Source: http://masscases.com/cases/app/3/3massappct489.html
Timestamp: 2019-04-23 21:51:45+00:00

Document:
COMMONWEALTH vs. JEFFREY F. BREGNARD.
INDICTMENT found and returned in the Superior Court on February 15, 1973.
The case was tried before Linscott, J.
Daniel F. Toomey for the defendant.
364 Mass. 87 , 101-102 (1973) (decided before the trial of this case) and the denial of his motion to poll the jury.
The jury began its deliberations at approximately 2:15 P.M. on June 6, 1974, the fourth day of trial. At 8:30 P.M. the jury was recalled by the trial judge, and he read them the Tuey charge, as modified in the Rodriquez case (the Tuey-Rodriquez charge). He read it practically verbatim but with a deletion and some added explanation.
". . . and if the greater number of you are for a conviction, what this says is the lesser or the fewer should reconsider their position, and vice versa." He objects particularly to the use of the shorthand "vice versa" in stating the alternative. We disapprove this seemingly perfunctory treatment, but we do not believe that the jury could have failed to grasp its import -- that it was addressed to the possibility that a majority might be for acquittal. It thus did not have, as the defendant argues, the flaw of Commonwealth v. Brown, 367 Mass. 24 , 32 (1975), in which the charge gave "the impression that acquittal was not a real alternative"; nor did it vitiate the rest of the charge.
We take this occasion to point out the danger in departing from the Tuey-Rodriquez charge as set out in Commonwealth v. Rodriquez, supra. Whether the Supreme Judicial Court will ultimately insist that there be no variation whatsoever from it or from the illustrative charge in Section 5.4 of the ABA Standards Relating to Trial by Jury, set out in Commonwealth v. Rodriquez at 102-103 (Appendix B), which is suggested as an alternative, we cannot say. In general, we cannot see any reason for any variation or amplification of the Tuey-Rodriquez charge. Further, "[s]uch departures impose on appellate courts the almost impossible task of weighing the prejudicial impact of a variation of the approved charge." United States v. Flannery, 451 F. 2d 880, 883 (1st Cir. 1971). "The impact can never be assessed accurately, for the relevant events take place in the secrecy of the jury room, and never appear in the trial record. For us to become involved, at this point, in gauging the coerciveness of various Allen -- [Tuey-Rodriquez] type renditions would be to launch us on an unnecessary voyage in judicial review." United States v. Angiulo, 485 F. 2d 37 (1st Cir. 1973). But we cannot say that special circumstances may not arise which might justify a trial judge, in determining, after careful consideration, that some amplification or (as is less likely) some variation is appropriate.
Trial by Jury, Section 5.5, providing that "[t]he jury shall be polled at the request of any party or upon the court's own motion."
[Note 1] The district attorney was not permitted to argue since he had not submitted a brief prior to oral argument. A thorough brief and oral argument by the district attorney would have been helpful to the court.
[Note 2] See Huffman v. United States, 297 F. 2d 754, 759 (5th Cir. 1962), dissenting opinion quoted in ABA Standards Relating to Trial by Jury, Section 5.4 (b) p. 151 (Approved Draft 1968): "I think a mistrial from a hung jury is a safeguard to liberty. In many areas it is the sole means by which one or a few may stand out against an overwhelming contemporary public sentiment. Nothing should interfere with its exercise."
[Note 3] The last sentence of the Tuey-Rodriquez charge reads: "And, on the other hand, jurors for conviction ought seriously to ask themselves, whether they may not reasonably doubt the correctness of a judgment, which is not concurred in by others with whom they are associated"; the omitted clause reads: "and distrust the weight or sufficiency of that evidence which fails to carry conviction to the minds of their fellows."
[Note 4] We have examined the defendant's subsidiary contentions and find them without merit. Further, no exception was taken to the action of the trial judge (of which the defendant now complains) in recalling the jury after six and one quarter hours. In any event, that was a matter of discretion. Commonwealth v. Rollins, 354 Mass. 630 , 638 (1968). Commonwealth v. Moore, 359 Mass. 509 , 516 (1971). Commonwealth v. Brunelle, 361 Mass. 6 , 12 (1972). See Commonwealth v. Rodriquez, 364 Mass. 87 , 97-98 (1973). We cannot say the discretion was abused. But see the Rollins case, supra ("It [the charge] should not be employed prematurely or indiscriminately") and the Rodriquez case, supra, at 100 ("Still, the charge has a sting, and our approval of it is not to be taken as an indication that it may be used prematurely or without evident cause"). Nor can we say in the circumstances of this case that the lapse of ten minutes from the Tuey-Rodriquez charge to the jury's return of its verdict was indicative of coercion. Compare Commonwealth v. Brunelle, supra, at 12; Commonwealth v. Moore, supra, at 516.

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