Opinion ID: 2460345
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Prejudice: Were Substantial Rights Affected?

Text: Nevertheless, as our discussion has revealed, the jail clothing taint on this trial does not mean that a mistrial must be declared. Typically, after finding a fundamental failure in the proceeding, a trial court would assess the prejudicial effect. Here, however, the trial court did not find error or misconduct and, therefore, did not determine whether curative instructions or admonitions were warranted and did not gauge the prejudice caused by the error. In cases such as this, where an appellate court finds that the trial court erred in its first step of analysis regarding whether there is a fundamental failure in a proceeding and consequently did not make a prejudice assessment, the appellate court may undertake the second step without benefit of the trial court's assessment. The role of the appellate court in this circumstance is to review the entire record and determine de novo if a trial court's error was harmless. K.S.A. 60-2105. This is a role an appellate court frequently undertakes, and K.S.A. 60-261 and K.S.A. 60-2105 or else Chapman, 386 U.S. 18, 87 S.Ct. 824, provide the tools for this assessment. In applying those tools, the Court of Appeals imposed the burden of production on Ward, i.e., required Ward to come forward with evidence, and, without stating the level of certainty required, applied the substantial rights threshold, citing State v. Albright, 283 Kan. 418, 425-26, 153 P.3d 497 (2007); see K.S.A. 60-261. If a right guaranteed by the United States Constitution is implicated, as Ward suggests, both the trial court and the Court of Appeals should have applied the federal constitutional harmless error standard (beyond a reasonable doubt/reasonable possibility threshold) and imposed the burden of production on the State. In assessing whether the Court of Appeals erred in this regard, we note that courts from other jurisdictions have generally not found the presumption of innocence to be implicated when the individual wearing the jail clothing was someone other than the defendant. A trend is not as clear with regard to whether the due process right to a fair trial has been infringed, however. Nevertheless, we conclude that the right to a fair trial and the right to a presumption of innocence as guaranteed by the Sixth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution are implicated when individuals in jail clothing are identified to the jury as associates of a defendant. This means Chapman should have been applied by the Court of Appeals when assessing prejudice and will be applied by this court in determining if the error was harmless. Again, under this standard, the error may be declared harmless where the State, as the party benefitting from the error, proves beyond a reasonable doubt that the error complained of did not affect substantial rights, meaning there is not a reasonable possibility that the error contributed to the verdict obtained. We recognize that imposing that burden on the State at this point changes the rule because, as noted, past Kansas cases have placed the burden of establishing prejudice on the defendant in mistrial cases. This shift in burden is of no consequence in this case, however, because the State presented arguments as to why there was no prejudice. These arguments are consistent with those made in the cases we have discussed in which courts found it harmless to have a nonwitness in the courtroom in jail clothing. It is significant that in some of those cases, the appellate court applied the higher level of certainty and still found the presence of a nonwitness in jail clothing to be harmless. We do not read these cases as basing this decision solely on the fact that the conduct in question occurred outside the witness stand. To this extent the cases are consistent with Kansas precedent, which has rejected such a distinction. See, e.g., State v. Leaper, 291 Kan. 89, 96-97, 238 P.3d 266 (2010) (mistrial requested after juror reported seeing witness take offered exhibit and place in pocket while leaving courtroom; fact that witness' negative behavior occurred in courtroom rather than on witness stand was not dispositive on question of whether mistrial should have been granted); State v. Foster, 290 Kan. 696, 718, 233 P.3d 265 (2010) (mistrial requested after defendant's weeping father left courtroom during rape victim's testimony). Rather, it appears to be that other factorssuch as the strength of the evidence against the defendant and an attenuated or unexplained connection between the individual's incarceration and the charged crimesweigh against a finding of prejudice. Considering those factors, although West was identified as a coconspirator of Ward, there was never any statement that he had been found guilty of that charge. Further, Ward's own arguments attempted to point a finger at West or others to suggest that while Ward was present at the scene of the crimes she was not directly involved in the cocaine sales. In addition, Ward raised the possibility of misidentification. For example, defense counsel implied there was a mistake when Ward was identified in a photo lineup and suggested reasonable doubt arose because Ward and her daughter, Jackson, looked very similar in the photo lineup. One could even conclude that the presence of West and Jackson during transactions benefitted the defense's theory, which focused on the officers' admissions that they never saw Ward physically hand over the drugs to Stinnett, in an attempt to suggest someone else made the sales. Also, the defense at least attempted to imply that the similar appearance of Ward and Jackson could lead to misidentification. Finally, the State presented substantial direct and circumstantial evidence connecting Ward to four separate drug transactions. We are convinced beyond a reasonable doubt that the State has met its burden of proof in showing that the witnesses' identification of West and Jackson dressed in jail clothing did not affect the outcome of the trial.