Opinion ID: 1984499
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: trial court's limitation of lawson's voir dire

Text: Lawson asserts that the trial court committed reversible error by sustaining three objections during his trial attorney's voir dire and, therefore, limiting the scope of questioning in such a way to prevent him from meaningfully exercising his peremptory strikes. The first such error occurred, according to Lawson, when the trial court prevented him from questioning a member of the jury panel regarding his prior jury service: Defense: Have any of you served as jurors before today? Start right here, sir. Your number please. Juror: 23. I, in Ohio, I served as a juror on a case. Defense: What type of case was that, sir? Juror: It was arson, actually. Defense: It was arson. Is there anything about that situation that will affect your judgment here today? Juror: No, it was a very different type of case. Defense: What was the result of that case. Comm: Objection, your honor. Judge: Sustained as to the result. Defense: Anything about that case that will affect your decision? Juror: Absolutely not. Defense: How long ago was that? Juror: Probably about six or seven years ago. Lawson exercised one of his peremptory challenges to remove Juror 23, but argues that the trial court's ruling preventing his counsel from inquiring regarding the verdict in the prior case deprived him of information necessary to make a fully-informed decision regarding whether to excuse the juror. Lawson's second alleged error concerns the trial court's ruling on the Commonwealth's objection to a question his trial counsel asked the potential jurors about their beliefs regarding leniency within the criminal justice system: Defense: Anyone feel the courts are too lenient on a defendant when they set a punishment? Anyone feel that sentences should be longer than they are? Comm.: I'm going to object to this, your Honor. Judge: Sustained as to that question. RCr 9.38 directs trial courts to afford parties a reasonable opportunity to conduct voir dire examination, and, in Thomas v. Commonwealth, [1] we recognized voir dire's instrumental role in garnering information from jurors to be later used in peremptory challenge decisions. [2] Of course, the ability to effectively and intelligently exercise challenges does not justify unlimited voir dire on any topic upon which counsel might wish to probe prospective jurors, and we have granted trial courts discretion to direct the scope of voir dire. [3] We do not believe the trial court abused this discretion. Counsel's questioning revealed that Juror 23 had sat on a jury in a factually distinct arson case a number of years ago in a different jurisdiction which the juror did not believe would have any influence on his decision in this case. Appellant correctly notes that in McGinnis v. Commonwealth [4] this Court affirmed the trial court's finding that the Commonwealth had given a racially-neutral explanation for challenging two jurors who had previously sat on a jury which returned a reckless homicide verdict which [the prosecution] considered pro-defense under the particular circumstances. [5] We cannot agree, however, with Appellant's hasty generalization that a trial court abuses its discretion to control the scope of voir dire whenever it sustains an objection to a question which could potentially provide a racially-neutral explanation for the use of a peremptory challenge. Because parties may, essentially, remove jurors by peremptory challenge for any reason other than race or gender, the entitlement which Appellant attempts to spin from the McGinnis holding would permit unfettered questioning on any topic and strip the trial court of any discretion to control the scope of voir dire. Under the logic of Appellant's argument, every litigant has a right to ask prospective jurors to choose a favorite between Elvis Presley and the Beatles because a party could properly exercise peremptory challenges against Elvis-adverse jurors. The fallacy in Lawson's logic is demonstrated by its complete incompatibility with the discretion we have granted trial courts to control the scope of voir dire. We believe that the trial court acted within its discretion in sustaining the Commonwealth's objection to this question and further find that the trial court's ruling did not prevent Lawson from effectively and intelligently deciding whether to challenge Juror 23. We likewise find no abuse of discretion in the trial court's ruling preventing Appellant from inquiring of the potential jurors' feelings regarding the leniency of criminal punishments. We recognize that we labeled proper a similar question which was posed by the Commonwealth in Iles v. Commonwealth. [6] The fact that a given question might be permissible does not, however, mandate the conclusion that reversible error results whenever a trial court fails to permit itthis is the very nature of discretion. In Mu'Min v. Virginia, [7] the United States Supreme Court clarified that the critical inquiry is not whether the question