State Of Louisiana v. Jace Crehan ( 2020 )

NOT DESIGNATED FOR PUBLICATION
STATE OF LOUISIANA
COURT OF APPEAL
FIRST CIRCUIT
2018 KA 0746R
STATE OF LOUISIANA
VERSUS
JACE CREHAN
Judgment Rendered: 7jul: 0 9 Mt
On Appeal from the
Nineteenth Judicial District Court
In and for the Parish of East Baton Rouge
State of Louisiana
Trial Court No. 09- 15- 0123
The Honorable Anthony J. Marabella, Jr., Judge Presiding
Hillar Moore, III Attorneys for Appellee
District Attorney State of Louisiana
Allison Miller Rutzen
Assistant District Attorney
Baton Rouge, Louisiana
Bruce G. Whittaker Attorney for Appellant
New Orleans, Louisiana Jace Crehan
BEFORE: GUIDRY, THERIOT, AND PENZATO, JJ.
PENZATO, J.
Defendant, Jace Crehan, was charged by grand jury indictment with second
degree murder, a violation of La. R. S. 14: 30. 1. He pled not guilty. After a trial by
jury, defendant was found guilty as charged by eleven of twelve jurors. Defendant
filed a motion for new trial, which was denied by the trial court. Immediately
following the denial, the trial court imposed a term of life imprisonment at hard
labor, to be served without the benefit of probation, parole, or suspension of
sentence. This court denied defendant' s appeal. State v. Crehan, 2018- 0746 ( La.
App. 1st Cir. 11/ 5/ 18), 2018 WL 5785479 ( unpublished). The Louisiana Supreme
Court denied writs. State v. Crehan, 2018- 2024 ( La. 4/ 15/ 19), 267 So. 3d 1124.
Defendant filed a writ of certiorari in the United States Supreme Court, which
was granted. This court' s judgment was vacated and the case was remanded to this
court for further proceedings consistent with the Court' s ruling in Ramos v.
Louisiana, 590 U.S. , 140 S. Ct. 13905 206 L.Ed.2d 583 ( 2020). Crehan v.
Louisiana, U.S. , S. Ct. , 2020 WL 1978930. Justice Alito,
concurring in the Court' s decision to vacate and remand the instant case, did so " on
the understanding that the Court is not deciding or expressing a view on whether the
question was properly raised below but is instead leaving that question to be decided
on remand." Id. Here, defendant filed a motion for new trial in which he claimed,
among other things, Louisiana' s non -unanimous jury verdict provisions are
unconstitutional,'
and he also assigned his conviction by a non -unanimous jury
verdict as error on appeal.
Further, we note that the Louisiana Supreme Court recently remanded several cases to this court
in which defendants were convicted by a non -unanimous jury verdict, wherein the court ordered
this court to conduct an error patent review pursuant to La. Code Crim. P. art 920( 2), even when
the issue was not preserved for review. See e.g., State v. Cagler, 2018- 02015 ( La. 6/ 3/ 20),
So. 3d , 2020 WL 3423802 ( per curiam).
2
In the recent decision of Ramos, the United States Supreme Court overruled
Apodaca v. Oregon and held that the right to a jury trial under the Sixth Amendment
of the United States Constitution, incorporated against the States by way of the
Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution, requires a unanimous
verdict to convict a defendant of a serious offense. Ramos, 140 S. Ct. at 1397. The
Ramos Court further noted that its ruling applied to those defendants convicted of
felonies by non -unanimous verdicts whose cases are still pending on direct appeal.
Ramos, 140 S. Ct. at 1406.
Accordingly, defendant' s conviction and sentence are set aside, and the case
is remanded for a new trial.
CONVICTION AND SENTENCE SET ASIDE; REMANDED FOR
NEW TRIAL
2 Oregon' s non -unanimous jury verdict provision of its state constitution was challenged in
Apodaca v. Oregon, 406 U. S. 404, 92 S. Ct. 1628, 32 L.Ed.2d 184 ( 1972). Johnson v. Louisiana,
406 U. S. 356, 92 S. Ct. 1620, 32 L.Ed.2d 152 ( 1972), decided with Apodaca, upheld Louisiana' s
then -existing constitutional and statutory provisions allowing nine -to -three jury verdicts in
criminal cases.
3