Opinion ID: 4311816
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: challenge to closing argument

Text: ¶48 Mr. Fullerton claims that the prosecutor violated his due process rights by saving his criticism of a witness’s memory for closing arguments instead of raising them on cross-examination, confess to shaking the baby. Id. Mr. Fullerton, however, did not fall into this same logic trap. Mr. Fullerton offered an evolving account of events with no less than seven different explanations for N.L.’s injuries. But, Mr. Fullerton never admitted to shaking the baby. We fail to see how Mr. Fullerton was logically compelled to confess to shaking the baby when he did not actually confess to doing so. 19 STATE v. FULLERTON Opinion of the Court thereby denying Mr. Fullerton the ability to bring in the witness’s prior consistent statements under Utah Rule of Evidence 801(d)(1)(B) and fostering a false impression of the evidence. ¶49 Defense counsel did not object to the closing argument at the time and only raised the objection in a motion for new trial. As already discussed, an objection not preserved at trial cannot be raised on appeal unless the proponent can show plain error or exceptional circumstances. Supra ¶ 46. As State v. Larrabee further explained, “with respect to appellate review of closing arguments . . . we will not examine the State’s closing argument if the defendant failed to timely object to it.” 2013 UT 70, ¶ 15, 321 P.3d 1136 (citation omitted) (internal quotation marks omitted). And an objection to closing arguments is not timely if it is filed in a posttrial motion. Id. ¶ 16. 15 __________________________________________________________ 15 This court has previously, in rare circumstances, considered on appeal unpreserved issues raised in a post-trial motion when the trial court decided the issue on the merits, rather than rejecting the issue as untimely. See State v. Johnson, 821 P.2d 1150, 1159, 1161 (Utah 1991) (holding that “a jury must be unanimous on all elements of a criminal charge for the conviction to stand” and decided before the current Utah Rules of Criminal Procedure were in effect); State v. Belgard, 830 P.2d 264, 265–66 (Utah 1992) (holding that “[i]mplicit in granting the post-judgment evidentiary hearing was the trial court’s finding that there was cause to grant . . . relief [from waiver of preservation]”). But in Larabee, we explained that there are two important policy reasons behind requiring a defendant to timely object at trial: (1) it “affords the trial court an opportunity to address the claimed error, and if appropriate, correct it, thereby promoting judicial economy,” and (2) it “prevents defendants from foregoing an objection with the strategy of enhancing the defendant’s chances of acquittal and then, if that strategy fails . . . claiming on appeal that the [c]ourt should reverse, thereby encouraging fairness.” 2013 UT 70, ¶ 15 (alterations in original) (citations omitted) (internal quotation marks omitted). And we concluded that “allowing defendants to preserve issues like prosecutorial misconduct through motions to arrest judgment would directly contradict the[se] purposes of the preservation rule.” Id. ¶ 16. We reaffirm our holding in Larabee and emphasize that an objection 20 Cite as: 2018 UT 49 Opinion of the Court ¶50 Because Mr. Fullerton did not raise his objection to this issue until his motion for a new trial and does not claim exceptional circumstances or plain error, we will not consider the objection here.