could be helpful, but whether its denial implicated fundamental fairness: Questions ... might be helpful in assessing whether a juror is impartial. To be constitutionally compelled, however, it is not enough that such questions might be helpful. Rather, the trial court's failure to ask these questions must render the defendant's trial fundamentally unfair. [8] We find no such denial of fundamental fairness in the trial court's ruling. We allowed oral argument in this case primarily to address Lawson's argument that the trial court impermissibly limited his voir dire when it sustained the Commonwealth's objection to questioning concerning the members' ability to impose a sentence within a range of penalties: Defense [9] : The penalty range in this case is Comm.: Objection, your honor. Defense: May we approach? Judge: Yes. [Attorneys for the Commonwealth and the defendants then conferred at the bench] Judge: In bifurcated trials, the first phase is guilt or innocence. The penalty's not a relevant matter. Defense: Judge, there's a string of cases now about five or six years old that say she's allowed to give the range and to ask if they can consider the full range. If they can't consider the full range, they can't sit as a juror. I don't think that she is allowed to ask anything past that. Judge: Go ahead. Go ahead. You may ask. Defense: The penalty range in this case is five years to life. Is there anyone who cannot consider Comm.: I'm going to object to that. Judge: I object. Approach the bench counselors. That is not what the range is in this case. The PFO charge is totally separate. The line of cases, I think, talks about only the initial charges. Defense: I don't, yeah, she cannot mention about PFO, but I mean Judge: That was Defense: But the entire punishment phase will be considered Judge: I don't think that the cases that Mr. Gibbs is talking about says that. I think it talks about only the initial charges. And I think the court should have been advised that that was what you were going to ask. Defense: Judge, I don't have those cases directly in front of me. It'sI'm trying to remember the exact language It'sbut certainly you can't ask about lessers either, so I don't know where that leaves us. Judge: Well, let's see, I'm trying to figure out how Comm.: There's no charge. Judge: She should move on to the next question. Ladies and gentlemen, if you would disregard the last question by counsel who mentioned that particular range of penalties in this case. Lawson's trial counsel then addressed a new line of questioning and did not return to the topic of the penalty range. Defense counsel for Brown did not voir dire the panel on this subject. Lawson contends on appeal that the trial court's ruling prevented him from questioning members of the panel to determine if they could consider the full range of possible penalties. We conclude that Lawson's failure to propose a question which properly defined the appropriate penalty range presents no properly preserved error for our review. We nevertheless feel this is an appropriate opportunity to revisit Shields v. Commonwealth [10] and its progeny in order to establish parameters for proper penalty-range voir dire in non-capital cases. In Shields , we held that trial courts must allow voir dire questioning of prospective jury members to assess their abilities to consider the range of permissible penalties in the event the trial proceeded to a sentencing phase: It is true that our current criminal trial procedure generally precludes the jury from hearing purely `sentencing information' during the guilt or innocence phase of a trial, [but] it does not absolutely preclude their being given some information of that type incidental to a proper voir dire examination. In order to be qualified to sit as a juror in a criminal case, a member of the venire must be able to consider any permissible punishment. If he cannot, then he properly may be challenged for cause. This type of questioning, of course, must come before the guilt or innocence phase since there is no separate voir dire thereafter but before the punishment phase. [11] At oral argument, the Commonwealth urged this Court to reconsider Shields and hold that penalty-range voir dire is required only in capital cases. We remain convinced that, in all criminal cases, the right to a fair and impartial jury requires the jury to possess the ability to consider the full range of penalties, and we decline the Commonwealth's invitation. Although we find it easy to resolve the question of whether penalty-range voir dire is necessary in non-capital cases, we have struggled for almost a decade with the question of how this inquiry should be conducted. In Shields itself we recognized that trial courts must be wary of the possibility of prejudice: Of course, care must be exercised to assure that information unduly prejudicial to either side is not introduced into the voir dire examination unnecessarily or by subterfuge for the real purpose of influencing the jury prematurely. For example, it would be impermissible