Wililams v. State ( 2023 )

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE
RONNIE WILLIAMS, §
§ No. 80, 2022
Defendant Below, §
Appellant, § Court Below: Superior Court
§ of the State of Delaware
v. §
§ Cr. ID No. 1909016936(N)
STATE OF DELAWARE, §
§
Appellee. §
Submitted: February 22, 2023
Decided: April 25, 2023
Before VALIHURA, VAUGHN, and TRAYNOR, Justices.
Upon appeal from the Superior Court. AFFIRMED.
CHRISTOFER C. JOHNSON, Esquire, Wilmington, Delaware, for Appellant
Ronnie Williams.
Kathryn J. Garrison, Esquire, DELAWARE DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE,
Dover, Delaware, for Appellee State of Delaware.
TRAYNOR, Justice:
Ronnie C. Williams was convicted in the Superior Court of several sexual
offenses committed against two children. In this appeal of those convictions,
Williams claims that, during the course of his trial, the Superior Court erroneously
denied his requests that the court declare a mistrial when the jury was exposed to
evidence that Williams deemed to be highly prejudicial.
The evidence that, according to Williams, was so prejudicial as to warrant a
mistrial falls within two categories. The first category consists of “outbursts” by the
victims’ mother and, specifically, her two references to Williams as a “liar.” The
second category refers to a friend of the victims—another child who resided with
Williams named Cyree. These references ran afoul, Williams argues, of a pretrial
ruling, the record of which was, it appears, not transcribed. We can, however, glean
the gravamen of Williams’s complaint as to these references from the nature of his
objections and the trial court’s responses. It seems that Williams sought to exclude
testimony about Cyree because it might cause the jury to infer—improperly and in
contravention of D.R.E. 403(b)—that Williams may have engaged in uncharged
sexual misconduct with him.
Our review of the trial record persuades us that the victims’ mother’s
outbursts, while inappropriate, were unlikely to have misled or prejudiced the jury.
2
And Williams does not explain how the testimony referring to Cyree was
inadmissible, let alone prejudicial. Therefore, we affirm Williams’s convictions.
I
A
The defendant, Ronnie C. Williams, met two brothers, E.H. and A.G., in 2008
when E.H. was 12 years old and A.G. was 7 or 8 years old.1 He was introduced to
the brothers by Cyree, a 14-year-old boy who was living with Williams. Williams
had been roommates with Cyree’s mother and had agreed to look after her son while
she spent time in prison and, later, in North Carolina.
Williams and Cyree had recently moved into the New Castle neighborhood
where E.H. and A.G. lived and, according to Williams, he and Cyree “went to their
house to meet them because we were new to the neighborhood.” 2 E.H. and A.G.
appeared to enjoy spending time with Williams and Cyree at Williams’s home. A.G.
testified that “it was a fun environment, there was game systems such as Xbox, Play
Station, and I liked hanging out with Cyree and just go over there, talk about life
with Ronnie.”3
1
With the exception of Cyree, who is deceased, the parties have referred to the juveniles involved
in this matter by their initials.
2
App. to Opening Br. at A1031.
3
Id. at A551.
3
Williams took on a “parental” role in A.G.’s life while A.G.’s father was in
prison, and he eventually became A.G.’s legal guardian, making A.G.’s doctor
appointments, paying for food and clothing, giving him access to a car, and bringing
him to Chicago Bulls games. Eventual disclosures revealed, however, that this
veneer of generosity concealed a disturbing pattern of sexual abuse.
The allegations of abuse were first disclosed following a 2018 fight between
Williams and A.G. After the altercation, the two went to A.G.’s mother’s home in
Wilmington, where A.G. told his mother that Williams had hit him. When A.G.’s
mother chastised A.G., who at this point was 17 years old, about his behavior toward
Williams and at her house, A.G. “[stood] up and [said], ‘Well, Ronnie has been
abusing me. When I was 10 years old, he touched my butt, and he has been making
me masturbate in front of him.’”4
Later that day, a New Castle County police officer responded to a call for
assistance at A.G.’s mother’s residence. A.G. told the officer about the fight with
Williams earlier in the day. A.G. also told the officer that Williams had engaged in
“unwanted sexual things”5 with him, dating back to when A.G. was 10 years old. As
a result, Williams was arrested and charged with unspecified offenses6 for his role
4
Id. at A1061.
