Opinion ID: 1736847
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Prejudicial and Inflammatory Comments and Misstatements of Law

Text: Within these assignments of error, the defendant next claims that, throughout the guilt and penalty phases of trial, the prosecutor aggressively engaged in a pattern of misconduct calculated to undermine the defendant's right to a fair trial. The defendant argues that (1) the prosecutor argued facts not in evidence, primarily as to the weather the day on which the defendant was arrested, whether the police officers had actually seen the defendant discarding clothing before his arrest, and why there was no fingerprint evidence; (2) the prosecutor improperly suggested that the defendant had committed other crimes, and (3) during the penalty phase, the prosecutor impermissibly argued biblical authority for the death sentence. As to the defendant's assertion that the prosecutor argued facts not in evidence during the guilt phase of the trial, none of those arguments point to any reversible error. Regardless, the defendant waived these claims based on prosecutorial misconduct as defense counsel failed to object to any of the comments at the time they were made. Taylor, 669 So.2d at 369. The defendant also claims that the prosecutor engaged in misconduct during its cross-examination of Chantal Cannon, the defendant's alibi witness who testified that she and the defendant were in her apartment until 6:00 p.m. on November 4, 1996, the day Gary Booker was murdered. First, while questioning the witness about her testimony that the defendant left her apartment around 6:00 p.m. and later returned with money, the prosecutor remarked, Clifford went and robbed somebody for that $50, didn't he? At that point, defense counsel objected and asked for a mistrial which the trial court denied after sustaining the objection. The prosecutor then continued making improper remarks by commenting, I don't blame you, after Ms. Cannon indicated that she had never left the defendant alone in her apartment. Next, the prosecutor in his rebuttal argument continued his attack by asking the jury, Now, where do you go get money in the St. Thomas project on a Saturday night. ATM machine? He looks like he's got an ATM card to you? After defense counsel objected, the trial court sustained the objection and instructed the prosecutor to refrain from comment[ing] like that. Finally, in closing argument at the guilt phase, the prosecutor argued: And armed robbers and people that are criminals tend to take the clothing off because sometimes-[defense objection overruled] Sometimes they take their clothes off because people are going to remember black or purple clothing or whatever clothing it is. So you take the clothing off as you're running back to home base. Back to home. Back to where you know. Back to 2062 Annunciation where your girlfriend lives. In the defendant's view, the prosecutor's remarks implied criminal conduct on part of the defendant and were intended to inflame the passions of the jury. While the inference raised by the prosecutor during cross-examination of Ms. Cannon was better suited to closing argument, the trial court admonished the prosecutor and instructed the jury to disregard the remarks. The defendant has not demonstrated that those remarks, which the trial judge properly instructed the jury to disregard, warranted a mistrial, La.Code Crim. Proc. art. 770, or that they so influenced the jury as to undermine the reliability of the jury's verdict. Thus, this claim is also without merit. Turning to the defendant's argument of improper argument regarding the penalty phase, the defendant asserts that the prosecutor's eye for an eye [8] argument, along with references to Moses and the Ten Commandments, impermissibly suggested that God's law required the imposition of the death penalty. [9] In State v. Monroe, 397 So.2d 1258, 1271 (La.1981), we criticized the eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth argument as improper, but found no reversible error since the argument when considered as a whole lost much of its objectionable flavor. The same can be said of the instant case. Moreover, we do not find that the prosecutor's improper remarks so influenced, prejudiced, or diverted the jurors from their sentencing obligations, which the trial judge correctly set forth in his charge to them after argument, that they contributed to their recommended sentence of death. See State v. Howard, 98-0064 p. 14 (La.4/23/99), 751 So.2d 783, 801.