ANNQUASIA WATSON v. STATE OF DELAWARE
No. 237, 2024
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE
Court Below-Superior Court of the State of Delaware, Cr. ID No. 2206005032 (N)
Submitted: March 10, 2025; Decided: May 6, 2025
Before VALIHURA, TRAYNOR, and LEGROW, Justices.
After consideration of the no-merit brief and motion to withdraw filed by the appellant‘s counsel under
(1) In February 2023, a Superior Court grand jury indicted the appellant, Annquasia Watson, on two counts of possession of a firearm by a person prohibited (“PFBPP“), one count of PFBPP while in possession of a controlled substance, one count of possession of marijuana, and one count of possession of ammunition by a person prohibited (“PABPP“).
(2) The State called three witnesses at trial: Wilmington Police Department (“WPD“) Detective Leonard Moses; Gerald Nagowski, a ballistics officer for the
(3) In mid-May, officers obtained a warrant to search Apartment 3. When they arrived to execute the search warrant on May 17, Watson was seated in a brown Ford Fusion parked in front of the stairwell to Apartment 3. During the execution of the search warrant, officers found a loaded Taurus 9 mm firearm, a bag of marijuana, bank paperwork with Watson‘s name on it, female clothing, and a loaded Kimber Micro 9 mm firearm in the bedroom that they believed to be Watson‘s. Watson was not immediately charged for any crime because Detective Moses was hopeful that she would provide the WPD with information related to an ongoing investigation, and Detective Moses acknowledged that he expressed frustration with Watson‘s failure to do so when he encountered Watson ten days later on May 27.
(4) Detective Moses sent the firearms to the Evidence Detection Unit for testing, intending to have the firearms tested for operability as well as DNA and fingerprint evidence. Detective Moses failed, however, to fill out the preprinted
(5) At the close of its case, the State submitted a stipulation signed by the parties acknowledging that Watson is a person prohibited by Delaware law from possession or controlling a firearm, deadly weapon, or ammunition. Watson elected not to testify, and the defense rested. Over the State‘s objection, the Superior Court granted Watson‘s request for a missing-evidence instruction and instructed the jury that the State had failed to preserve evidence from the firearms when they were initially collected and that the State‘s failure to do so entitled Watson to an inference that the missing evidence was exculpatory.
(6) The jury found Watson guilty of the charges related to the Kimber firearm-one count of PFBPP and PABPP-but acquitted her of charges related to
(7) On appeal, counsel has filed a brief and a motion to withdraw under (8) The standard and scope of review applicable to the consideration of a motion to withdraw and an accompanying brief under (9) Watson has submitted 22 enumerated “points for consideration.” Her arguments may be fairly summarized as follows: (i) the evidence was insufficient to support her convictions; (ii) Officer Moses was not a credible witness and perjured himself; (iii) the State violated its obligation under Jencks v. United States;4 and (iv) trial counsel was ineffective. After careful review, we find no merit in Watson‘s arguments. (10) In support of her argument that the evidence was insufficient to sustain her convictions, Watson argues, among other things, that “[t]he location of my possessions in the same area as the firearm is not sufficient to establish that I knew the location of the firearms,” and that her case is similar to State v. Deputy,5 where the Superior Court found that the evidence was insufficient to support a finding of constructive possession and granted the defendant‘s motion for judgment of (11) Here, the record does not support Watson‘s claim that the evidence was insufficient to support her convictions related to the loaded Kimber firearm. The evidence presented at trial showed, among other things: (i) over a several-week period, surveilling officers had observed Watson conducting routine household chores as she came and went from Apartment 3; (ii) Watson was outside Apartment 3 when the search warrant was executed; (iii) the police found female clothing and paperwork addressed to Watson in a bedroom in Apartment 3; (iv) the police found (12) Watson‘s reliance on Deputy is misplaced. There, the State relied merely on the presence of the defendant‘s possessions near the firearm to establish constructive possession. But there was no evidence that Deputy had been in the apartment when the firearm was present, there was minimal evidence tying him to the apartment, and, notably, there was no DNA evidence linking him to the firearm. Here, we find that the State presented sufficient evidence upon which a rational jury could rely to find that Watson constructively possessed the Kimber firearm and was therefore guilty of PFBPP and PABPP.10 We also note that the jury, which acquitted Watson of charges involving the Taurus firearm, apparently gave great weight to the State‘s forensic evidence and little, if any, weight to the circumstantial evidence that arguably supported a finding that Watson constructively possessed both firearms. (13) Watson cites portions of Officer Moses‘s testimony that she believes are inconsistent and argues that Officer Moses‘s “credibility is shot.”11 The record (14) Watson next argues that the State failed to disclose evidence in violation of its discovery obligation under Jencks, which requires the government to provide to the defense prior recorded statements of its witnesses “touching the subject matter of their testimony at trial,” but only after the witness has testified on direct examination.13 Watson‘s argument is premised on her belief that the State did not disclose footage from the body camera Officer Moses was wearing when he and she interacted on May 27-footage that Watson believes would have contradicted his testimony at trial. The existence of that body camera footage was discovered by the State on the eve of trial and discussed by the parties at a November 27, 2023 pre-trial conference. At the time of the conference, the prosecutor had not yet reviewed (15) Finally, Watson argues that trial counsel‘s performance was deficient. Ineffective-assistance-of-counsel claims are generally not cognizable on direct appeal,15 and we see no reason to depart from that general rule here. (16) The Court has reviewed the record carefully and has concluded that Watson‘s appeal is wholly without merit and devoid of any arguably appealable issues. We are also satisfied that Watson‘s counsel has made a conscientious effort to examine the record and the law and has properly determined that Watson could not raise a meritorious claim in this appeal. BY THE COURT: /s/ Gary F. Traynor Justice