Opinion ID: 2281338
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Defendants' Motions for New Trial.

Text: The Defendants moved for new trials on the ground that misconduct of two jurors had been prejudicial to Defendants. At the hearing on this motion a witness testified that during a recess on the third day of the trial he had overheard a conversation between two members of the jury while they were passing through the corridor on their way to the courtroom. He testified that one juror was saying that he thought the first Defendant to testify was the guilty person and that the other juror disagreed saying he thought the first Defendant was innocent but that the second Defendant was the guilty person. The first juror insisted that the second Defendant was innocent. The Justice denied the motion for new trial holding that while the jurors should avoid even private evaluations of the evidence during trial which might lead them to premature tentative conclusions which later testimony would rebut, such discussions are not ipso facto misconduct. Higgins v. Dean Gas Engine & Foundry Co., 140 Ky. 44, 130 S.W. 800 (1910). We agree. The conversation, it should be noted, was between two jurors only and not between a juror and a witness, or a lawyer, or any other person. Such conduct will not warrant a new trial unless the substantive rights of the complaining party were prejudiced. Furthermore, the danger that an expression of a tentative conclusion might lead the juror to a stubborn disregard of subsequent testimony in opposition to that position appears to be dispelled hereby the fact that the verdicts demonstrate that each juror did come to reverse part of his earlier stated opinion. In any event, the Defendants' complaint came too late. Although the person who overheard the jurors' conservation on the third day of the trial brought it to the attention of the Defendants' attorneys immediately, it was not until the following day when the jury had heard further testimony, the attorneys' arguments and the Court's charge and had retired to deliberate that the Defendants' attorneys informed the Justice of the claimed misconduct. Counsel then filed formal motions which the Justice later acted upon following the jury verdicts of guilty. If the Defendants felt danger of prejudice from the jurors' conversation, it was counsels' duty to have brought the matter to the Court's attention immediately so that the Court might have given a curative or cautionary instruction. A party feeling himself prejudiced by misconduct may not remain silent through the remainder of his trial, depriving the Court of possible opportunity to correct any error, in order that his choice whether or not to claim right to a new trial may rest upon his last minute evaluation of his chances of success in the present trial. McGuffie v. Hooper, 122 Me. 118, 119 A. 111 (1922); Belcher v. Estes, 99 Me. 314, 59 A. 439 (1904). Appeals denied.