Can prosecutors request jury instructions on any offense supported by the charging document? State v. Carruth Explained

In State v. Carruth, the Utah Supreme Court addressed a fundamental question about when prosecutors may request jury instructions on lesser-included offenses. The Court’s decision reinforces Utah’s strict approach to lesser-included offense instructions and rejects the more flexible standards adopted by some other jurisdictions.

Background and Facts: Carruth rented a van for four days but kept it for over six weeks, taking it to Nevada despite agreeing to use it only in Utah. The State charged him with theft, a second-degree felony. At trial, the prosecution requested and received a jury instruction on felony joyriding, even though it was not charged. The jury convicted Carruth of felony joyriding. The Utah Court of Appeals vacated that conviction and entered a conviction for misdemeanor joyriding instead.

Key Legal Issues: The central question was whether the trial court properly instructed on felony joyriding at the State’s request. This required the Court to determine what standard governs prosecutor-requested lesser-included offense instructions—whether Utah should follow the strict “necessarily-included offense” test from State v. Baker or adopt the more permissive “charging document” approach used in other jurisdictions.

Court’s Analysis and Holding: The Court reaffirmed Baker‘s holding that prosecutors may only request instructions on offenses whose statutory elements are necessarily included within the charged offense. The Court rejected the State’s argument for adopting a “charging document” standard that would allow instructions on any offense supported by facts in the charging document. Under Utah Rule of Criminal Procedure 21(e) and the necessarily-included offense doctrine, felony joyriding was not a proper lesser-included offense of theft because it contains temporal elements (the 24-hour requirement) not required for theft.

Practice Implications: This decision maintains Utah’s restrictive approach to prosecutor-requested lesser-included offense instructions. Prosecutors must ensure that every element of a proposed lesser offense is necessarily included in the charged offense’s elements, regardless of what facts the charging document alleges. The decision protects defendants from being convicted of crimes they weren’t adequately noticed to defend against, even when the charging document might provide factual notice of the conduct underlying the lesser offense.