First-degree burglary statute covers the common hallway of an occupied residential apartment building.

Hallway by Jack Zalium, licensed under Creative Commons

Ruffin v. U.S., 15-CF-1378 (decided November 21, 2019)

• Holding 1: Proof that appellant pushed complainant at knife-point through the entrance and into the common hallway of her multi-unit row house apartment building was sufficient to establish that he “enter[ed] . . . [a] dwelling” as required for the crime of first-degree burglary, even though appellant did not enter into any apartment before he fled the scene. A “dwelling” includes “any enclosed space used for human habitation,” such as a residential apartment building. Slip Op. at 9. The common hallway at issue, located behind a locked door, was “in no way . . . so open to the public at large as to be considered outside” and was therefore “part of the private dwelling.” Id. at 12.
• Holding 2: The evidence presented was sufficient to establish kidnapping, notwithstanding withstanding appellant’s argument that the only detention of complainant was brief and incidental to the assault and robbery complainant suffered. Id. at 14-15.
• Holding 3: Where the government sent DNA profiles generated by one laboratory (DFS) to be interpreted by a second laboratory (Bode), amid reports of serious flaws in DFS’s interpretation procedures, the trial court did not abuse its discretion by allowing a Bode expert to testify regarding opinions that she derived from the data that DFS generated. The court had no reason to think the DFS data was unreliable given that “the criticisms of DFS pertained only to its statistical interpretation of DNA data,” not the procedures used to generate profiles, and given the Bode expert’s testimony that it was not uncommon for one laboratory to review and analyze data provided by another. Id. at 20.
• Holding 4: The trial court did not err in admitting into evidence a silver and black folding knife that police found in appellant’s jean pocket months after the attack on complainant, given that it fit complainant’s general description of the knife used during the attack. Although complainant never identified appellant’s knife or mentioned its black handle in describing the knife used by her attacker, and although there was a seven-week gap between the attack and when appellant would stipulate that his knife was in his possession, none of these factors was significant enough to deprive the knife of any probative value. Id. at 24-25.

Read the full opinion here.

Relevant portions of this post have been added to Expert Testimony section and Physical Evidence section of The (Early) Year in Review (Part 2), as well as the Elements/Sufficiency of the Evidence section of The (Early) Year in Review (Part 3).

WCC

Convictions reversed in light of "stark" racial disparity in the use of peremptory strikes, failure to proceed to steps two and three of Batson inquiry.

The Jury (1861) by John Morgan, Public Domain

Beasley v. U.S., 17-CF-1398 (decided November 21, 2019)

• Holding 1: Following defense counsel’s Batson challenge, the trial court erred in finding no prima facie case of discrimination, where the government “used 80% of its peremptory strikes against black jurors, a group that comprised approximately 33% of the venire.” Slip. Op. at 8. A statistical disparity of this magnitude was sufficient to create prima facie case, notwithstanding the lack of evidence regarding the racial makeup of the seated jury and the fact that the defense also struck some of the black jurors included in its prima facie case. Although the court has “taken note in some cases when certain classes of people have been totally excluded from a jury through the government’s use of strikes,” it has “never signaled that this factor was” either necessary or sufficient. Id. at 9. Given that the reasons underlying the parties’ overlapping strikes are “not readily apparent, the overlap [is] not a valid basis for subtracting . . . jurors from the step-one analysis of the government’s strikes.” Id. at 10-11.
• Holding 2: As in Haney v. United States, 206 A.3d 854 (D.C. 2019), the trial court’s erroneous finding that the defense failed to establish a prima facie case requires reversal because resuming the Batson inquiry on remand, after more than two years have passed, is not feasible. The government made “no contemporaneous proffers regarding its strikes of any jurors,” and as the government has conceded, the record provides no “obvious justification” for at least three of the relevant strikes. Id. at 13-14.

Read the full opinion here.

A copy of this post has been added to the Jury Selection section of The (Early) Year In Review (Part 2).

DCCA: Barring notices cannot bar DCHA residents and household members from areas that their leases permit them to access.

Signspotting by K@ja, licensed under Creative Commons

Foster v. U.S., 17-CM-994 (decided November 7, 2019)

• Holding: Evidence that appellant violated a notice purporting to bar him from three out of six buildings in the DCHA development where he lived with his mother was insufficient to establish the crime of unlawful entry, where appellant’s mother’s lease apparently granted appellant access to the entire development, including all common areas and grounds associated with all buildings. Although special police officers testified that the development had been subdivided into three-building sections for purposes of issuing and enforcing barring notices, and that appellant had been barred from the section where he did not reside, the alleged subdivision was not reflected in appellant’s mother’s lease agreement, which listed appellant as a household member and which was further binding on DCHA. Accordingly, the government failed to prove that appellant was an “unauthorized person” subject to barring on the property listed in the notice, i.e., that he was not a “member of [a] resident’s household” on the property in question. 14 DCMR § 9600.2.

Read the full opinion here.

A copy of this post has been added to Elements/Sufficiency of the Evidence section of The (Early) Year in Review (Part 3).

- WCC