Opinion ID: 1455790
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: restricted voir dire of prospective jurors

Text: The questions which defense counsel was not permitted to ask in voir dire are set forth in the margin. [1] As characterized in Appellant's brief, defense counsel's questions were for the purpose of ascertaining from the prospective jurors their attitudes and presumptions concerning the veracity of women who bring criminal sexual charges; their reactions to sexual acts which are legal when practiced by two consenting adults; and their ability objectively to hear and evaluate appellant's testimony if the evidence disclosed that he was engaging in an extramarital affair. Since we conclude that it was within the discretion of the trial court to deny permission to make these inquiries on voir dire, it is not necessary for us to consider whether the questions proposed by defense counsel were proper in form and, if they were not, what duty rested on the trial court to submit suitable questions to the prospective jurors for these purposes. The examination of prospective jurors in a criminal case is governed by Rule 24(a), Hawaii Rules of Penal Procedure (same in Hawaii Rules of Criminal Procedure, at the time of trial), which reads: (a) Examination of Jurors. The court shall permit the parties or their attorneys to conduct the examination of prospective jurors or shall itself conduct the examination. In the latter event the court shall permit the parties or their attorneys to supplement the examination by such further inquiry as it deems proper. The right of trial by an impartial jury is guaranteed to a criminal defendant by the state constitution (Art. I, Sec. 11) and by the Sixth Amendment of the federal constitution as applicable to the States through the Fourteenth Amendment, as well by principles of due process under both the state and federal constitutions. State v. Pokini, 55 Haw. 640, 526 P.2d 94 (1974). Refusal of the trial court to make or permit sufficient inquiry into possible prejudices of prospective jurors may infringe these constitutional rights. The circumstances of a particular case may create a necessity for questioning prospective jurors specifically about racial prejudice during voir dire. Ham v. South Carolina, 409 U.S. 524, 93 S.Ct. 848, 35 L.Ed.2d 46 (1973). Defendants have been held to have the right to inquire into possible prejudices concerning their alleged ties with the Communist Party. Morford v. United States, 339 U.S. 258, 70 S.Ct. 586, 94 L.Ed. 815 (1950). It has been said that the right extends to examination into religious and other prejudices of a serious character. Aldridge v. United States, 283 U.S. 308, 51 S.Ct. 470, 472, 75 L.Ed. 1054 (1931). In State v. Pokini, supra , we reversed a conviction for the reason, among others, that the voir dire examination of prospective jurors had been unduly restricted. In the opinion of two members of this court, the pretrial publicity had been so extensive and so likely prejudicial as to constitutionally require an examination of the prospective jurors to determine the impartiality of those jurors who had been exposed to it. A third member of the court was not convinced that the nature and extent of pretrial publicity made the voir dire examination of the prospective jurors inadequate for the purpose of ascertaining whether or not a prospective juror was qualified to serve, but concluded that the prohibited inquiry into pretrial publicity should have been permitted to enable the defendants to exercise their peremptory challenges successfully. The remaining two members of this court were of the opinion that the voir dire procedure followed by the trial court was within its discretion in the absence of any demand for an individual voir dire prior to the exercise of the defendants' peremptory challenges. It is clear that a defendant is not constitutionally entitled to examine into every possible prejudice which might be harbored by a prospective juror. In Ham v. South Carolina, supra , the Court refused to extend the right to include inquiry into possible prejudice against the defendant because he wore a beard. Even examination into possible racial prejudice is not constitutionally required in all cases. The Constitution does not always entitle a defendant to have questions posed during voir dire specifically directed to matters that conceivably might prejudice veniremen against him. Ham, supra, 409 U.S., at 527-528, 93 S.Ct., at 850. Voir dire is conducted under the supervision of the court, and a great deal must, of necessity, be left to its sound discretion. Connors v. United States, 158 U.S. 408, 413, 15 S.Ct. 951, 953, 39 L.Ed. 1033 (1895); see Ham, supra, 409 U.S., at 527-528, 93 S.Ct., at 850; Aldridge v. United States, 283 U.S. 308, 310, 51 S.Ct. 470, 471, 75 L.Ed. 1054 (1931). This is so because the determination of impartiality, in which demeanor plays such an important part, is particularly within the province of the trial judge. Rideau v. Louisiana, 373 U.S. 723, 733, 83 S.Ct. 1417, 1423, 10 L.Ed.2d 663 (1963) (Clark, J., dissenting). Thus, the State's obligation to the defendant to impanel an impartial jury generally can be satisfied by less than an inquiry into a specific prejudice feared by the defendant. ( Ristaino v. Ross, 424 U.S. 589, 594, 96 S.Ct. 1017, 1020, 47 L.Ed.2d 258 (1976)). In Ristaino, the Court rejected a per se rule that would have required voir dire on racial prejudice in any case involving a crime of violence where the defendant was of a different race than the victim, noting that the logic of such a rule would