Opinion ID: 747772
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Cook County Case: Prosecutor's Use of Lieberman's

Text: 27 Post-Arrest Silence to Undermine His Alibi Testimony 28 With respect to his Cook County conviction, Lieberman challenges as unconstitutional the prosecution's use of his post-arrest silence to undermine his alibi testimony. Lieberman testified that he was with his mother at her house at the time the rape occurred. On cross-examination, the prosecutor asked Lieberman whether he had told the police officers who arrested him about this alleged alibi. Lieberman's counsel raised, and the court sustained, a timely objection as to the form of the question asked. The prosecutor thereafter rephrased the question and Lieberman responded, without further explanation, that he had not informed the police of his alibi at the time he was taken into custody or during subsequent questioning. 11 29 During final arguments, the state's attorney again challenged Lieberman's purported alibi by making reference to his post-arrest silence: 30 You saw the defendant's slickness when he testified. He told you also about [being] severely questioned. He told you he denied this and [defense counsel] stood up here and yelled nine or ten times about how he denied it. You heard [the state's attorney] ask him questions, did you tell the police you were with your mother on December the 17th, 1979? No. That's where he says he was today, ladies and gentlemen. Did he tell the police when he was severely questioned, according to him? Absolutely not, absolutely not. 31 Lieberman's counsel failed to object altogether to the above-quoted closing remarks. 32 Lieberman maintains that these questions and statements made by the prosecutor concerning his failure to divulge his alleged alibi to police were constitutionally impermissible under the Supreme Court's decision in Doyle v. Ohio, 426 U.S. 610, 96 S.Ct. 2240, 49 L.Ed.2d 91 (1976). The Court in Doyle held that it is a violation of due process for a prosecutor to impeach a defendant's exculpatory story, told for the first time at trial, by cross-examining the defendant about his failure to have told the story after receiving Miranda warnings. Id. at 611, 96 S.Ct. at 2241 (citing in footnote Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 467-73, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 1624-27, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966)); see also United States v. Scott, 47 F.3d 904, 906 (7th Cir.1995). 33 The Appellate Court of Illinois noted in Lieberman's direct appeal that [t]he State concedes that the cross-examination and closing argument on defendant's post-arrest silence violated Doyle, but contends that the issue was waived. It argues, in the alternative, that the error was harmless. Lieberman, 63 Ill.Dec. at 589, 438 N.E.2d at 520 (emphasis added). For reasons unknown, the court chose to ignore the State's waiver argument, and proceeded on to conclude that the improper comments and examination concerning defendant's post-arrest silence were harmless beyond a reasonable doubt and did not contribute to defendant's conviction. Id. (citations omitted). We, however, have reason to believe that Lieberman did in fact waive his Doyle argument on appeal, and as such, shall begin our analysis there. 34 It is axiomatic that, [t]o preserve an issue for appellate review, a party must make a proper objection at trial that alerts the court and opposing party to the specific grounds for the objection. United States v. Wynn, 845 F.2d 1439, 1442 (7th Cir.1988) (citing United States v. Laughlin, 772 F.2d 1382, 1391-92 (7th Cir.1985)). Neither a general objection to the evidence nor a specific objection on other grounds will preserve the issue for review. Id. (emphasis added) (citing Laughlin, 772 F.2d at 1392). These principles are not cast aside simply because a constitutional right might otherwise be lost. See Laughlin, 772 F.2d at 1391; People v. Lucas, 88 Ill.2d 245, 58 Ill.Dec. 840, 430 N.E.2d 1091 (Ill.1981). In the present case, Lieberman's attorney objected to the form of the question--that is, he made a specific objection-during the State's questioning of petitioner as to his post-Miranda silence. This was clearly a different ground than that upon which Lieberman now bases his appeal (i.e., an alleged Doyle violation). Petitioner also allowed the State's closing remarks regarding his post-Miranda silence to pass without objection. Because the trial judge was never called upon to rule whether the State's cross-examination and/or closing statements were violative of Doyle, Lieberman waived this argument on appeal unless plain error is manifest. See United States v. Whaley, 830 F.2d 1469, 1478 (7th Cir.1987). 