Title: Ex Parte Nelson
Citation: 595 So. 2d 510
Docket Number: 1901453
State: Alabama
Issuer: Alabama Supreme Court
Date: December 13, 1991

595 So. 2d 510 (1991)
Ex parte Joseph Langston NELSON.
(Re Joseph Langston Nelson v. State).
1901453.

Supreme Court of Alabama.
December 13, 1991.
*511 Eddie Beason of Fine &amp; McDowell, Russellville, for petitioner.
James H. Evans, Atty. Gen., and Yvonne A. Henderson, Asst. Atty. Gen., for respondent.
KENNEDY, Justice.
In Alabama, when a witness takes the stand and swears to tell the truth and then testifies, there is no legal presumption that he or she testifies truthfully. Such an instruction to a jury would constitute error.
The petitioner, Joseph Langston Nelson, was indicted for the offense of attempted murder. Following a jury trial, Nelson was found guilty of the lesser included offense of first degree assault, and he was ultimately sentenced to 20 years' imprisonment. On appeal, the conviction was affirmed by the Court of Criminal Appeals. 595 So. 2d 506.
On Thursday, February 1, 1990, Anthony Winston, the victim, went into the Washington Court housing project in the Reedtown Community of Russellville, Alabama. Upon arrival he was approached by Nelson, who requested a sum of money. Winston refused to give Nelson any money, and left. Later that day Nelson met Winston again and made a similar demand. A dispute ensued, and Winston shoved Nelson from the back. Nelson turned and struck Winston with his fist. He then drew a knife and began swinging it. Nelson admits to swinging the knife and cutting Winston's hand but denies inflicting wounds to his chest. Winston fled the scene and was rushed to a hospital, where he underwent surgery for two puncture wounds to his hand and chest.
At trial, the court charged the jury in pertinent part as follows:
(R. 468).
The Criminal Court of Appeals relied on Williams v. State, 520 So. 2d 179 (Ala.Cr. App.1987), in reaching its decision. In that case, the trial court gave an almost identical jury charge. In deciding Williams, Judge Taylor stated:
520 So. 2d  at 181.
In this case, however, the Court of Criminal Appeals held the charge to be harmless error. Although error, the giving of a charge like the one in this case can be found to be harmless error when viewed in light of the entire charge.
Harris v. State, 412 So. 2d 1278, 1281 (Ala. Cr.App.1982).
Rule 45, A.R.App.P., states in pertinent part:
Several decisions have held that, when a jury was charged that there is a presumption of truthfulness on the part of a sworn witness, the error was harmless. See, in accord, Touart v. State, 562 So. 2d 625 (Ala.Cr.App.1989), Williams v. State, 538 So. 2d 1250 (Ala.Cr.App.1988), and Weaver v. State, 568 So.2d. 309 (Ala.Cr. App.1989). In those cases, however, the trial courts further instructed the jurors that it was their duty to use that presumption to reconcile the testimony. In the case before us, the trial court's instructions contained no such clarifying language.
In this case, as in Williams, the trial court asserts a legal presumption of the truthfulness of a witness's testimony. By erroneously charging the jury that a witness is presumed to tell the truth and then compounding this error by charging the jury that, because Nelson had previously been convicted of a crime involving moral turpitude, there was no longer a presumption that he would tell the truth, the trial court prejudiced Nelson. This constitutes a comment on the weight and credibility of the evidence, which is impermissible. "In charging the jury, it is the duty of the trial judge not to indicate, by the matter or manner of his charge, what his own views are as to the effect of the testimony." C. Gamble, McElroy's Alabama Evidence, § 469.01 (3d ed. 1977); see also Pease v. Montgomery, 333 So. 2d 221 (Ala.Cr.App. 1976); Summerlin v. State, 40 Ala.App. 652, 120 So. 2d 755 (1960); Bertrand v. State, 46 Ala.App. 631, 247 So. 2d 386 (1971); Mays v. State, 45 Ala.App. 337, 230 So. 2d 248 (1970).
Williams v. State, 520 So. 2d 179 (Ala.Cr. App.1987).
We have carefully reviewed the trial court's oral charge to the jury in its entirety. From this review, we conclude that the error was not cured by the entire charge but was compounded and was therefore prejudicial to Nelson. Therefore, we hold that that error "probably injuriously affected substantial rights of the accused." Rule 45, A.R.App.P.
We conclude that once the jury was told that one who takes the oath is presumed to tell the truth, but that this defendant was not presumed to tell the truth, because of a prior felony conviction, no amount of instruction to the contrary could have erased that thought from the minds of the jurors.
REVERSED AND REMANDED.
HORNSBY, C.J., and MADDOX, SHORES, ADAMS and INGRAM, JJ., concur.
STEAGALL, J., concurs in the result.
HOUSTON, J., dissents.
HOUSTON, Justice (dissenting).
The oath and the perjury penalty are "prophylactic rules" of "auxiliary probative policy" that seek "to remove, before the evidence is introduced, such sources of danger and distrust as experience may have shown lurk in it." 4 J. Wigmore, Evidence § 1172 (Chadbourn Rev.1972).
Ex parte Frazier, 562 So. 2d 560, 566 (Ala. 1989).
I think that there is a legal presumption that a witness, who is sworn to tell the truth and who testifies, testifies truthfully. The oath and the penalty for perjury are two prophylactic rules that have been promulgated to assure, and are time-honored in assuring, that truth, "which is the sine qua non of a fair trial,"[1] "will out." I would overrule cases that hold that it is error to instruct a jury that there is a legal presumption that every witness who takes the witness stand and is sworn to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, testifies truthfully.
[1]  Estes v. Texas, 381 U.S. 532, 540, 85 S. Ct. 1628, 1631, 14 L. Ed. 2d 543 (1965).