Opinion ID: 1892239
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Wilhelm Case

Text: When the assistant prosecutor in his opening remarks made reference to the hue and cry of police protection and advised the jury that this was their chance  this is your occasion to do something about it, it appears that his remarks were not carefully constructed in toto before the event and his improvisation result[ed] in syntax left imperfect and meaning less than crystal clear. Donnelly v. DeChristoforo, supra . Indeed, in the syntax used it might suggest at most a slip of the tongue, not unknown in extemporaneous speaking. Orebo v. United States, supra , citing Pacman v. United States, 144 F.2d 562 (9th Cir.1944). The reference to police protection seems by itself ambiguous, although the prosecutor had theretofore advised the jury that the crimes charged  robbery, assault with intent to rob, resisting arrest and violation of the handgun law  all involved a police officer as the victim of the designated crimes. At best, the totality of these opening remarks could be concluded to be an invocation of law and order or an exhortation unto the jury to do their duty, or an appeal to have law enforcement. See Annot., 78 A.L.R. 1465 (1932). In Matthews v. State, 3 Md. App. 555, 240 A.2d 325, cert. denied, 251 Md. 750 (1968), the appellant contended that the trial court committed prejudicial error in failing to grant a motion for mistrial based upon the State's comment to the jury in closing argument that the jury acts as a protective force to the citizens of Montgomery County. The Court of Special Appeals found that there was no abuse of the discretion vested in the trial court in failing to grant the motion based upon such an argument. In State v. Spears, 505 S.W.2d 92 (Mo. 1974), the prosecutor, in closing argument after first observing that the defendant was in jail, told the jury: Ladies and Gentlemen, all this talk about crime and lack of law enforcement ends right here with you. The defendant is before you. The evidence has been presented to you. You are now the sole judge of the defendant's guilt or innocence. If you find the defendant guilty I am going to ask you in all justice to send him back to that jail over there where the other burglars are waiting to be tried. After an objection by the defense was overruled the prosecutor told the jury that We are asking for justice now.... But right now the State of Missouri asks and insists on justice under the law as you see it. Such remarks were not held to be prejudicial. In Commonwealth v. Feiling, 214 Pa. Super. 207, 252 A.2d 200, allocatur denied, 252 A.2d 200 (1969), the appellee's conviction for armed robbery was affirmed. During his summation to the jury the prosecutor told the jury that they might place themselves in the position of having been robbed. The court, in holding that there was no abuse of discretion on the part of the trial court, which found the remarks not sufficiently harmful, if indeed they be harmful in the law at all, stated: Although appeals to prejudice and passion are not to be approved, we have held that a District Attorney in his arguments, within proper limits, may argue for law and order and remind the jury of the danger to the community posed by persons prone to resort to violence. Commonwealth v. McHugh, 187 Pa.Super. 568, 145 A.2d 896 (1958). We hold that those limits were not exceeded in the present case although the District Attorney's remarks were directed to the individual jurors as members of the community. Generally it is for the trial judge to determine whether such remarks are so prejudicial as to require a new trial on that ground alone, or whether their effect was sufficiently attenuated by the rest of the argument as to have no effect on the verdict. Kuchinic v. McCrory, 422 Pa. 620, 222 A.2d 897 (1966); Smith v. Evans, 421 Pa. 247, 219 A.2d 310 (1966). 214 Pa. Super. at 212, 252 A.2d at 203. In Guajardo v. State, 363 S.W.2d 259 (Tex. Crim. App. 1963), where the appellant had been convicted of the murder of a policeman, the prosecutor, in his opening remarks to the jury, stated: So bear that in mind, that you are the conscience of your community. You are going to speak out for this community and let the rest of the state know exactly what this community thinks about people that kill law officers. Such remarks were held to be clearly a plea for law enforcement and permissible under the holdings of Scarborough v. State,  344 S.W.2d 886 (Tex. Crim. App. 1961), and Lockett v. State, 155 Tex. Crim. 55, 231 S.W.2d 416 (1950). See also Parks v. State, 400 S.W.2d 769 (Tex. Crim. App. 1966). Compare with Pennington v. State, 171 Tex. Crim. 130, 345 S.W.2d 527 (1961); Jackson v. Commonwealth, 301 Ky. 562, 192 S.W.2d 480 (1946); Emerson v. State, 90 Ga. App. 323, 82 S.E.2d 882 (1954); People v. Farrar, 36 Mich. App. 294, 193 N.W.2d 363 (1972) (each of which was cited by appellant Wilhelm ). In Pennington the prosecutor in closing argument told the jury: The people of Nueces County expect you to put this man away; in Jackson the prosecutor told the jury: Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, you are being watched by the men and women of this county so that they can tell by your verdict your character and the kind of men and women you are in the county; in Emerson the prosecutor told the jury: Let's get stern and severe with these damned `coloreds'; and in Farrar, involving a conviction for felonious assault upon a police officer, the prosecutor told the jury that, Every day they're [policemen] called pigs and people assault them with their fists and words. You know they don't bring these things in. Those people are never charged with offenses. They don't bring these things into court unless they really happen. The point is the reason why they're here is this actually happened as the officers testified that it happened. He added, that if the defendant in the opinion of the police and in my opinion were innocent of this charge, we would not be here right now. These remarks  stating the personal opinion of the prosecutor and of the police  were held to have subtly converted the presumption of innocence into a presumption of guilt. See Annot., 85 A.L.R.2d 1132 (1962), concerning the prejudicial effect of a prosecuting attorney's argument to a jury that the people of a city, county or community want or expect a conviction. Kellum v. State, supra , as in Wilhelm, involved an assault and battery upon a police officer in which the testimony disclosed that the defendant had used force in resisting a lawful arrest. In closing argument the State's Attorney read to the jury a magazine article giving a description of a police officer which can succinctly be described as a eulogy of a hypothetical or perhaps somewhat synthesized and idealized police officer. Chief Judge Brune for this Court, after citing from Toomer v. State, supra , the holdings in Glickman v. State, supra and Wood v. State, supra , stated: In the instant case it is clear that the description objected to was not evidence outside the record which tends to connect the defendant with the crime, nor evidence that the trial was dominated by prejudice and passion. While the statement could have been designed to arouse the sympathy of the jury for policemen in general, it is difficult to see how the jury could have been misled or prejudiced against Kellum because of the reading of it.... The jury, representing as it does the collective experience of the community, may be fairly presumed to have known, in general, the varied tasks and lot of a policeman and to have known the essential needs filled by police officers. Though the reading of such an effusion was, we think, certainly not to be commended and should, indeed, not have been permitted in the trial of the case, we are unable to find in it any such persuasive power or significance as might be expected to sway a jury of reasonable intelligence and ordinary human experience. We are, therefore, unable to conclude that any actual prejudice resulted from its reading. 223 Md. at 88, 162 A.2d at 478. In Westcoat v. State, supra , the appellant had been convicted of the murder of a policeman and it was contended, inter alia, on appeal that the trial court had erroneously permitted the State's Attorney to argue improperly to the jury in making a reference to the slaying of the policeman and a characterization of the slain policeman as this poor officer.