STATE v. KANNEH (2026)

[¶1] Momo Kanneh appeals from a criminal judgment entered after a jury found him guilty of continuous sexual abuse of a child under N.D.C.C. § 12.1-20-03.1(1). He argues the district court coerced the jury's verdict by giving a supplemental instruction patterned on Allen v. United States, 164 U.S. 492, 17 S.Ct. 154, 41 L.Ed. 528 (1896), after the jury reported during deliberations that it was deadlocked.

[¶2] Whether a jury's verdict was coerced depends on the totality of the circumstances. State v. Knight, 2023 ND 130, ¶ 9, 993 N.W.2d 528. A supplemental instruction directing the jury to continue deliberating is not coercive when it includes an offsetting instruction reminding jurors not to surrender their honest convictions, and a court's unsolicited awareness of a jury's numerical division does not make an otherwise proper instruction presumptively coercive. Id. at ¶¶ 8, 12–13. The instruction here included that cautionary language, and the court learned of the jury's division only because the jury volunteered it. The totality of the circumstances does not show a coerced verdict. We summarily affirm under N.D.R.App.P. 35.1(a)(7). State v. Knight, 2023 ND 130, 993 N.W.2d 528.

Per Curiam.

[¶3] Lisa Fair McEvers, C.J. Jerod E. Tufte Jon J. Jensen Douglas A. Bahr Mark A. Friese