New Jersey v. Bailey

Carlos Guerrero and Alex Mejia were walking in New Brunswick after a night of drinking. A video surveillance camera captured defendant Karlton Bailey approaching Guerrero from behind and putting his hand in Guerrero’s back pocket. Mejia responded by running across the street to confront defendant. The conflict quickly turned violent. Upon seeing defendant draw a gun, Mejia held his hands up in the air and backed away. Defendant followed Mejia into the street, struck him in the face, searched his pockets, and fled the scene. A Grand Jury returned an indictment (Indictment 1650) against defendant, charging him with second-degree possession of a firearm by certain persons not to possess a firearm. A second indictment (Indictment 1317) charged defendant with robbery, assault, and weapons offenses. A jury found defendant guilty on all counts of Indictment 1317. A separate jury trial on the certain persons indictment immediately followed. At that trial, defendant did not stipulate to the predicate convictions that prohibited him from possessing a firearm. The parties agreed that evidence of defendant’s prior convictions would be sanitized, that is, “redacted except for the date and the degree of the offense.” The trial court properly advised the jury that they “must disregard [their] prior verdict, and consider anew the evidence previously admitted on possession of a weapon.” The issue this case presented for the New Jersey Supreme Court’s review centered on the sanitization and model jury charge, and whether that clean-up infringed on defendant’s constitutional right to be tried by a jury on all necessary elements of each charged offense. Over-sanitization here rendered the proof insufficient to demonstrate that the defendant previously violated a predicate offense enumerated within the certain persons statute. The New Jersey Court reversed and remanded, holding that when a defendant refuses to stipulate to a predicate offense under the certain persons statute, the State shall produce evidence of the predicate offense: the judgment of conviction with the unredacted nature of the offense, the degree of offense, and the date of conviction. Furthermore, the model jury charge on this issue had to be revised. View "New Jersey v. Bailey" on Justia Law