5
Id. at A511.
6
The record in this case does not disclose the offenses with which Williams was charged on that
day, but it does indicate that he eventually pleaded guilty to offensive touching.
4
in the altercation with A.G., and the New Castle County Police Department opened
an investigation into A.G.’s sexual abuse allegations. During that investigation,
A.G.’s older brother, E.H. also disclosed that Williams had sexually abused him
when E.H. was still a minor.
The investigation culminated in Williams’s arrest at his home on September
27, 2019. When officers arrived, they found Williams’s then 13-year-old nephew,
A.D., playing videogames. A.D. told the officers that Williams had, on several
occasions, touched him in inappropriate ways while he was sleeping over at the
house.
Williams eventually faced trial on a 15-count indictment that charged him
with various sexual offenses against the three juveniles, including rape in the second
degree and continuous sexual abuse of a child.
At trial, E.H. testified that Williams would force him into unwanted sexual
acts when he would spend the night at Williams’s home with Cyree. A.G. also
testified that Williams first molested him during a sleepover at Williams’s home and
that the abuse escalated after Williams caught him watching pornography on the
PlayStation.
On November 19, 2021, Williams was convicted by a jury of rape in the
second degree, continuous sexual abuse of a child, unlawful sexual contact, sexual
solicitation of a child, and sexual abuse of a child by a person in a position of trust.
5
Williams was, however, acquitted on all charges that he had abused A.D. The
Superior Court sentenced Williams to 71 years of Level V incarceration, suspended
after 22 years for two years of Level III probation.
B
In this appeal, Williams’s principal claims of error center on what he claims
was improper and prejudicial testimony by prosecution witnesses. He points
specifically to an angry outburst from E.H.’s and A.G.’s mother during which she
called Williams a liar, as well as to testimony that Cyree, who had since died, was
living with Williams during the years that Williams was accused of abusing E.H.
and A.G. Thus, we briefly describe the testimony underlying Williams’s concerns.
1
Although able to speak and understand English, E.H.’s and A.G.’s mother—
Katty Cordova—elected to testify during trial with the help of a Spanish interpreter.
While on direct examination by the State, Ms. Cordova, using English, yelled over
the interpreter that Williams was “a freaking liar.”7 She then repeated the word
“liar,” as the court interjected “no outbursts . . . [j]ust answer the question.”8 Defense
counsel immediately asked the judge to excuse the jury to allow Cordova a moment
to calm down. The court declined defense counsel’s request, but Cordova again
7
App. to Opening Br. at A468.
8
Id. at A469.
6
stated that Williams was “such a liar.”9 Defense counsel then requested, and the
court called, a sidebar.
During the sidebar, defense counsel moved for a mistrial on the grounds that
Cordova’s outburst was “prejudicial to [Williams], which w[ould] reflect on his
credibility when he [] testif[ied].”10 The trial judge, after discussing the matter with
counsel, elected to break for the weekend but not before instructing the jury to
“disregard the last comment that was given.”11 After the jury left the courtroom, the
court informed Cordova that “[t]his is a courtroom. We have a certain level of
decorum in a courtroom. We don’t have outbursts, we don’t have people yelling at
other people, and we don’t have people pointing fingers and calling them names.”12
When Cordova’s testimony resumed following the weekend recess, there were no
further outbursts.
2
Before trial—precisely when and in what setting is unclear—the court ruled
that the State could not present evidence showing that Cyree lived with Williams or
that Williams was Cyree’s guardian. Neither Williams nor the State has provided
the Court with a transcript of this pretrial ruling, and the Court’s independent review
9
Id.
10
Id. at A469–70.
11
Id. at A471.
12
Id. at A473.
