STATE OF CONNECTICUT v. LUIZ ROMAN, SC 20993

Judicial District of Bridgeport

Criminal; Murder; Accessory; Whether Jury Properly Instructed that Defendant Could be Found Guilty as Accessory to Murder When Charged as Principal; Prosecutorial Impropriety. On November 20, 2019, the victim, Miguel Afzal, who was forty-two years old, disabled, and lived with his parents, packed his gaming system and went to play video games with the defendant, Luiz Roman, at the defendant's house in Bridgeport. The victim later reported to his father that he was going to stay overnight. The next morning, the defendant and the victim called his father and said that the defendant would walk the victim part of the way home and that the victim would ride the defendant's bicycle the remainder. When the victim did not return home, his mother called the police. On November 25, 2019, the defendant and his acquittance, Robert Perez, returned the victim's bag and gaming system to his father, and they told him that they last saw the victim at a bus station. The police interviewed the defendant, who stated that he had smoked marijuana with the victim and Perez on the morning of November 21 and that, after they left his house, Perez had departed to go to work while the other two continued walking. According to the defendant, someone started to antagonize the victim, and he urged the victim to keep walking as the defendant headed off to work. The victim's cell phone provider led the police to his body in an abandoned factory with a single gunshot to the head. Shortly after the murder, in December, 2019, the defendant moved to Ohio to live with his cousin and her husband, Jose Cruz. Over one year later, on January 27, 2021, Cruz called the police to report that the defendant had confessed to him. The police arrested the defendant and charged him with one count of murder. At trial, Cruz testified that, in January, 2020, the defendant had told him that "there was a problem" among himself, the victim, and "another guy," and that "they [took] the guy . . . to the factory [where] they have him kneel and, then, they shoot him in the head." Cruz' testimony, however, was equivocal about whether the defendant was the shooter, and the state requested that the jury be instructed on accessorial liability under General Statutes § 53a-8 (a). The defendant objected, arguing that he lacked notice that he could be liable as an accessory, as the state alleged in the operative information that the defendant "did shoot with a firearm and cause the death" of the victim. The court overruled the objection, reasoning that a "defendant is on notice when he is charged as a principal that he may be convicted as an accessory." The jury found the defendant guilty, from which he brings this appeal to the Supreme Court pursuant to General Statutes § 51-199 (b) (3), arguing that "the record clearly refutes the state and the trial court's determinations that [Cruz' testimony] supported the accessorial liability instruction," as Cruz also testified that the defendant was the shooter. Furthermore, he argues that the instruction was prejudicial because it "limited fodder" for his closing argument. In the alternative, the defendant argues that the instruction violated the state constitution and that his conviction should be "automatically reversed" under State v. Chapman (227 Conn. 616), which held that the state constitution prohibits a jury instruction "on a statutory alternative for which there is no evidence." On reconsideration, however, the court (229 Conn. 529) found no state constitutional violation and concluded that harmless error analysis applied. The defendant also argues that there were "material improprieties" during closing argument, depriving him of a fair trial. The state responds, among other things, that the defendant's instructional error claim is not reviewable because he did not claim before the trial court that the evidence did not support the charge, but, rather, that he lacked notice.