for the Commonwealth at that stage to attempt to inform the jury of a defendant's prior criminal record or the fact that there would be a persistent felony offender count to be tried if there were a guilty verdict as to the underlying offense. [12] The Shields majority suggested that penalty-range qualification questions should integrate the possibility of PFO enhancement into the penalty range described to the jury: In the case at bar, the record shows that defense counsel was prevented by the in limine ruling from telling the jury that the range of punishment would be imprisonment for ten to twenty years. The ruling was correct, since, as indicated by the final sentence, this was not the correct permissible range of punishment; it was twenty years to life, by reason of the PFO count. If the trial court had permitted defense counsel to discuss the range of punishment as requested, then, in fairness, the prosecution should also have been permitted during its questioning to explain that, under certain circumstances in the case, the range of punishment could be from twenty years' to life imprisonment. [13] In cases decided subsequent to Shields , we have attempted to further define the scope of permissible voir dire regarding the penalty range. In Snodgrass v. Commonwealth, [14] we held that the trial court properly prevented defense counsel from informing the prospective jury members during voir dire that the Department of Corrections would determine the defendant's parole eligibility under the violent offender statute. In McCarthy v. Commonwealth, [15] we addressed the appellant's improperly preserved issue concerning whether the trial court erred in allowing voir dire as to the penalty range for the underlying offense without PFO enhancement. The McCarthy Court noted that the defendant received the minimum sentence and, therefore, found no error in the trial court's ruling. [16] In Samples v. Commonwealth, [17] we found that the trial court properly exercised its discretion when it allowed the Commonwealth to factor the possibility of lesser included misdemeanor offenses into its description of the permissible penalty range: During voir dire, the prosecutor told prospective jurors that appellant faced a penalty range of one day to life in prison. Appellant objected because the minimum penalty for the charges in the indictment was one year, not one day. The trial court overruled the objection, concluding that with the potential for instructions on lesser included offenses, the prosecutor's statement was not a misrepresentation of the possible range of punishments. ... Shields is distinguishable from the case at bar because it involved an attempt to ask prospective jurors about an impermissible penalty range. Here, the prosecutor told the jurors of a possible minimum penalty, and indeed the jury was ultimately instructed on the misdemeanor offense of second degree unlawful imprisonment. While the voir dire question bordered on exaggeration and tended toward trivialization, there was no direct misrepresentation of the permissible range of punishment. There was no Shields violation and the trial court's denial of appellant's motion was proper. [18] We recognize the difficulty trial courts and attorneys have experienced in defining penalty ranges in such a way as to avoid prejudice to either party and still gather meaningful information about whether jury members can consider the full range of penalties. We observe that the confusion regarding how to pose penalty-range questions during voir dire in non-capital cases remains despite a number of opinions by this Court on the subject, and we suspect the uncertainty stems from the inherent limitations of ad hoc appellate determinations. We have reviewed our previous opinions on this topic and reexamined the value judgments made in those opinions and now hope to finally resolve these questions. Essentially, the question before the Court is how the possible range of penalties should be described to potential jurors during voir dire examination. Conceptually, we must decide how much information to give jurors before asking if they can consider the full range of penalties. Initially, we observe that there are significant opportunity costs both to overgeneralizing the inquiry and to overloading the jury with information. We have little confidence that questioning will identify jurors who can actually consider the full range of penalties if we give them no inkling of what those penalties might be and simply inquire whether they will follow the trial court's instructions during the penalty phase. [19] On the other hand, in order to maximize our confidence in the jurors' ability to consider the full range of penalties in the case, we could, in some manner, communicate the possibility of convictions for lesser-included offenses, including misdemeanor offenses, the possibility of PFO-enhancement, and explain the operation of concurrent and consecutive sentencing. The risks associated with such an approach would include: (1) overemphasis of a probabilistic sentencing