## Facts

- Quayjuan A. English and David Rivers were with several others in and around Rivers’s car in a backyard.
- English was seated in the back seat when someone handed him a shotgun.
- Rivers stood on one side of the car, another person stood on the other side, and two people were seated in the front.
- Multiple witnesses said English was “messing with” or “flicking” the shotgun’s hammer (part of the firing mechanism); testimony conflicted on whether English also swung the gun around and whether his finger was on the trigger.
- The shotgun discharged while English was manipulating the hammer and struck Rivers in the chest from roughly two to four feet away.
- Rivers died from the gunshot wound.
- English admitted he was holding the shotgun and that he “pulled back the thing on the top,” but he denied pulling the trigger, knowing the gun was loaded, knowing how to check whether it was loaded, having meaningful prior gun experience, swinging the gun, or knowing where Rivers was standing.
- The police initially did not recover the shotgun used in the shooting and were first shown a different firearm that did not match the wound.
- A neighbor testified he saw someone throw a gun into his yard; after the neighbor demanded it be removed, the same person retrieved it and ran toward the side of the house. About ten days later, the neighbor found a shotgun on his property and called police; it was identified as the fatal weapon.
- A forensic scientist testified that when she tested the shotgun by flicking the hammer without applying pressure to the trigger, it fired two out of twenty-five times, indicating a “sometimes operable hammer safety.”
- English was indicted and, after a jury trial, convicted of reckless homicide (with a firearm specification) and tampering with evidence.

## Issues

1. Whether the evidence was sufficient, and whether the verdict was against the manifest weight of the evidence, that English acted recklessly and caused Rivers’s death (reckless homicide).
2. Whether the evidence was sufficient, and whether the verdict was against the manifest weight of the evidence, that English—knowing an investigation was in progress or likely—concealed or removed the shotgun with purpose to impair its value or availability as evidence (tampering with evidence).
3. Whether the trial court erred by declining to instruct the jury on negligent homicide as a lesser-included offense of reckless homicide.

## Decision

- Affirmed the convictions for reckless homicide (with firearm specification) and tampering with evidence.
- Held the evidence was sufficient and the jury’s verdicts were not against the manifest weight on both counts.
- Held the trial court did not err by refusing to instruct on negligent homicide.

## Legal Principles

- Reckless homicide (R.C. 2903.041) requires proof that the defendant caused death recklessly as defined in R.C. 2901.22(C): with heedless indifference to consequences, perversely disregarding a known risk that the conduct is likely to cause a certain result.
- A jury may find recklessness from handling and manipulating a firearm at close range to others, including repeatedly flicking the hammer in a way that can cause discharge.
- On sufficiency review, the question is whether, viewing the evidence in the state’s favor, any rational factfinder could find the elements proved beyond a reasonable doubt; on manifest-weight review, the appellate court considers the full record and defers to the jury on credibility unless the verdict is a clear miscarriage of justice.
- Tampering with evidence (R.C. 2921.12(A)(1)) is proved by showing that, knowing an official investigation is in progress or likely, the defendant altered, destroyed, concealed, or removed an item with purpose to impair its value or availability as evidence; purpose may be inferred from conduct and surrounding circumstances, including actions taken immediately after the event.
- A lesser-included-offense instruction is required only when the evidence would reasonably support both acquittal on the greater offense and conviction on the lesser; where the evidence supports either recklessness or no culpable mental state, a negligent-homicide instruction is not required.

## Conclusion

The Tenth District Court of Appeals affirmed English’s convictions, concluding that the jury could reasonably find that repeatedly flicking a shotgun’s hammer in close quarters created a known risk of deadly discharge and that English disregarded that risk, and that the evidence also permitted the inference that he participated in concealing the shotgun despite knowing a police investigation was likely. The court also held the trial court properly refused to instruct on negligent homicide because the record did not reasonably support a verdict based on negligence rather than recklessness.


State v. English, 2014-Ohio-89 (2014)