7
of the Superior Court record suggests that no such transcript was prepared. Yet the
parties appear to agree that there was such a ruling and that the Superior Court
intended that it would limit the testimony during Williams’s trial. At any rate, given
Cyree’s pivotal role in Williams’s relationship with A.G. and E.H., the ruling proved
to be difficult to enforce at trial.
The difficulties first surfaced during testimony from Latonya Smith, Cyree’s
mother. The prosecutor asked Ms. Smith whether she was “aware of whether or not
[her] son was spending time with [Williams] when [she] w[as] in North Carolina.”13
Defense counsel objected to the question as calling for an answer that would violate
the pre-trial ruling. Defense counsel was concerned that any questions or answers
that suggested that Cyree was living with Williams could cause the jury to question
whether Williams was doing something inappropriate with Cyree. The prosecutor
responded that the question was necessary to explain how E.H. and A.G. met Cyree
and Williams in Delaware despite Cyree’s mother being in North Carolina.
During the ensuing sidebar, the trial judge told the prosecutor that, although
she was “allowed to say that Cyree played with [E.H. and A.G.] on Ronnie’s
block[,]” she could not make any mention of the fact that Cyree was living with
Williams, noting that “[l]iving with and playing with are two different things.”14 The
13
Id. at A332.
14
Id. at A335–36.
8
prosecutor then asked whether the victims could talk “about the fact that they slept
with Cyree at [Williams’s] house[,]” to which the judge responded that they would
“cross that bridge when [they] g[ot] to it.”15
They quickly reached that bridge. When E.H. took the stand, he testified that
he and Cyree would play and have sleepovers at Williams’s home. When asked
what would happen at these sleepovers, E.H. stated that he and Cyree would “play
video games [and] watch movies.”16 E.H. then started to explain that there was one
evening where he “stayed up all night and Cyree was sleeping and . . . .” 17 Defense
counsel objected before E.H. could finish his sentence, arguing to the judge that it
was “hard enough to defend the three people that [Williams had] been charged with
rather than impliedly defend with Cyree.”18
The trial judge offered to give a curative instruction, but defense counsel
spurned the offer, observing that one would “not be helpful at this point.”19 Instead,
defense counsel requested that the jury be given a short break and that E.H. be
instructed to not mention Cyree during the remainder of his testimony. The court
obliged, dismissing the jury and explaining to E.H. that “[y]ou can talk about you
15
Id. at A337.
16
Id. at A368.
17
Id.
18
Id.
19
Id. at A368–69.
9
and Cyree playing PlayStation or Xbox 360 or anything like that, but . . . you are not
to talk about Cyree sleeping overnight.”20
That was not, however, the end of it. E.H. later testified that he would go on
overnight trips to amusement parks with Williams and Cyree. Although defense
counsel did not initially object to this statement, he objected when the prosecutor
asked E.H. about whether he had maintained a relationship with Cyree after leaving
Delaware. At sidebar, defense counsel stated Williams’s position:
First of all, he mentioned Cyree again and unresponsively, and I didn’t
object because I didn’t want to draw attention to it . . . Number two, I’m
going to move for a mistrial. This whole thing about Cyree is calculated
to suggest to the jury that something was going on with Cyree too, and
it’s not relevant and the State persists in asking questions about Cyree.21
The prosecutor responded that she was only asking E.H. about his communications
with Cyree for the purpose of explaining that E.H. had informed Cyree about
Williams’s abuse. Defense counsel appeared to be placated by the prosecutor’s
reasoning, saying “[i]f we just limit it to that, that’s fine if that’s as far as it goes[.]”22
The Cyree saga continued into Ms. Cordova’s testimony. Cordova began her
testimony by explaining that she had first met Williams while he was living in her
neighborhood and that she would see him in the evenings with Cyree. Later, when
asked whether Williams had moved out of her neighborhood, Cordova stated that
20
Id. at A372.
21
Id. at A384.
22
Id.
