Opinion ID: 2115813
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Was there a waiver of the jury trial?

Text: At his arraignment Spiller stated he waived his right to trial by jury, but the transcript is silent on the reaction of the district attorney and the court. The case was not tried for almost eight months and when it was reached for trial it was tried before a jury. No mention was made of the attempted waiver of the jury by Spiller. Whether everyone forgot about the attempted waiver, whether it was rejected by the district attorney and the court without a note being made thereof in the record, or whether the transcript is incorrect that Spiller waived the jury, are all possibilities for speculation but immaterial to the disposition of this issue. Spiller's attempted waiver is governed by sec. 957.01, Stats., [1] which requires a defendant's waiver to be either in writing or by a statement in open court, entered in the minutes, with the approval of the court and the consent of the state. While the statute does not expressly provide the approval of the court and the consent of the state need be in writing or entered in the minutes, proper trial procedure would so require. It makes no sense to have the defendant offer a waiver and a record made of it and not have the required affirmative act of acceptance and approval of it also be of record. How else is there to be an orderly record of a completed waiver? If the statute provided only that the district attorney and the court could object to a waiver by the defendant, perhaps their silence could be taken as a failure to object, but silence as consent is not a reasonable inference when affirmative acts of consent and approval are required. The right to waive a jury trial in a criminal case is in this state a conditional right, not an absolute right of the accused [2] and silence on the part of the district attorney and the court is not tantamount to their respective consent and approval. Thus there was no waiver of a jury trial.