encompass other factors, such as religious affiliation or national origin. As defined in Ristaino, the federal constitutional right to examine into specific possible prejudices on voir dire is confined to cases where under all of the circumstances presented there was a constitutionally significant likelihood that, absent questioning about the specific prejudice in question, the jurors would not be free from disqualifying prejudice. (424 U.S. 589, 596, 96 S.Ct. 1017, 1021, 47 L.Ed.2d 258). We have discovered no reason to be dissatisfied with the rationale of the constitutional rule announced in Ristaino and adopt it as a definition of the right, under the state constitution, of an accused to inquire into specific prejudices on voir dire. The record before us contains nothing to show a significant likelihood that any of the prospective jurors, if not questioned as defense counsel proposed, would be prejudiced against the appellant. We conclude that the generalized inquiry by the trial judge into the impartiality of the prospective jurors satisfied the requirements of both the federal and the state constitutions. However, the appellant argues for a rule which would provide more opportunity for the accused to uncover the existence of beliefs and opinions on the part of prospective jurors which would be relevant to the exercise of his peremptory challenges. Although Ristaino denies federal constitutional support for this argument, it was indicated that the Court would, under its supervisory power, have required a federal court to propound appropriate questions designed to identify racial prejudice if requested by the defendant under the circumstances present in that case. (424 U.S. 589 at 597, n. 9, 96 S.Ct. 1017, 47 L.Ed.2d 258). It is open to us to consider a similar exercise of our supervisory power. Peremptory challenges are created by rule of court and there is no constitutional requirement that the right to challenge peremptorily be extended to an accused. Stilson v. United States, 250 U.S. 583, 40 S.Ct. 28, 63 L.Ed. 1154 (1919). Although some form of peremptory challenge seems to be given to the accused in all American jurisdictions, in a number of them questions on voir dire may not be asked solely to determine the advisability of peremptory challenges. Orfield, Trial Jurors in Federal Criminal Cases, 29 F.R.D. 43, 115 (1962). On the other hand, it has been said that the fairness of trial by jury requires that the voir dire be used to expose race, religion, nationality, occupation or affiliations of prospective jurors for the purpose of exercising peremptory challenges. Swain v. Alabama, 380 U.S. 202, 85 S.Ct. 824, 13 L.Ed.2d 759 (1965). The American Bar Association Standards for Criminal Justice require that a voir dire examination be conducted both for the purpose of discovering bases for challenge for cause and for the purpose of gaining knowledge to enable an intelligent exercise of peremptory challenges. ABA Standards, Trial by Jury, Sec. 2.4 (1968). Our decisions support the use of voir dire to guide peremptory challenges. Choy v. Otaguro, 32 Haw. 543, 546 (1932), Carr v. Kinney, 41 Haw. 166, 169-170 (1955); State v. Pokini, supra at 662 (Menor, J., concurring). Although Rule 24(a), H.R.P.P., gives the trial judge discretion in fixing the permissible scope of voir dire examination, that discretion is not unlimited and must be exercised so as not unduly to restrict the conduct of voir dire for this purpose. The scope which an accused should be afforded in conducting such an examination is limited by considerations related to the purpose properly served by peremptory challenges and by considerations of judicial efficiency. Peremptory challenges are but one of several procedural measures which have been adopted to promote the selection of impartial juries and to weed out jurors affected by bias. The right to an impartially selected jury assured by the Fourteenth Amendment does not entitle one accused of crime to a jury tailored to the circumstances of the particular case, whether relating to the sex or other condition of the defendant, or to the nature of the charges to be tried. Hoyt v. Florida, 368 U.S. 57, 59, 82 S.Ct. 159, 161, 7 L.Ed.2d 118 (1961). Although the nonconstitutional right to challenge peremptorily may be exercised for any reason or purpose, including that of limiting the selection of jurors to those who are thought to be predisposed toward the defendant, Swain v. Alabama, supra , we are free to subject the voir dire examination of prospective jurors, which implements the right, to restrictions which are not imposed upon the exercise of the right itself. Rule 24(a) leaves to the court's discretion the regulation of voir dire examination so as to keep the questioning by counsel within reasonable bounds and to confine it to assisting in the impaneling of an impartial jury. In an effort to provide direction to trial courts in the exercise of this discretion, the New Jersey Supreme Court designated as improper the use of voir dire by defense counsel to educate the jury panel on the facts of the particular case, to prejudice the jury for or against a particular party, to argue the case, to indoctrinate the jury, to induce the jurors by use of ... hypothetical questions or otherwise to commit themselves to vote in a particular way, or to instruct them in matters of law. State v. Manley, 54 N.J. 259, 276, 255 A.2d 193, 202 (1969). At the same time, the fact that putting a proper question on voir dire may incidentally constitute anticipatory argument having a tendency to precondition the jury does not justify