10
“[Williams] used to live with Cyree, then he moved out to continue living with
Cyree.”23 A sidebar conference was immediately convened, and the court again
offered to give a curative instruction. Defense counsel responded:
I would ask you to do that but I don’t know how we cure this. This
woman is causing so much trouble here, she’s not that important of a
witness. She’s now called him a liar in front of the jury, we’ve now
introduced evidence you said was not admissible. I know it’s not [the
prosecutor’s] fault, she didn’t elicit it, but it’s out here.24
The trial judge ultimately elected to instruct the jury to “disregard the last answer
that was given.”25 Cordova was then allowed to continue her testimony, but the
prosecutor was limited to asking questions calling for a “yes or no” answer.26
But Cyree came up again during A.G.’s testimony. A.G. explained that he
had first met Williams while hanging out with E.H. and Cyree and that he had
continued spending time with Williams and Cyree after E.H. left the state. The
prosecutor then asked A.G. why he had kept going over to Williams’s home after
Williams had moved out of Cordova’s neighborhood.27 A.G. responded:
I gained a strong relationship with Ronnie where I saw him as a father
figure in my life. I liked being around him and Cyree. I saw him as
family for me. I wasn’t too close with my own family on my dad’s side
and I had issues with my mom’s side, so I felt more of a part of that
family with Cyree and Ronnie, that’s why I enjoyed staying over
there.28
23
Id. at A495–96.
24
Id. at A497–98.
25
Id. at A500.
26
Id. at A499–500.
27
Id. at A555.
28
Id.
11
The trial judge again called for a sidebar, stating that it “[s]eems as though every
answer [A.G.] is giving is couched in reference to Cyree.”29 The prosecutor told the
court that she had specifically advised A.G. not to mention that Cyree was living
with Williams, and the court responded that A.G. “seem[ed] to be smirking every
time” he mentioned Cyree’s name.30 The judge then informed the prosecutor that
she was dismissing the jury and would speak with A.G. herself because “they don’t
listen to you, apparently.”31 Defense counsel, for his part, renewed his request for a
mistrial. Although the court denied defense counsel’s request, it instructed A.G. to
stop mentioning Cyree during his testimony.
Even so, Cyree was brought up later by Williams himself, who was explaining
how he had come to meet E.H. and A.G.:
It was at a time when [A.G.’s] brother was hanging out with Cyree, and
Cyree had introduced me to [E.H.]. And we went to their house to meet
them because we were new to the neighborhood. We had only been
there maybe two or three months at the time, and that’s how we were
able to introduce [] m[e] to them.32
C
Williams argues that the trial court abused its discretion when it refused to
declare a mistrial after Cordova called him a liar and several of the State’s witnesses
29
Id.
30
Id. at A555–56.
31
Id. at A556.
32
Id. at A1031.
12
alluded to the fact that Cyree was living with him. Williams believes that, these
statements improperly prejudiced the jury against him and that the trial court erred
further by not providing adequate curative instructions to the jury.33
II
A
“Granting a mistrial is an extraordinary remedy, warranted only when there is
manifest necessity and no meaningful and practical alternatives.” 34 We review “a
trial judge’s denial of a motion for a mistrial for abuse of discretion because the trial
judge is in the best position to assess the risk of any prejudice resulting from trial
events.”35
B
Williams claims that the Superior Court’s failure to declare a mistrial after
prosecution witnesses gave unfairly prejudicial testimony compromised his Sixth
Amendment right to trial before an impartial jury. To be sure, “[t]he right to a fair
33
Id. Williams also makes a half-hearted argument in his opening brief that his Sixth Amendment
right to confrontation was violated by the repeated mentions of Cyree who, because of this death,
was unavailable to testify at trial. We cannot, however, identify a testimonial statement from
Cyree introduced at trial that would trigger Williams’s confrontation rights. Nor could Williams’s
counsel during oral argument. See Oral Argument at 18:45–18:55, Williams v. State of Delaware,
80, 2022, available at
https://livestream.com/accounts/5969852/events/10726676/videos/235147565/player (conceding
that no evidence was presented at trial suggesting that Cyree made accusatory statements about
Williams). The mere mention of an unavailable person is insufficient to invoke the protection of
the Confrontation Clause.
34
Copper v. State, 85 A.3d 689, 693 (Del. 2014).
35
Id. at 692.
