Opinion ID: 2404633
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Propriety of Prosecutor's Cross Examination

Text: During the course of the prosecutor's cross-examination, Franzen insisted that he did not think he was drunk on the particular night in question. In an attempt to cast doubt upon the defendant's memory of the events in the early morning hours of October 12, 1981, the prosecutor risked asking a question having reference to a statement given by the defendant to a probation officer during the presentence investigation ordered by the court following a Rule 11 proceeding and the acceptance at that hearing of the defendant's pleas of nolo contendere to the respective charges. [3] [Do you] [r]ecall ever making the following statement, quote: I admit I was under the influence and am not positive of all the events that took place? At a bench conference, the defendant objected, pointing out that the particular statement to which the prosecutor had reference was privileged information not to be disclosed to anyone unless the defendant had already pleaded or had been found guilty. [4] Although the prosecutor argued that the form of the question did not disclose to whom the statement was made, the court ruled that the question was improper in that it may suggest some circumstance to the jury, the details of which the prosecutor could not legally present to the jury, but which the jury might be led to guess. The defendant's attorney requested the court to inform the jury that the objection to the question had been sustained and that they are to disregard anything about that question. The trial justice complied with the defendant's request and stated formally before the jury: The record will reflect the last objection is sustained and the jury is to ignore the question. The defendant's statement given to the probation officer in the course of a presentence investigation ordered by the court was, under Rule 32(c)(1), beyond disclosure to the jury. Furthermore, Rule 11(e)(5) in pertinent part provides that [t]he admissibility of evidence of a withdrawn plea of guilty or nolo contendere, or of offers or statements pertaining thereto, is governed by Rule 410 of the Maine Rules of Evidence. And, under Rule 410, M.R.Evid., evidence of any statements made in connection with a plea of guilty later withdrawn is expressly made inadmissible in any civil or criminal proceeding against the person who made the plea. We can only view this trial confrontation as improper prosecutorial conduct on the part of the State's attorney. Nevertheless, we hold that the mere asking of the question in the instant case, even in the form in which it was done, accompanied by the immediate instruction to the jury that they are to ignore the question, as specifically requested by the defense attorney, did not constitute reversible error. In the first place, we note that no motion for mistrial was made at the time. We notice also that the question was never answered and, therefore, no error can be predicated on it ( see State v. Stack, 441 A.2d 673, 678 (Me.1982)), and, furthermore, it must be presumed that the jury followed the trial court's immediate and specific admonition to ignore the stated question. See State v. Kingsbury, 58 Me. 238, 242 (1870); State v. Fortin, 106 Me. 382, 384, 76 A. 896 (1910); State v. Cedre, 314 A.2d 790, 795 (Me.1974). This Court generally will defer to the determination of a presiding Justice that a curative instruction will adequately protect against the jury's giving any consideration to a matter that a question asked might suggest, where the jury was told that the objection thereto was sustained. See State v. Brown, 410 A.2d 1033, 1037 (Me. 1980). Besides, Franzen did admit on the stand that his memory was affected by the amount of liquor he had had to drink.