Summary
In State v. Berry, 99-0001 (La. 5/7/99), 735 So.2d 618, 619 (per curiam), the defendant was convicted on three counts of aggravated kidnapping in which the distinctive ransom element of the crime was shown by the perpetrators' action in gathering a female victim and her two children into the bathroom of a home they shared with the male victim, as a means to extort money from the victim.
Summary of this case from State v. ManningOpinion
No. 99-KO-0001
May 7, 1999
IN RE: Berry, Brian; — Defendant(s); Applying for Supervisory and/or Remedial Writs; Parish of East Baton Rouge 19th Judicial District Court Div. "G" Number 11-95-1111; to the Court of Appeal, First Circuit, Number KA98 0173
Granted in part. See per curiam.
HTL
PFC
WFM
CDK
JPV
JOHNSON, J. not on panel.
Granted in part; denied in part. Relator's convictions and sentences on three counts of aggravated kidnapping are vacated, verdicts of second degree kidnapping are entered, and this case is remanded to the district court for resentencing. On the evidence at trial, rational jurors could only speculate whether the perpetrators herded Stephanie Evans and her two children into their own bathroom to extort money from Kevin Evans, Sr., thereby satisfying the distinctive ransom element of Louisiana's aggravated kidnapping statute, La.Rev.Stat. 14:44; see State v. Arnold, 548 So.2d 920 (La. 1989), or whether they simply intended to move them out of the way for purposes of facilitating the murder of Evans which followed immediately thereafter. The evidence otherwise supported the lesser included and responsive verdict of second degree kidnapping committed when the armed perpetrators forcibly secreted the victims inside their own home. La.Rev.Stat. 14:441A(5) and B(3). In all other respects, in particular regarding the conviction of relator. for second degree murder and sentence to life imprisonment at hard labor, the application is denied.