A man serving a possible life sentence for sexually abusing a woman will face a retrial after Colorado’s second-highest court agreed that a jury lawyer had introduced damaging outside legal information into its deliberations.
In 2016, a jury convicted Damon D. Newman of raping a woman at gunpoint at Sloan’s Lake. Years later, investigators were able to link Newman to the 2011 assault using his DNA. Newman claimed he and the victim had consensual sex. Additionally, there was no forensic evidence of assault and the victim had a motive to falsely accuse him.
After the trial, one juror claimed that another juror told everyone he knew it would be beneficial for him to take the bar exam. He then read a legal-sounding principle and explained why it indicated Newman’s guilt. A trial judge held a hearing and concluded that it was not the kind of outside information that jurors were not allowed to consider.
On Thursday, a three-judge panel of the appeals court disagreed.
The juror “independently investigated the irrelevant legal definition regarding character evidence,” Judge Jaclyn Casey Brown wrote in her August 8 opinion. “In a case that primarily involves testimony from defendants, this is precisely the type of irrelevant information that would present a reasonable possibility that the verdict was influenced to the defendant’s detriment.”
The panel ordered a retrial of Newman, who is serving an indefinite to life sentence.
After the verdict was announced, a juror named SP wrote a statement saying that she thought it was “a very difficult case with little concrete evidence.” SP was inclined to acquit Newman, but one juror, “an attorney for the Colorado Rockies,” was determined to convict him.
According to SP, the lawyer identified as MO returned after a weekend to say he had seen “Twelve Angry Men” and was thinking about the case.
“And then he said, I knew it would be convenient for me to take the bar exam, and he pulled a piece of paper out of his pocket and said something along the lines of character witness,” SP alleged. MO “read this legal definition and then said that because Mr. Newman and his character witness were not interviewed and there were no character witnesses, it is safe to assume that he is a bad guy.”
SP added that MO told jurors that Newman must have committed other crimes – probably a sex offense for police to get his DNA – and that the alleged victim must be telling the truth.
The Lindsey Flanigan Courthouse in Denver.
Without a hearing, the original judge in Newman’s case denied the motion for a retrial. However, another three-judge appellate panel ordered further investigation in 2020. The panel noted that courts generally do not interfere with a jury’s deliberations and that jurors are allowed to draw on their professional and personal experiences. It also stated that juries cannot be influenced by “legal content” outside of the trial that is relevant to the facts in a case.
“In summary, an attorney-juror, like any other juror, must refrain from conducting an independent investigation of any matter of law or fact relevant to the case,” wrote Judge Ted C. Tow III. “But an attorney-juror must also refrain from introducing legal testimony (even from memory) that contradicts or adds to the court’s legal instructions.”
At a 2021 hearing, SP testified before District Judge Jennifer B. Torrington. Her statements were largely consistent with her previous allegations, and she said MO’s comments led other jurors to write that Newman had previously been “arrested” for capital and sex crimes – which was not supported by the evidence.
Torrington declined to order a retrial because MO “had the right to use his training and experience in evaluating evidence” and “was not required to place his preexisting views on the law at the jury room door.” She added that there was “no reasonable possibility” that MO’s legal statements in the jury room would have influenced the verdict.
U.S. Solicitor General Elizabeth B. Prelogar speaks with Colorado Court of Appeals Judge Jaclyn Casey Brown at the Colorado Women’s Bar Association conference at The Hythe luxury resort in Vail on May 18, 2024.
The Second Appellate Panel again sided with Newman. Brown wrote that by reading the definition of character witnesses and then interpreting the absence of character questions as an indication that Newman was “a bad guy,” MO introduced prohibited legal content into the deliberations.
“Juror SP’s testimony suggests that Juror MO – who ‘knew that admission to the bar would benefit him’ – did not rely on his personal legal knowledge but instead conducted outside research and shared the results of that research with other jurors,” Brown stated.
She added that the trial judge’s instructions never told the jury that they could assume Newman was “a bad guy” because of the lack of questions or character witnesses. Moreover, there is no rule that allows the jury to make that assumption.
The only remaining question, Brown wrote, was whether MO’s inappropriate statements, made expressly as a lawyer with legal training, could have persuaded the other jurors to convict.
“In the circumstances of this case, we cannot come to any other conclusion,” she noted.
The case is People v. Newman.