35 As just noted, [i]ssues that have not been properly preserved for appeal must be reviewed under the strict standards of the plain error doctrine ... which allows appellate courts to correct only 'particularly egregious errors' for the purpose of preventing a miscarriage of justice. Id. We will find plain error in the event that there is apparent an actual miscarriage of justice, which implies the conviction of one who but for the error would have been acquitted. United States v. Silverstein, 732 F.2d 1338, 1349 (7th Cir.1984), cert. denied, 469 U.S. 1111, 105 S.Ct. 792, 83 L.Ed.2d 785 (1985). Under such a deferential standard, it should come as little surprise that reversal for plain error is exercised in only the most exceptional of circumstances. United States v. Jackson, 542 F.2d 403, 409 (7th Cir.1976). This certainly is not one of those exceptional circumstances wherein it was absolutely necessary for the prosecutor to have introduced inadmissible evidence or made improper statements to obtain a conviction. The abundance of evidence proffered at trial, including, among other things, the victim's in-court identification of Lieberman, the badge and weapon used in perpetrating the crime, as well as the testimony of three other women whom the defendant had earlier assaulted or attempted to assault using a similar modus operandi, overwhelmingly points to the petitioner's guilt. Had the State neither engaged in the line of questioning nor made the statements which Lieberman now challenges, would the result of the trial have been different? Not by any stretch of the imagination. 36 This Court in no way endorses the State's improper cross-examination and closing remarks regarding Lieberman's post-Miranda silence. They were the exact tactics that Doyle explicitly prohibits and which a trial judge, upon proper objection, would be expected to forbid. While the state prosecutor should have known better than to have referenced Lieberman's protected silence, whether on cross-examination or during closing arguments, he did so, and petitioner's counsel either failed to object on Doyle grounds or did not object at all, thereby waiving the argument on appeal. In sum, upon reviewing for plain error, we do not believe that the entire proceeding was so infected with impropriety that, but for the Doyle violation, the jury would have acquitted, rather than convicted, Lieberman. 37 Nevertheless, even assuming for the sake of argument that Lieberman preserved his Doyle argument for appeal and that a Doyle violation did in fact occur, we agree with the district court that habeas relief is not proper since the purported Doyle violation was harmless under the standard set forth by the Supreme Court in Brecht, at 623-25, 113 S.Ct. at 1714, which the parties agree is applicable here. 12 Under this standard, our habeas review is limited to the question of whether the Doyle error 'had [a] substantial and injurious effect or influence in determining the jury's verdict.'  Id. (quoting Kotteakos v. United States, 328 U.S. 750, 776, 66 S.Ct. 1239, 1253, 90 L.Ed. 1557 (1946)); see also Kappos v. Hanks, 54 F.3d 365, 369 (7th Cir.1995). We consider the impact of the alleged Doyle violation in light of the record as a whole[.] Brecht, at 637-39, 113 S.Ct. at 1722; see also O'Neal v. McAninch, 513 U.S. 432, 436-38, 115 S.Ct. 992, 995, 130 L.Ed.2d 947 (1995) (stating that in the special circumstance in which record review leaves the conscientious judge in grave doubt about the likely effect of an error on the jury's verdict the judge should issue writ of habeas corpus) (emphasis added). 38 We agree with the district court's conclusion that in light of the overwhelming evidence of Lieberman's guilt in the Cook County case, the alleged Doyle violation could not have had a substantial and injurious effect or influence in determining the jury's verdict. Once again, as the district court observed, the evidence against the petitioner included the eyewitness testimony of the victim, who testified that she had a very good look at her assailant's face and identified Lieberman in court, along with the badge and the weapon used in perpetrating the crime. Furthermore, as the district judge also noted, [a]t the time of the incident [the victim] made a prompt outcry and was examined medically, which revealed the presence of sperm in her vagina. The evidence against Lieberman also included the testimony of three other women whom the defendant had assaulted or attempted to assault, all of whom testified that he had employed a similar modus operandi on each occasion. See United States v. Gant, 17 F.3d 935, 944 (7th Cir.1994) (Doyle violation harmless beyond reasonable doubt where government presented a very strong case that [defendant] was guilty of the charges). We further note, as did the Illinois appellate court, that the defendant's own testimony may have weighed against him, for his credibility was certainly undermined when the prosecution introduced physical evidence (i.e., timesheets) which refuted his sworn testimony that he had been working at the Lutheran General Hospital at the time of one of the previous sexual assault incidents. Finally, the references by the state's attorney to Lieberman's post-arrest silence, while not insubstantial, were hardly egregious or repeated enough for us to conclude that they affected the jury's verdict. See Scott, 47 F.3d at 907 (Doyle error harmless where references to postarrest silence were limited in their intensity and frequency). Indeed, it would be disingenuous at best to suggest that the disputed closing remark tainted the entire proceeding's integrity and constituted a due process violation when one considers that it comprised only ten out of almost thirteen-thousand lines of transcript generated from testimony given over a six-day trial. In sum, considering the prosecutor's remarks in light of the overwhelming evidence of Lieberman's guilt, we concur with the district court that if a Doyle violation did occur, it was harmless under Brecht. 39