13
trial before an impartial jury of one’s peers is fundamental to the American criminal
justice system.”36 “Both the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution and
Article I, § 7 of the Delaware Constitution guarantee defendants in criminal cases
the right to have their cases brought before an impartial jury.”37 Mistrials are one
way to remedy instances where a jury has been subjected to improperly admitted and
unfairly prejudicial evidence. But, as we explain next, that did not happen here.
1
Williams believes that Ms. Cordova’s outburst on the stand—during which
she called Williams a “freaking liar”—was sufficiently prejudicial to have warranted
a mistrial and that the trial judge erred by not declaring one.
“A trial judge is in the best position to evaluate the prejudicial effect of an
outburst upon [a] jury.”38 This Court has adopted a four-factor test—enunciated in
Taylor v. State39—to determine “whether a witness’[s] outburst was so prejudicial
that the refusal to grant a mistrial constituted an abuse of discretion, or deprived the
defendant of a substantial right.”40 These factors are: “(1) the nature, persistency,
and frequency of the witness’s outburst; (2) whether the witness’s outburst created
36
Id. at 693.
37
Id.
38
Id.
39
690 A.2d 933 (Del. 1997).
40
Copper, 85 A.3d at 693.
14
a likelihood that the jury would be misled or prejudiced; (3) the closeness of the
case; and (4) the curative or mitigating action taken by the trial judge.”41
Williams concedes that Cordova’s outbursts were not persistent, but that,
because his case was close and the court’s curative instruction was inadequate, the
likelihood of jury prejudice was high. This, as we follow Williams’s argument,
results in three out of the four Taylor factors pointing toward a mistrial, a score that
Williams claims warrants a reversal and new trial. We see it differently.
In the first place, we reject the notion that the application of Taylor requires
us to engage in a mechanical score-keeping exercise by which we are to count the
numbers of factors that go this way or that. Rather we see the four-factor “test” as a
guide for the trial courts to employ in the first instance, and this Court to review on
appeal, when presented with a claim that the only fair way to respond to a witness’s
improper outburst is by declaring a mistrial. Put another way, the Taylor “test” lists
the considerations that the trial court should take into account under these
circumstances as it exercises its considerable discretion and decides whether to take
the extraordinary step of pulling the plug on a trial and starting over. And likewise,
we look to the Taylor factors as we assess the trial court’s exercise of discretion and
whether it is indicative of abuse.
41
Id. at 694.
15
In many instances—and this is one of them—one Taylor factor can weigh so
heavily in favor of or against the ordering of a mistrial as to overwhelm the
remaining factors. And the factors most likely to predominate in that manner are the
first two factors, which focus on, among other things, the nature of the outburst and
the likelihood of jury prejudice.
The prototypical example of an outburst that would tip the first two factors in
a mistrial movant’s favor would be an inappropriate reference to clearly inadmissible
and highly prejudicial evidence, such as a defendant’s prior conviction or uncharged
misconduct. But Ms. Cordova’s outburst does not fit that description. As
mentioned, Williams acknowledges that the outbursts were not persistent. And their
“nature” was, in context, relatively benign. By that, we mean that her accusation
that the alleged abuser of her children’s trust was, by virtue of his denials, a “liar,”
or even “a freaking liar,” while inappropriate in a trial setting, was unlikely to have
come as a surprise to the jury. More to the point, it was very unlikely—again, in
context—to have misled or prejudiced the jury. For these reasons alone, the trial
court’s denial of Williams’s mistrial applications was not an abuse of discretion.
Yet the other factors also militated against a mistrial, including the mitigating
action, in the form of a curative instruction, taken by the trial judge. This Court has
previously held that prejudice “can normally be cured by the use of a curative
16
instruction to the jury, and [that] jurors are presumed to follow those instructions.”42
And there is no prescribed form for such instructions.43 Rather, what matters is that
the instruction is “properly designed to cure any prejudice” to the defendant.44 Here
the trial judge offered a limited curative instruction commensurate with Ms.
