Because a Logan County judge did not clear up confusion among the jury, the Court of Appeals has ordered a new trial for a man convicted of child abuse.

The Colorado Supreme Court upheld the two convictions of Michael W. Struckmeyer last fall, after he argued that the jury could not have found him guilty on one charge of knowingly abusing a child, and at the same time convicting him of negligently abusing a child. A majority of justices found that while acting both “knowingly” and “negligently” may be “logically inconsistent,” the two concepts were legally consistent.

However, Struckmeyer’s appeal contained another issue: that the trial court did not clearly answer a question from the jury when they indicated they were confused about the legal definitions of the crimes.

During deliberations, jurors sent a question to District Court Judge Charles M. Hobbs. “There is some confusion on the definitions of ‘knowing or recklessly’ and ‘with criminal negligence.’ Please elaborate and explain these to us,” the question read in part.

Under the jury instruction about the two mental states, knowingly means to be aware that some conduct will likely cause a certain outcome, while criminal negligence means a failure to perceive a risk.

Hobbs, as well as the prosecution and the defense, agreed that he could not elaborate further. He subsequently admitted that the answer would be “entirely unsatisfying” to the jury. That proved to be true, as the jury soon had another question: What if they could agree on one charge but not the other?

Hobbs spoke to the foreperson, who explained that jurors were having trouble with the charge of “knowing” child abuse. The judge referred the jury back to the written instructions “and their own life experiences,” according to the Court of Appeals. Thirty minutes later, the jury returned with its two guilty verdicts.

A three-member appellate panel decided on Thursday that Hobbs’s intervention was insufficient.

“Because the jury did not understand central elements to the offenses charged, we conclude the trial court had an obligation to clarify them,” wrote Judge Gilbert M. Román. 

The jury’s confusion over a key element of the crime cast doubt, in the appellate court’s opinion, on the reliability of the verdict. As such, the panel ordered a new trial.

Justice Richard L. Gabriel, the only member of the Supreme Court who believed it was illogical for a jury to convict someone for knowing and negligent conduct simultaneously, likewise worried about the reliability of jury verdicts in this circumstance.

“When, however, a defendant is convicted of two crimes requiring the jury to have found the existence of mutually exclusive elements, the defendant cannot be said to have been convicted of each crime beyond a reasonable doubt,” he wrote in a related case last year.

The case is People v. Struckmeyer.