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Virginia Malicious Wounding Attempted Murder Indictment Lawyers Attorney

by

Atchuthan Sriskandarajah

Jeff White V. Commonwealth Of Virginia

Facts:

Defendant was involved in a “shoot out” at a music festival. The evidence showed that he shot the victim in the leg and that a friend then shot and otherwise assaulted the victim. The trial court denied a vague motion to strike at least one of the indictments. The Commonwealth argued that each offense had different elements. judgment of the Circuit Court convicted defendant of assault and battery under an indictment that charged attempted murder, and also convicted him of the unlawful wounding of the same victim under an indictment that charged

malicious wounding

in a dual prosecution that arose out of the same incident. Defendant appealed the judgment.

Issue:

Whether defendant may be convicted of assault and battery under an indictment charging attempted murder, and also be convicted of an unlawful wounding of the same victim under an indictment charging malicious wounding, when both prosecutions arose out of the same incident?

Discussion:

This court held that defendant had satisfied Va. Sup. Ct. R. 5:21, which required a defendant to state with reasonable certainty his objection to the ruling of the trial court, because he had alerted the trial court to his objection to being tried under both indictments. The court held that both assault and battery and unlawful wounding were lesser-included offenses of malicious wounding and that a conviction of unlawful wounding barred a conviction of assault and battery. The court held that when a person was improperly convicted of both a higher-ranked and a lower-ranked offense, the remedy was to vacate the lesser conviction. The court held that the trial court should have instructed the jury that once it determined to convict under either indictment, it should not consider the other indictment.

Judgment:

This court hence affirmed defendant’s conviction of unlawful wounding, dismissed the

attempted murder indictment

, and reversed and vacated the conviction of assault and battery under that indictment.

Disclaimer:

These summaries are provided by the SRIS Law Group. They represent the firm s unofficial views of the Justices opinions. The original opinions should be consulted for their authoritative content

Atchuthan Sriskandarajah is a Virginia lawyer and owner of the SRIS Law Group. The SRIS Law Group has offices in Virginia, Maryland,

Massachusetts

, New York, North Carolina & California. The firm handles criminal/traffic defense, family law, immigration & bankruptcy cases.

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