exclusion of the question. United States v. Blount, 479 F.2d 650, 651-652 (6th Cir.1973). Since the regulation of the voir dire has been intrusted to the discretion of the trial judge, we are not permitted to substitute our judgment for his. We agree with the standard of review stated by the Third Circuit Court of Appeals in dealing with the comparable provision of Rule 24(a) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure: [A]bsent abuse of his broad discretion, and a showing that the rights of the accused have been substantially prejudiced thereby, the trial judge's rulings as to the scope and content of voir dire will not be disturbed on appeal. United States v. Robinson, 154 U.S.App.D.C. 265, 475 F.2d 376, 380 (1973). We must consider in what context the trial judge exercised his discretion in this case. The appellant, a married man, was charged with having forced the wife of another man to engage in an oral sex act. The questions he sought to address to the prospective jurors would have disclosed biases against persons who engage in such sexual conduct or in extramarital sexual relations and biases in favor of women who bring criminal sexual charges. The existence of such biases, even if not providing a ground of challenge for cause, would certainly have been significant to the appellant in exercising his peremptory challenges. However, a host of other biases would have been similarly significant if discerned by defense counsel. Possible biases might have existed against members of the armed forces, mainlanders, persons with appellant's physical characteristics, and the like. Virtually any question addressed to the jurors would have had the potential of disclosing some mental attitude on the part of a juror which might affect his consideration of the evidence and might be relevant to the exercise of peremptory challenges. In ruling as to a particular question, the trial judge must be guided in very large part by his appraisal of the usefulness of the question in achieving the selection of an impartial jury, which in turn will depend upon his judgment of the likelihood that the question will disclose a mental attitude which would be significant in exercising challenges, whether for cause or peremptory. The question for us is whether such a likelihood existed here and whether its existence should have been so apparent to the trial judge that his refusal to permit the question was an abuse of discretion. In United States v. Robinson, supra , the appellate court indicated that it might have disagreed with the exclusion by the trial court, in a murder case, of questions proposed by defense counsel on voir dire which inquired whether any jurors felt that self-defense did not justify the willful taking of human life and whether any of them would be unable to follow the court's instructions on self-defense. However, the court found no reversible error. The prejudice against a claim of self-defense which the questions sought to expose was not seen as one concerning which the local community or the population at large is commonly known to harbor strong feelings, or one which had come to be recognized as a proper subject for voir dire. When the matter sought to be explored on voir dire does not relate to one of those recognized classes, it is incumbent upon the proponent to lay a foundation for his question by showing that it is reasonably calculated to discover an actual and likely source of prejudice, rather than pursue a speculative will-o-the-wisp. The appellants made no such effort at the time the question was submitted to the trial judge; nor did they present before this court any material tending to show that prejudice against a claim of self-defense was likely to be encountered in the community from which the veniremen were drawn. Absent such a showing, we find no prejudice to the rights of the accused. (475 F.2d at 381) A substantially similar standard for questions dealing with prejudices not generally recognized in the community is proposed in Note, Voir Dire: Establishing Minimum Standards to Facilitate the Exercise of Peremptory Challenges, 27 Stanford L.R. 1493, 1518 (1975). Although the Robinson court appears to distinguish between actions of the trial court which constitute an abuse of discretion and those which prejudice substantial rights, we do not see the usefulness of the distinction. We adopt the criteria stated in Robinson for the purpose of determining whether the trial judge abused his discretion in the present case. No representation was made to the trial judge, or has been made to this court, that opinions in the community with respect to oral sex and extramarital sexual relations are, or are commonly known to be, so intense, divided or militant that failure to ask the proposed questions entailed any significant risk that the jury would not be impartial. We do not consider that the trial judge was required, in the absence of any showing, to assume that these circumstances existed. It was otherwise in Pokini, where pretrial publicity had been extensive. Here it was not even argued to the trial judge that there was any reason to believe that a juror would in fact give answers to these questions which would be significant to the exercise of peremptory challenges, although defense counsel expressed a desire to know the answers for that purpose. The trial judge was not required to agree with defense counsel as to the usefulness of the proposed questions, under these circumstances. Accordingly, we conclude that there was no error in the conduct of the voir dire examination of prospective jurors in this case.