Opinion ID: 688709
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: denial of relief on the caldwell claim

Text: 65 Because it held that sentence stage relief was due to be granted on ineffective assistance grounds, the panel did not reach Waters' contention that the district court erred in denying his claim that the prosecutor's closing argument at the sentence stage violated Caldwell v. Mississippi, 472 U.S. 320, 105 S.Ct. 2633, 86 L.Ed.2d 231 (1985). We do reach that claim. 4 66 Waters' Caldwell claim focuses upon two sentences in the next to last paragraph of the prosecutor's argument. In order to put those sentences back into the context from which Waters has taken them, we quote the entire last three paragraphs of the prosecutor's argument. 67 So again, I call on you to follow your oath that you took as a Juror to return a verdict that speaks the truth under the evidence that you heard and under the law of this case. Kelly Waters took two lives, two innocent fellow human beings. I say you may conclude Kelly Waters was the architect of his own misfortune. He planned it; he schemed it; and he killed them. He did his thing. In essence, under the evidence of this case he had sentenced himself. He has written out his own verdict. And he, even in his own words, in his own words when he spoke to his sister, Judy, he said according to his own wife, if I killed those people, I want to die. Your verdict says he killed those people. It's his request that he wants to die, according to the evidence before you. I ask you to show to him the same mercy he showed to them, to Ann and Anita. He showed them no mercy. Why should he be shown mercy. On behalf of the State, we state to you, we have no reservations or hesitation in asking for the maximum punishment as provided by the laws of the State of Georgia, under all of the evidence and the law of this case. 68 The late Judge Jack W. Ballenger once said, When I slept I dreamed that life was beauty, but when I awoke I found that life was duty. When I slept I dreamed that life was beauty, but when I awoke found that life was duty. Let me state to you under Georgia law, a Jury is not responsible for the consequences of their verdict. The Jury is responsible for the truthfulness of their verdict. That's us. Kelly Waters has sentenced himself, under the law and under the evidence of this case. So we ask you to simply do one thing and one thing only. Under the evidence, and under the law, take your time in writing out these verdicts. Have his punishment to meet that which he delivered, and let your verdict speak long, loud and clear to Kelly Waters and say no more, Kelly Waters. Not in Glynn County, Georgia. 69 All the instructions that the Court will give you, when you fix his punishment at death, state the reasons why, and please state each and every one of them. You can be assured that Ann and Anita will feel that justice has prevailed. We thank you. 70 Earlier in his argument, the prosecutor had told the jury: 71 I want to say to you that your verdict form that you write out is most important, because the law requires the Jury to write out, to fix and set the punishment under all the evidence that you have heard and determine, under the evidence of this case, for you to affix your verdict. We ask that you fix and set his punishment at death. 72 Waters' contention is that two sentences of the prosecutor's argument undermined the jury's sense of responsibility: Under Georgia law a jury is not responsible for the consequences of its verdict; and, Kelly has sentenced himself under the laws and under the evidence of this case. Those two statements, he maintains, unconstitutionally lessened the jury's sense of responsibility. Whether those two statements viewed out of context might have undermined the jury's sense of responsibility is an issue we need not decide. The challenged statements were not uttered or heard in isolation. We will consider them in the context they were made. It is clear to us that the prosecutor was arguing to the jury that Waters was facing a death sentence because of what Waters had done; he was the one who had gotten himself into the predicament he was in; and the jury should not feel sorry for him, but for his victims. Instead of undermining the jury's sense of responsibility for its sentence verdict, the prosecutor's argument, as a whole, stressed the importance of the jury's verdict and urged the jurors to follow their oath and return a verdict that speaks the truth under the evidence that you heard and under the law of this case. Moreover,  '[t]o establish a Caldwell violation, a defendant necessarily must show that the remarks to the jury improperly described the role assigned to the jury by local law.'  Romano v. Oklahoma, --- U.S. ----, ----, 114 S.Ct. 2004, 2010, 129 L.Ed.2d 1 (1994) (quoting Darden v. Wainwright, 477 U.S. 168, 184 n. 15, 106 S.Ct. 2464, 2473 n. 15, 91 L.Ed.2d 144 (1986)). These remarks did not. Thus, the prosecutor's argument did not contravene the Caldwell rule. 5 73