Opinion ID: 1935115
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Court's Comment on Potential for Appellate Review

Text: Defendant claims that the trial court committed prejudicial error when it informed the jury during the guilt phase that sometimes these cases go up on appeal and    are reversed and    all of the time, all of the weeks and effort that you put in would go for [naught]. The purpose of the comment was to abate perceived juror discontent with the number and length of trial interruptions required to permit the court to resolve legal issues. Although our reversal of the death sentence makes the effect of the comment on the penalty phase a moot issue, we consider whether the comment had the capacity to prejudice defendant in the guilt phase. A jury should not be reminded of the potential for appellate review, because that prospect may diminish the jury's sense of responsibility for its decision and might encourage the jury to render a verdict based on a lesser degree of certainty than required. See Caldwell v. Mississippi, 472 U.S. 320, 328-34, 105 S.Ct. 2633, 2639-42, 86 L.Ed. 2d 231, 239-43 (1985); State v. Slattery, 239 N.J. Super. 534, 552, 571 A. 2d 1314 (App.Div. 1990). The court's comment was unnecessary and improper. However, we are convinced that that isolated comment did not have the effect of diminishing the jurors' sense of responsibility for the verdicts to be rendered. First, the comment was not made in the context of a jury instruction. The court's remarks preceding that comment made clear that the court was addressing the potential juror discontent caused by delays, and that those delays were prompted by the need to resolve legal issues. The court observed that the court's improper resolution of the legal issues might result in a reversal. No suggestion was made that the jury's determinations were subject to review. Furthermore, the reference was an isolated comment that the court made on the tenth day of a nineteen-day trial that spanned five weeks and included testimony from over forty witnesses. Moreover, the jury heard the comment three weeks before it began its guilt-phase deliberations. Finally, in its opening comments to the jury at the beginning of the guilt-phase trial, and during its charges in both the guilt and penalty phases, the court stressed to the jury that it alone had the duty to determine the factual issues and that it squarely shouldered the responsibility for imposing the death sentence. Although comments regarding the potential for review are not proper in guilt-phase or penalty-phase proceedings, a special danger exists in the penalty phase that is not present in the guilt phase. Even when a sentencing jury is unconvinced that death is the appropriate punishment, it might nevertheless wish to `send a message' of extreme disapproval for the defendant's acts. This desire might make the jury very receptive to the [court's] assurance that it can more freely `err because the error may be corrected on appeal.' Caldwell, supra, 472 U.S. at 331, 105 S.Ct. at 2641, 86 L.Ed. 2d at 241 (quoting Maggio v. Williams, 464 U.S. 46, 54-55, 104 S.Ct. 311, 316, 78 L.Ed. 2d 43, 50 (1983) (Stevens, J., concurring)). The penalty phase involves a qualitative assessment by the jury of what sentence is appropriate for a defendant who has already been found guilty. That context presents a much greater risk that a jury will send a message than does the guilt phase, in which the jury is still deciding whether the defendant should be convicted. We conclude that the court's remark did not have the capacity to undermine the sense of responsibility with which the jury performed its duty in the guilt phase, and thus does not require reversal of defendant's convictions.