telephone records obtained by law enforcement for both Thornton’s and Davis’s cellular telephones showed their volatile relationship, revealing conversations in which Thornton and Davis had accused each other of cheating one another, in which they had argued with each other, and in which they had broken up and gotten back together.¹ Law enforcement also discovered two reports in which Thornton had accused Davis of domestic violence. (R. 391.) Despite their up-and-down relationship, Thornton and Davis had made plans to get together on the evening of February 8, 2017, to celebrate Thornton completing nursing school and Davis getting into the military.

But in the early morning hours of February 9, 2017, Thornton called 911 requesting that an ambulance come to her home to attend to Davis.² Thornton told the 911 operator that Davis was throwing scissors up in the air, that they went into his chest, and that he pulled them out. David Saxon, a sergeant with the Dothan Police Department, responded to Thornton’s apartment at about 1:30 a.m. By the time Sgt. Saxon arrived, two other officers were already at Thornton’s apartment. Sgt. Saxon went upstairs in Thornton’s apartment and found Davis "laying [sic] on his back unresponsive" with a wound in the center of his chest. (R. 189, 192.) The emergency medical personnel who arrived to treat Davis transported him to the hospital where he was pronounced dead at 2:08 a.m.

According to Sgt. Saxon, Thornton said that Davis "was playing with a pair of scissors, and he accidentally stuck himself." (R. 200.) Thornton did not tell Sgt. Saxon that Davis had assaulted her, that she and Davis had been in a fight, that Davis had sexually assaulted her, or that Davis had tried to rape her. Sgt. Saxon also said that he did not see any injuries to Thornton.

Jerry Moore, an investigator with the Dothan Police Department, also responded to Thornton’s apartment. At some point, Thornton went to the police department and Inv. Moore interviewed her there. After waiving her Miranda³ rights, Thornton gave a statement to Inv. Moore.⁴ During that interview, Thornton said that she and Davis had planned to get together the evening of February 8, 2017, to celebrate his getting into the military and her completing nursing school. Inv. Moore said that Thornton explained:

"She said that -- she mentioned that part of the celebration, the celebratory that they planned on doing was to have sexual intercourse. And she stated that they did -- she showered, and then they had sexual intercourse, and then he was -- they were having a few drinks. Well, she actually stated that he did not have any drinks, because he was only drinking water, preparing for the military. She stated that he was lying on the floor, and he was cutting a pair -- an undergarment that had been ruined somehow and cutting it into a thong that he wanted her to wear and that she went downstairs to fix a drink, and as she come up the stairs, she saw him twirling the scissors with -- the way she represented, with two fingers together, twirling the scissors like this with her -- and as she was coming up the stairs, she saw the scissors go up in the air in the apartment and then land inside of his chest. And then, that’s when she said she -- she called for emergency services."

(R. 273-74.) Inv. Moore said that when he told Thornton that Davis was dead, the "interview kind of shifted." (R. 275.) At that point, Thornton told Inv. Moore that the "sexual intercourse was not wanted, and that [Davis] forced her to have sexual intercourse." (R. 275.) Thornton told Inv. Moore that

"she was faced away from [Davis] while the intercourse was going on. And she said at one point that she did kick back, and she turned

...