Opinion ID: 469177
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Instruction During Voir Dire

Text: 40 During the early stages of voir dire, the trial court made the following statement to the array: 41 Now, let me explain something very important to you, and I hope that everyone will pay particular attention to this. This case must be decided on the basis of the evidence produced in this case and the law that applies to it and nothing else other than your common sense. 42 This case has its own set of facts as will be urged to you by the respective sides. It has nothing to do with the long-standing investigations and series of trials involved in the county commissioner cases in Oklahoma. They are completely unrelated. They have nothing to do with each other, they are different people who are alleged to have committed offenses, they are different offenses charged, and there is simply no connection between them, yet it is all of our concerns that the massive publicity that was generated by that massive investigation and series of criminal proceedings known as the county commissioner scandal ... because ... it deals with public office, public agencies and public monies, that somehow there will be some confusion ... in the minds of our jurors between those two categories of investigations; and it is very important that you understand that there is none. 43 I assume, if I ask you how many have heard of the county commissioner cases, virtually every hand in this courtroom would go up, of course. There is no need for me to even ask that question, but there is a great need for you to understand that they are separate and apart from this case and even its category of cases, so please accept that, it is true, and you are asked to accept that as fact. 44 The defendants contend the trial court, by issuing this instruction, eliminated uninhibited inquiry of the prospective jury members. The defendants argue that members of the panel could not feel comfortable revealing their preconceived ideas about the connection between these scandals after the court's speech; therefore, the trial court's subsequent inquiries could not have illicited honest responses. The defendants base this conclusion on an independent public opinion survey which revealed that eighty-six percent of a sample of people in the area from which potential jurors in the case were to be drawn felt there was a connection between the cases. The defendants argue that they were deprived of their constitutional right to an impartial jury because they were not able to exercise intelligent peremptory challenges. 12 The defendants' arguments are without merit. 45 The Supreme Court has held that voir dire plays a crucial function in assuring the criminal defendant that his Sixth Amendment right to an impartial jury will be honored. Rosales-Lopez v. United States, 451 U.S. 182, 101 S.Ct. 1629, 68 L.Ed.2d 22 (1981). A thorough voir dire is necessary for the trial court to properly assess each prospective juror's ability to impartially follow the court's instructions and evaluate the evidence, id., and for defense counsel to exercise sensitive and intelligent peremptory challenges. United States v. Baker, 638 F.2d 198, 200 (10th Cir.1980). Because the obligation to impanel an impartial jury lies in the first instance with the trial judge, and because he must rely largely on his immediate perceptions, federal judges have been accorded ample discretion in determining how best to conduct the voir dire. Rosales-Lopez, 451 U.S. at 189, 101 S.Ct. at 1634; Baker, 638 F.2d at 201 (court's failure to ask particular questions propounded by the defense reviewed under an abuse of discretion standard). 46 The judicial system has shown particular sensitivity to the problems of pretrial publicity and its effect on the selection of an impartial jury. Baker, 638 F.2d at 201, n. 2. See, e.g., United States v. Liddy, 509 F.2d 428 (D.C.Cir.1974), cert. denied, 420 U.S. 911, 95 S.Ct. 833, 42 L.Ed.2d 842 (1975) (G. Gordon Liddy's trial in the wake of Watergate). The defendants here, however, do not dispute the propriety of the trial court's questions dealing with prospective jurors' knowledge of the bidrigging investigation or trials of other indicted contractors. Instead, they challenge the trial court's method of dealing with another highly publicized, but unrelated, investigation and series of trials. 13 47 The court in United States v. Lewis, 738 F.2d 916 (8th Cir.1984), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 105 S.Ct. 1362, 84 L.Ed.2d 383 (1985), was presented with a similar issue. Lewis was tried and convicted of mail fraud for devising and implementing a fraudulent credit card scheme. He was also a suspect in several deaths resulting from cyanide-laced Extra Strength Tylenol capsules. Between September 30, 1982, and May 23, 1983, the date of Lewis's mail fraud trial, numerous television and radio broadcasts and approximately 135 local newspaper articles mentioned or discussed Lewis and the Tylenol investigation. In conducting voir dire the district court read to the panel a strongly worded instruction that the publicity concerning the Extra Strength Tylenol investigation and Lewis's indictment for other charges ... had nothing to do with the case before them. Lewis, 738 F.2d at 922. The court then conducted individual voir dire to discover the effect of pretrial publicity. The Lewis court held that the defendant was not deprived of his right to an impartial jury despite the massive publicity surrounding his other suspected activities. The court found that the trial court had not abused its discretion in conducting jury selection and had carefully confronted a most difficult situation. Id. at 924. 48 In response to the defendants' objection to its instruction to the panel in this case, the trial court stated that it had no reason to doubt that the veniremen had not answered sincerely and truthfully concerning any connection between the cases. The trial court's finding is entitled to a presumption of correctness as long as there is support in the record for its conclusion. See Patton v. Yount, 467 U.S. 1025, 104 S.Ct. 2885, 81 L.Ed.2d 847 (1984). The defendants ask this court to overrule this finding solely on the basis of their opinion survey, despite the record, which indicates that those veniremen who remembered the county commissioner scandal accepted the court's statement. We are more persuaded by the findings of the trial judge who confronted the venire and observed its reactions than we are by statistical conclusions based upon a survey of faceless citizens. The court's conclusions are fully supported by the record, and we therefore decline the invitation to indulge in speculation. 49 Moreover, we hold that, under the circumstances of this case, the trial court did not err in prefacing its en masse questions with an instruction that the bidrigging and kickback scandals were unrelated. To the contrary, we commend the court's efforts to select an unbiased jury. Finally, we hold that it was not an abuse of discretion for the court to deny the defendants' request to conduct individual voir dire on this issue. United States v. Hall, 536 F.2d 313 (10th Cir.), cert. denied, 429 U.S. 919, 97 S.Ct. 313, 50 L.Ed.2d 285 (1976); Fed.R.Crim.P. 24(a).