Opinion ID: 1571939
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 7

Heading: The DiGuilio Standard

Text: The now firmly established standards that we articulated in DiGuilio many years ago control the resolution of whether the publication and admission of Rigterink's videotaped interrogation constituted harmless error. In that decision, we stated: The harmless error test . . . places the burden on the state, as the beneficiary of the error, to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the error complained of did not contribute to the verdict or, alternatively stated, that there is no reasonable possibility that the error contributed to the conviction. Application of the test requires an examination of the entire record by the appellate court including a close examination of the permissible evidence on which the jury could have legitimately relied, and in addition an even closer examination of the impermissible evidence which might have possibly influenced the jury verdict. . . . . . . . [H]armless error analysis must not become a device whereby the appellate court substitutes itself for the jury, examines the permissible evidence, excludes the impermissible evidence, and determines that the evidence of guilt is sufficient or even overwhelming based on the permissible evidence. In a pertinent passage [which we endorsed and adopted], Chief Justice Traynor [of the California Supreme Court] points out: Overwhelming evidence of guilt does not negate the fact that an error that constituted a substantial part of the prosecution's case may have played a substantial part in the jury's deliberation and thus contributed to the actual verdict reached, for the jury may have reached its verdict because of the error without considering other reasons untainted by error that would have supported the same result. . . . . . . . The test must be conscientiously applied and the reasoning of the court set forth for the guidance of all concerned and for the benefit of further appellate review. The test is not a sufficiency-of-the-evidence, a correct result, a not clearly wrong, a substantial evidence, a more probable than not, a clear and convincing, or even an overwhelming evidence test. Harmless error is not a device for the appellate court to substitute itself for the trier-of-fact by simply weighing the evidence. The focus is on the effect of the error on the trier-of-fact. The question is whether there is a reasonable possibility that the error affected the verdict. The burden to show the error was harmless must remain on the state. If the appellate court cannot say beyond a reasonable doubt that the error did not affect the verdict, then the error is by definition harmful. DiGuilio, 491 So.2d at 1135-39 (citations omitted) (emphasis supplied) (quoting People v. Ross, 67 Cal.2d 64, 60 Cal.Rptr. 254, 429 P.2d 606, 621 (1967) (Traynor, C.J., dissenting), rev'd, 391 U.S. 470, 88 S.Ct. 1850, 20 L.Ed.2d 750 (1968)). We are not nor do we consider ourselves a super-jury; rather, we are an appellate tribunal charged with the task of determining whether there is a reasonable possibility that the error affected the verdict. Id. at 1139 (emphasis supplied). If such a possibility exists, it is our duty to remand for a new trial, which shall be free from the offending error. The test is not whether the jury reached what we believe to be the correct result but is, instead, whether a reasonable possibility exists that the constitutional violation contributed to the defendant's convictions. See id. at 1135-36, 1139. Where, as here, the State makes a defendant's inculpatory videotaped statement a fixture of its opening statement, case-in-chief, and closing argument, and, thereafter, where the jury specifically requests to review this tape yet again during its deliberations just before rendering its verdicts, we cannot say beyond a reasonable doubt that the error . . . did not contribute to the verdict or, alternatively stated, that there is no reasonable possibility that the error contributed to the conviction. Id. at 1135.