Opinion ID: 1409199
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: actions of judge and prosecutor

Text: This was not a perfect trial. No trial ever is. But it is ludicrous to believe the prosecutor's comments and the judge's actions were a proper basis for overturning these convictions, especially the one relating to Steven P. After the third youth took the stand and began to recant his earlier statement to police, the judge excused the jury and took the boys into chambers, on the record, whereupon he began to engage in a Dutch Uncle lecture. It is apparent that the judge was upset over the fact that there was so much changing of stories on the part of these young men. He lectured them on testifying truthfully, threatened an investigation, and concluded by ordering them [b]oys, I expectwhatever the truth is, I want the truth. The judge did not suggest to them which version of their story he considered the truth. The jury heard none of this. Now, had James resumed his testimony and recanted his recantation, one might reasonably conclude that the judge's little lecture improperly influenced the testimony. But the fact is that the judge's comments did not alter James' testimony in the least. In fact, James gave the least incriminating evidence of any of the boys. While the lower court's lecture on truth-telling during the course of a witness' testimony may have been questionable, the record is clear that it did not affect the witness' testimony and the jury heard none of it. How the majority found that it in any way enhanced the prejudicial effect of the use of the prior statements is incomprehensible. Lastly, the prosecutor's comments and argument weren't even made the subject of an assignment of error. Obviously, however, if a witness' in-court testimony is impeached by a prior inconsistent statement, the state has a right to attack the credibility and integrity of the testimony that was impeached. This Court permitted the prosecutor to call the defendant a liar in State v. Dietz, ___ W.Va. ___, 390 S.E.2d 15 (1990). Certainly it can't be more egregious to argue that an ordinary witness is lying than it is to call a criminal defendant a liar. One suspects the bottom line of all this is that the majority thought the circuit court went a little too hard on this defendant, and decided to cut him a break. The judge did impose a rather stringent sentenceconsecutive terms of one to five years each, an enhancement under West Virginia Code § 60A-4-406, fines of $30,000, along with a six-month sentence for the misdemeanor charge to be served concurrently, resulting in a cumulative sentence of four to twenty years. The harshness of the sentence was also raised as an assignment of error, but not dealt with by the majority. As the state points out, however, The Supreme Court of the United States, in Rummel v. Estelle, 445 U.S. 263, 100 S.Ct. 1133, 63 L.Ed.2d 382 (1980) and Hutto v. Davis, 454 U.S. 370, 102 S.Ct. 703, 70 L.Ed.2d 556 (1982), has virtually proscribed review of any sentence length where the sentence is within the statutorily decreed range. It is also significant that this was a high school teacher and coach distributing drugs to minors. A more stringent sentence certainly is merited when one placed by society in a position of authority and influence as a teacher and role model for youth uses that position to encourage the use of drugs.