Electronically Filed Supreme Court SCAP-13-0000029 21-DEC-2015 08:48 AM
*** NOT FOR PUBLICATION IN WEST’S HAWAI#I REPORTS AND PACIFIC REPORTER *** Electronically Filed Supreme Court SCAP-13-0000029 21-DEC-2015 08:48 AM SCAP-13-0000029 IN THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF HAWAI#I STATE OF HAWAI#I, Plaintiff-Appellee, vs. FAALAGA TOMA, Defendant-Appellant. APPEAL FROM THE CIRCUIT COURT OF THE FIRST CIRCUIT (CAAP-13-0000029; CR. NO. 11-1-0452) MEMORANDUM OPINION (By: Recktenwald, C.J., Nakayama, McKenna, and Pollack, JJ., and Circuit Judge Nacino, in place of Wilson, J., recused) Part I (By: Nakayama, J., with whom Recktenwald, C.J., and Circuit Judge Nacino, join, and Pollack, J., dissenting separately, with whom McKenna, J., joins) Part II (By: Pollack, J., with whom Recktenwald, C.J., and McKenna, J., join, and Nakayama, J., dissenting separately, with whom Circuit Judge Nacino J., joins) INTRODUCTION This appeal arises out of defendant-appellant Faalaga Toma’s (Toma) conviction of assault in the second degree in the Circuit Court of the First Circuit (circuit court). Toma was *** NOT FOR PUBLICATION IN WEST’S HAWAI#I REPORTS AND PACIFIC REPORTER *** charged with assault in the second degree on April 5, 2011. At the end of trial, the circuit court allowed the jury to be instructed with accomplice liability over the defense’s objection, and the jury found Toma guilty as an accomplice to the assault. On appeal, Toma argues that the circuit court erred in giving the complicity instruction because the felony information charged him as a principal and did not give him adequate notice that he could be convicted as an accomplice.
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