Opinion ID: 438824
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: the dismissal of juror todd

Text: 2 When this appeal was first argued, petitioner contended that one of the jurors at his resentencing trial, Mrs. Dorothy Mae Ponder Todd, had been replaced by the trial judge without an adequate inquiry into her ability to continue. Specifically, petitioner alleged that the jury had returned to the courtroom after several hours of deliberations to ask the judge whether petitioner could be sentenced to life imprisonment without possibility of parole. The judge informed the jury that he could not respond to this question, and the jurors filed out into the hallway to return to the jury room. At this point, according to the testimony of petitioner's counsel and a jury consultant retained by the defense, Mrs. Todd apparently experienced an hysterical reaction and fell to the floor, repeatedly crying I can't do it! in a voice that was audible within the courtroom itself. Following a colloquy between the trial judge and the jury foreperson, Mrs. Martha McGee, Mrs. Todd was discharged and replaced by an alternate. Petitioner also produced an affidavit from Mrs. Todd in which she stated that she had been one of two jurors holding out against the death penalty, that she had every intention of continuing as a juror even after her collapse, and that the trial judge had not questioned her to ascertain her condition before ordering her replacement. 1 3 On the basis of these allegations, this court noted that Green has stated a colorable claim of constitutional magnitude.... The circumstances of the dismissal of juror Todd raise the suggestion that her refusal to impose the death penalty was a factor in her dismissal. Green I, 715 F.2d at 555-56. Since we concluded that neither the state habeas court nor the state supreme court had made any findings of fact on this issue, id. at 558, we remanded the case to the district court for an evidentiary hearing. In accordance with our instructions, the district court subsequently held a hearing and issued its findings of fact, which were certified to this court in an order dated January 13, 1984. On the basis of the extensive testimony presented at the hearing, the district court held that the facts adduced permit no other conclusion but that there existed a sound basis for the exercise of the trial judge's discretion in replacing Mrs. Todd with an alternate juror.... Accordingly, petitioner cannot constitutionally complain that he was prejudiced by the trial court's refusal to hold a hearing.... Green v. Zant, No. 82-161-2-MAC, slip op. at 12-13 (M.D.Ga., Jan. 13, 1984). Petitioner challenges the district court's findings, but we conclude that they are not clearly erroneous. 4 Petitioner contends that the district court's findings should not withstand our scrutiny because they necessarily rest on [the] acceptance of certain deposition testimony from foreperson Martha McGee that is not only unworthy of belief but is contradicted on key points by every other witness with knowledge of these events. Mrs. McGee testified that she was waiting for the elevator in the hallway outside the courtroom with the other jurors when Mrs. Todd suddenly collapsed. 5 At that point, I'm in front, and I turn around, and I see Mrs. Todd on the floor; and at that point, she was in a state of emotion that she's jerking and her head is going from side to side, and her eyes--I could almost see the whites of her eyes, and she was not totally flat on her back, but she was sort of on the side, lying with her right side to me. She was muttering, and she was in a terrible state; and at that point, I knelt down and touched her on her shoulder, which would have been her right shoulder, and I hear her say I can't go on, and I touched her on her shoulder and looked at her, and she looked at me, and I said, Do you want to be replaced, and her answer to me at that time, and her head is still going and moving, and she is still trembling terribly bad, and her answer is Uh-huh, uh-huh, uh-huh. 6 Mrs. McGee indicated that Mrs. Todd made these remarks in a whisper type tone that would not have been audible in the courtroom or even to the other jurors standing around in the hallway. 7 Petitioner charges that Mrs. McGee's testimony is not worthy of credence, noting that no other witness testified to observing Mrs. McGee bending over Mrs. Todd as she was lying on the floor, that no other witness recalled Mrs. Todd saying I can't go on, and that several of the witnesses indicated that Mrs. Todd was unconscious while lying on the ground. We must expect some inconsistencies, however, when witnesses are interrogated in exhaustive detail concerning their recollections of a brief and startling incident that occurred almost four years earlier. The testimony of several other witnesses supplied at least circumstantial support for Mrs. McGee's account. Two of the other jurors, Mrs. Emmie Adams and Mrs. Belle Schell, as well as one of the bailiffs, Mrs. Mary Sewell, recalled that Mrs. Todd was mumbling or muttering something after she fell to the floor. While they all stated that they could not understand what she was saying, this would be consistent with Mrs. McGee's statement that Mrs. Todd was speaking in an almost inaudible voice. Mrs. Sewell's testimony indicated that she believed Mrs. Todd had first passed out and then had come to and begun rolling around on the floor, which would explain why some witnesses recalled Mrs. Todd as unconscious while others reported her in a semi-conscious or hysterical state. Mrs. McGee's testimony therefore appears generally consistent with the recollections of the other witnesses. Under these circumstances we clearly cannot hold that the district court erred in accepting her version of events. 8 Other testimony at the evidentiary hearing buttresses the district court's conclusion that the trial judge did not abuse his discretion in dismissing Mrs. Todd. The trial judge himself testified that he had no way of knowing Mrs. Todd's position in the sentencing deliberations, and this claim was supported by Mrs. McGee's testimony. In our initial opinion, we took note of the possibility that the trial judge might have been aware of Mrs. Todd's position in the jury's deliberations. This view was based on petitioner's claim that Mrs. Todd fell to the floor crying I can't do it! in a voice that was audible within the courtroom. This claim was completely discredited at the evidentiary hearing, however. The only witnesses who took this view were petitioner's defense counsel and a jury consultant working for the defense team; the other witnesses either indicated that Mrs. Todd said something else or stated that they were unable to understand her, although the other jurors and the bailiffs were much closer than those still inside the courtroom. 9 Once the suggestion that the trial judge knew of Mrs. Todd's position on petitioner's sentence is dispelled, we are left with no other reason for his actions than his apparent wish to proceed expeditiously with the jury's deliberations. The jury in fact returned to its deliberations after Mrs. Todd was discharged and succeeded in reaching a verdict later that evening. Since Mrs. Todd herself testified that she would not have been able to continue as a juror at that time, we conclude that the trial judge had a sound basis for his decision to discharge Mrs. Todd and that no prejudice resulted to petitioner from the trial judge's failure to question Mrs. Todd personally before dismissing her.