Opinion ID: 2123816
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: proof beyond all possible doubt

Text: Subsequent to Cage, other courts have upheld instructions containing the language which Gatson challenges. In U.S. v. Harris, 974 F.2d 84 (8th Cir.1992), the instruction at issue was used. It was taken from the manual of model criminal jury instructions for the district courts of the Eighth Circuit. Although the defendant in Harris attacked another section of the instruction, it included exactly the same statement Gatson now challenges, proof beyond a reasonable doubt does not mean proof beyond all possible doubt. Id. at 85. Reviewing the instructions as a whole, the court held it did not impermissibly lower the government's burden of proof. In U.S. v. Daniels, 986 F.2d 451, 456 (11th Cir.1993), the court upheld the instruction although it included language which stated it was `not necessary that the defendant's guilt be proved beyond all possible doubt.' This court recently approved instructions which included similar language. In State v. Morley, 239 Neb. 141, 474 N.W.2d 660 (1991), decided after Cage, this court approved an instruction which stated in part that a reasonable doubt was an actual and substantial doubt, language rejected in Cage. This court reasoned that the questioned instruction did not equate a reasonable doubt with a grave doubt, as did the instruction in Cage. Like the courts in Daniels and Harris, this court noted that the questioned instruction merely advised that a reasonable doubt is such as would cause a person `to pause and hesitate' when considering one of the `graver and more important transactions of life.' Morley, 239 Neb. at 155, 474 N.W.2d at 670. Although no such language is included in the instructions at issue in this case, we find it inconsequential. What is important is that the standard of proof required of the State is not lowered. We find the challenged instruction did not lower the standard by raising the level of doubt necessary to acquit Gatson. The questioned instruction merely informed the jurors that proof beyond a reasonable doubt did not require removal of all possible doubt.