phase; (2) de-emphasis of jurors' abilities to consider the penalty range by conveying the impression that the jury would enjoy largely unfettered sentencing discretion; [20] (3) implicit disclosure of the defendant's prior criminal record in any attempt to address the topic of PFO enhancement; and (4) a substantial risk of misinformation inherent in any attempt to define penalty ranges for lesser included offenses before the presentation of evidence. There is no perfect way to define the penalty range. Any attempt to maximize the ability to identify those jurors capable of considering the full range of penalties by exposing them to additional sentencing information linearly increases the risk of prejudice. Accordingly, we must strike a balance which maximizes the fundamental fairness of the proceeding by weighing the importance of selecting a fair and impartial jury against the fairness concerns implicated by the information overload approach. We feel that interests of fairness, uniformity, and certainty require that this balance be struck by this Court. After much reflection, we believe voir dire should examine jurors' ability to consider only the penalty ranges for the individual indicted offenses without PFO enhancement. Affirmative answers to such questions allow substantial confidence in jurors' abilities to consider the full range of penalties without potentially misleading them or otherwise prejudicing the defendant. Accordingly, we hold that in all non-capital criminal cases where a party or the trial court wishes to voir dire the jury panel regarding its ability to consider the full range of penalties for each indicted offense, the questioner should define the penalty range in terms of the possible minimum and maximum sentences for each class of offensei.e., a fine of not more than $250.00 for a violation, a term of imprisonment of not more than ninety (90) days and/or a fine of not more than $250.00 for a Class B misdemeanor and not more than twelve (12) months and/or a fine of not more than $500.00 for a Class A misdemeanor, or a term of imprisonment of one (1) to five (5) years for a Class D felony, five (5) to ten (10) years for a Class C felony, ten (10) to twenty (20) years for a Class B felony, and twenty (20) years to life imprisonment for a Class A felony or a capital offense for which the death penalty is not authorized. We overrule Shields , McCarthy , and Samples to the extent they hold otherwise. In the case now before the Court, we find no reversible error in the trial court's ruling. By conglomerating the charges, Lawson's trial counsel misstated the possible range of penalties even under Shields . Lawson's trial counsel defined the possible penalties in this case as ranging from five years to life. Although this definition properly characterizes the maximum possible penalty either for the indicted offense of second degree arson, if enhanced by PFO, or the maximum penalty to which convictions on both offenses, if enhanced by PFO, could aggregate, it misled the jury with respect to the minimum sentence. The jury could only sentence Lawson to five years if it found him guilty of the second degree burglary charge (a Class C felony with a penalty range of between five (5) and ten (10) years), but not guilty as to both the second degree arson charge (a Class B felony with a penalty range of between (10) and twenty (20) years) and the PFO indictment. Lawson's trial counsel's definition did not properly state either the appropriate penalty range for any individual offense or the possible functional penalty range to which convictions on the two indicted offenses could aggregate. We also believe Lawson mischaracterizes the trial court's ruling with regard to the permissible scope of voir dire on the panel's ability to consider the full range of penalties. The trial court, rather than prohibiting Lawson's trial counsel from any further questioning on this subject, merely limited the voir dire to whether the jury could consider the full range of penalties for the indicted offenses without enhancement by PFO. Prior to counsel's definition of the penalty range, the trial court appears to have overruled the Commonwealth's objection to voir dire regarding the penalty range. After counsel misdefined the possible penalty range, the trial court instructed counsel to move on to the next question, and admonished the jury to disregard the last question by counsel who mentioned that particular range of penalties in this case. We find that the trial court's ruling correctly prevented Lawson's trial counsel from misinforming the jury regarding the available penalty range, but did not prohibit her from questioning the panel regarding its ability to impose a penalty within the range available for the indicted offenses. As Lawson made no further effort in the trial court to voir dire the panel on the correct penalty range, his argument hinges on speculation that the trial court would not have permitted him to ask questions he wished to ask, and he has not preserved this error for our review. [21]