Cordova’s concededly brief outburst—“[l]adies and gentlemen of the jury, I instruct
you to disregard that last comment that was given.”45 It is notable that, in apparent
recognition of the adequacy of this instruction, William’s trial counsel did not
propose a more robust instruction nor did he ask the court for an additional curative
instruction during the final jury charge.
There is also independent evidence suggesting that the jury was not, in fact,
prejudiced by Ms. Cordova’s outburst: the jury acquitted Williams on all charges
relating to allegations that he had sexually abused his nephew, A.D. We can infer
from this acquittal that, despite Cordova’s outburst, the jury had kept an open mind
as to Williams’s credibility by the time that he took the stand. Accordingly, because
the Taylor factors, whether counted numerically or balanced more generally, weigh
in the State’s favor, the trial court did not abuse its discretion when it denied
Williams’s motion for a mistrial.
42
Guy v. State, 913 A.2d 558, 565–66 (Del. 2006).
43
See Hamilton v. State, 82 A.3d 723, 726 (Del. 2013) (“As a general rule, a defendant is not
entitled to a particular instruction, but he does have the unqualified right to a correct statement of
the substance of the law.”).
44
Garvey v. State, 873 A.2d 291, 299 (Del. 2005).
45
App. to Opening Br. at A471.
17
2
Williams’s second jury-prejudice argument focuses on the repeated mentions
of Cyree at trial by various prosecution witnesses. Specifically, Williams contends
that “[t]he State’s attorney[’s] fail[ure] to keep witnesses from mentioning [Cyree] .
. . and the trial court[’s] fail[ure] to provide an adequate curative instruction to
remedy the prejudice to Mr. Williams[,]” require that Williams be granted a
mistrial.46
This claim’s predicate is a pretrial evidentiary ruling that limited the
admissibility of testimony concerning Williams’s relationship with Cyree.
Regrettably, neither party provided us with a transcript of this ruling, nor could we
find it during our independent review of the record as transmitted to us by the
Superior Court. Consequently, the rationale for and precise scope of the court’s
ruling on this point is unclear. Yet both Williams and the State have argued this
appeal under the assumption that the trial court intended to exclude evidence of
Williams’s relationship with Cyree. Fortunately, this gap in the record does not
preclude our consideration of Williams’s claim.
Several facts compel our conclusion that the trial court was well within its
discretion when it denied Williams’s motions for a mistrial on these grounds. First,
the court offered to give, and Williams repeatedly declined, curative instructions
46
Opening Br. at 22–23.
18
throughout the trial. Williams, moreover, did not request that a curative instruction
be included in the final jury instructions, presumably to avoid reminding the jury
that another boy lived with Williams during the period in which he allegedly abused
E.H. and A.G. Given Williams’s strategic decision to forgo curative instructions
when offered during trial and before jury deliberations, his criticism of the court on
this point rings hollow.
Secondly, it would have been nearly impossible for E.H. and A.G. to explain
how they had come to meet and spend time with Williams without indicating that
Cyree lived with Williams; indeed, Cyree’s presence in Williams’s home was
inextricable from their presence. And the fact that E.H. and A.G. slept over at
Williams’s house was going to come out at trial regardless of whether the jury was
alerted to the fact that Cyree was living there. In fact, E.H.’s and A.G.’s sleepovers
at Williams’s appear less suspicious, not more so, when one considers that they were
invited to the house by a boy their own age rather than by a grown man who lived
alone. This is particularly true in the absence of any evidence indicating that
Williams had an inappropriate relationship with Cyree. We simply do not see—and
Williams has not explained—how these references to Cyree ran afoul of the rules of
evidence or caused any prejudice to Williams.
And finally, as we have mentioned, there is evidence suggesting that the jury
here was not, in fact, prejudiced by the repeated mentions of Cyree: Williams was
19
acquitted on all charges that he had molested A.D. despite the jury convicting
Williams of similar charges against E.H. and A.G. This fact indicates that the jury
was able to independently assess each boy’s allegations rather than assuming that
Williams was abusive towards every boy of that age who spent time in his home.
III
For the reasons set forth above, we affirm the judgment of the Superior Court.
20