Opinion ID: 2315619
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: rulings during trial

Text: Brown asserts error in the denial of his motion for a mistrial after the trial judge sustained his objection to a question asked Brown by the prosecutor during his cross-examination while testifying in his own defense. The question was, How soon after the Delhagen job were you involved in another armed robbery? Brown contends that he was entitled to a mistrial because the prosecutor by the question was attempting improperly to show that Brown had committed criminal acts for which he had not been convicted and which were not connected in any way with the indictment for murder on which he was being tried, and that the evidence did not fall within any exception to the rule making such testimony ordinarily inadmissible, citing State v. DePaola, 5 N.J. 1 (1950). But Brown's testimony on his direct examination was that he had abandoned the common scheme of robbing Delhagen when he saw all the blood and everything, and that he had become nervous and sick at the sight of Delhagen's blood. Immediately before the question at issue he had answered the prosecutor that the shame he felt during the robbery and murder was not alone for his part in what was happening to Delhagen but for both the robbery and the murder. The trial judge might thus well have viewed the question to be proper upon the authority of State v. Barth, 114 N.J.L. 112 ( E. & A. 1935), where it was held that a defendant, on trial for murder committed in attempting a robbery, who testified that after the homicide he suffered from remorse, was properly cross-examined to show that within a month thereafter he was involved in five other robberies. In any event, after sustaining the objection and after extended argument upon the motion for mistrial, outside the presence of the jury, the trial judge summoned the jury back to the court room and stated: I charge you now, as emphatically as I know how, to disregard that all together. It hasn't a thing to do with the trial of this case. The court has ruled in favor of the defendant Brown in connection with that question. He need not answer it. So it is not evidence and you will disregard it. We think this instruction clearly sufficed in the circumstances. Brown also alleges error in the overruling of his objections to two questions put to him, concerning his whereabouts the night before his arrest, upon his cross-examination while on the stand when the voluntariness of his confession was under consideration. The questions were: Were you at Deal police headquarters?, to which Brown answered, No, I was not, and Were you in the custody of any police officers during that time, county detectives or any other enforcement authorities?, and again the answer was, No, I was not. Brown argues that the questions contain a harmful insinuation prejudicial to his rights, despite his negative answers, that Brown had been implicated in other crimes and that Brown prior to his arrest had been doing something for which he should have been in the Deal Police Headquarters. We think from our examination of the full context of the testimony in which the questions appear that the inference is most strained. In any event, the questions were clearly proper, as the trial court ruled, to test the credibility of Brown's claim on his direct examination that he had spent that night at home sleeping. Vaszorich contends that he was prejudiced by the action of the trial judge in interrupting his counsel's opening to the jury to press counsel to state his defense. We have examined the colloquy at that point and perceive no impropriety of the trial judge in the circumstances.