Opinion ID: 1309189
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 7

Heading: prejudicial prosecutorial conduct

Text: The main claim in this area relates to the prosecutor's use of a novel that was written by the defendant several years before the trial and which contained incidents of sexual interplay between adult and consenting juvenile males. The prosecution's theory was that if the defendant put his character in issue, the book could be utilized to impeach him. The defense attorney advised the court that he would not be placing the defendant's character in issue and consequently the court indicated the book could not be used. [13] Even though the book was not used, it was left on counsel table by the prosecutor during portions of the trial and the prosecutor picked the book up and underlined passages in it on several occasions. The defense attorney requested the court to direct the prosecutor to remove the book from counsel table. The trial court did not require the removal of the book although it did advise the prosecutor not to attempt to use the book. The prosecutor also asked a defense witness on cross-examination if she was familiar with or had read anything that the defendant had written. The defense objected to this question and the court sustained the objection and advised the jury to disregard the question. The prosecutor was further advised that no more references should be made to the book. The defendant's motion for mistrial on this point was denied. It does not appear that any contents of the book were disclosed to the jury. We do not approve of the tactics used by the prosecutor in this case since the defendant's novel had no relevancy in view of the advanced declaration that his character would not be placed in issue. The question directed at the defense witness as to whether she was familiar with or had read anything that the defendant had written was clearly contrary to the trial court's prior ruling that no reference was to be made to the book. [14] Such tactics have the deleterious effect of forcing the defense counsel to make needless objections which may in turn prejudice his standing with the jury. [15] We spoke to the issue of prosecutorial conduct in State v. Boyd, W.Va., 233 S.E.2d 710, 717 (1977), and concluded that because of the cumulative effect of a number of incidents of prejudicial conduct by the prosecutor, reversible error had occurred. We do not, however, find such extensive and cumulative array of incidents in this case and decline to reverse on this ground. [16]