Opinion ID: 1730477
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 20

Heading: the doyle violation

Text: Carr argues that the prosecution improperly commented on his right to remain silent following arrest during closing argument of the guilt phase. The challenged statements are: Although I'm taking a little more time than I should, I've got to tell you about Anthony Washington. When Anthony Washington talked to this defendant, this defendant was not talking to a law enforcement officer, they had been making phone calls, trying to call a girlfriend, and what's the first thing he told him? He said, Man, we had a ball. We had a ball. That means that he enjoyed, he had a good time tying up people, shooting them in the back, sexually battering a nine-year-old child anally... . And then he told him, he said, `I want to talk to you brother to brother... .' In Johnson v. State, 596 So.2d 865 (Miss. 1992), this Court held that the prosecutors's repeated comments on the defendant's post-arrest silence, after receiving Miranda warnings, [4] violated the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, as held in Doyle v. Ohio, 426 U.S. 610, 96 S.Ct. 2240, 49 L.Ed.2d 91 (1976). Johnson, 596 So.2d at 868-869. In Dunaway v. State, 551 So.2d 162 (Miss. 1989), this Court announced the test to be used to determine if there was improper comment by the prosecutor: the test to determine if an improper argument by a prosecutor requires reversal is whether the natural and probable effect of the prosecuting attorney's improper argument created unjust prejudice against the accused resulting in a decision influenced by prejudice. Id. at 163. A defendant has the right to remain silent following arrest, and not have that silence used against him; however, this is not a case of the prosecutor improperly commenting on Carr's silence. In his closing argument, the prosecutor, relying on the evidence produced at trial, referred to the relationship between Carr and Washington, and described the circumstances under which Carr made some of the statements to which Washington testified. This was not an attempt by the prosecutor to comment on the fact that Carr was silent following his arrest. The prosecutor's statements were not improper. Furthermore, these statements were unlikely to create any unjust prejudicial effect against Carr. See Dunaway, 551 So.2d at 163. Compare Johnson, 596 So.2d at 865. This issue is without merit.