Opinion ID: 203179
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Bible in the Jury Room

Text: Our task then is to determine whether the district court adequately explored and exhausted alternatives to a mistrial on the basis of the Bible in the jury room and whether the court declared the mistrial after sufficient reflection. [9] [When] a colorable claim of jury taint surfaces during jury deliberations, the trial court has a duty to investigate the allegation promptly. Bradshaw, 281 F.3d at 289 (footnote omitted); see also United States v. Corbin, 590 F.2d 398, 400 (1st Cir.1979). The investigation must ascertain whether some taint-producing event actually occurred, and then assess the magnitude of the event and the extent of any resultant prejudice. Bradshaw, 281 F.3d at 289. Even if both a taint-producing event and a significant potential for prejudice are found through the investigation, a mistrial is still a remedy of last resort. See id. The court must first consider the extent to which prophylactic measures (such as the discharge of particular jurors or the pronouncement of curative instructions) will suffice to alleviate prejudice. Id. This painstaking investigatory process protects the defendant's constitutional right to an unbiased jury, id. at 289-90, as well as his `valued right to have his trial completed by a particular tribunal,' Jorn, 400 U.S. at 484, 91 S.Ct. 547 (plurality opinion) (quoting Wade, 336 U.S. at 689, 69 S.Ct. 834). The investigation is also critical in creating a sufficient record to permit meaningful appellate review of the district court's manifest necessity determination. Although we recognize that the presence of the Bible in the jury room posed an unusual situation for the district court, we must conclude that the inquiry conducted by the court was inadequate to support a finding that a mistrial was manifestly necessary. The court questioned only the court reporter and the jury foreperson. This minimal investigation produced only the following evidence: that a Bible had been brought into the jury room by one of the jurors, and that the same juror had stated, during deliberations, that he wanted the other jurors to hear the facts, but also consider what God says in the Bible, something like that. Immediately following the court's questioning of the jury foreperson (after the foreperson had been excused), the prosecutor characterized the foreperson's testimony as revealing that the juror who brought the Bible had referred to specific portions in the Bible and [had] urged the remaining members of that jury to consider those portions of the Bible in their deliberations. As we noted earlier, this characterization of the foreperson's testimony is untenable. We do not know whether any specific portions of the Bible were actually read or referred to or whether the Bible was ever even opened. We do not know whether the Bible was discussed by jurors during deliberations or whether a single juror simply referred to the Bible generally as something that should be taken into account. In sum, although the questioning of the jury foreperson may have been enough to establish that a taint-producing event had occurred, it fell far short of establishing the magnitude of the taint-producing event and the extent of any resultant prejudice. Without this information, the court had no basis upon which to assess the potential efficacy of the alternatives to a mistrial, such as further questioning of individual jurors, a curative instruction, or both. We recognize that conducting an inquiry into a colorable question of jury taint, particularly when that taint involves the Bible, is a delicate matter. See Bradshaw, 281 F.3d at 290. The privacy and secrecy of jury deliberations play an important role in isolating the jury from undue influence. United States v. Olano, 507 U.S. 725, 737-38, 113 S.Ct. 1770, 123 L.Ed.2d 508 (1993). However, concern for the sanctity of jury deliberations may not be elevated above the defendant's right to have his fate decided by the first jury empaneled in his case. Although the district court has broad discretion to fashion an appropriate procedure for assessing whether the jury has been exposed to substantively damaging information, and if so, whether cognizable prejudice is an inevitable and ineradicable concomitant of the jury's exposure to an improper outside influence, Bradshaw, 281 F.3d at 290, the judge does not have discretion to refuse to conduct any inquiry at all regarding the magnitude of the taint-producing event and the extent of the resulting prejudice. Accordingly, the district court's investigation in this case fell short of the scrupulous exercise of judicial discretion required to support the mistrial declaration. See Jorn, 400 U.S. at 485, 91 S.Ct. 547 (plurality opinion). Additionally, we discern two misconceptions of the law that appear to have contributed to the overly hasty mistrial declaration in this case. First, the district court indicated that curative instructions may only be given to the jury before they go to deliberate. Our case law does not support such a restrictive view of curative instructions. Although the issue does not arise often, see Bradshaw, 281 F.3d at 289 n. 6 (noting that the vast majority of reported cases deal with claims of jury taint raised after the jury has returned a verdict), we have held that curative instructions are an appropriate remedy when jurors are exposed, during their deliberations, to extraneous materials. Id. at 291-92. In Bradshaw, an unredacted copy of an indictment charging the defendant with three serious criminal counts that were not before the jury was found in the jury room and discussed by the jurors. 281 F.3d at 282, 290. When informed of the incident, the court first conducted an individual voir dire of each juror to determine precisely what had occurred and assess the magnitude of its impact on the jury's deliberations. Id. at 290. Then, the court gave a strongly-worded curative instruction. Id. at 291. Finally, the court undertook a second round of individual voir dire examinations, inquiring into each juror's ability to `put out of [his or her] mind[ ] entirely the facts and circumstances of the extraneous document' so he or she might decide the case solely on the evidence introduced at trial. Id. During its questioning, the court probed the extent of the jurors' exposure to the extraneous information and its potential impact on their ability to render an impartial verdict. Id. at 291-92. This careful investigatory process, coupled with the curative instruction, allowed the court to make explicit findings that [were] amply rooted in the record and fully supported its decision to allow the empaneled jury to proceed to a verdict. Id. at 292. The procedure followed by the trial court in Bradshaw was precisely the course of action repeatedly advocated by Lara's counsel during the colloquy prior to the mistrial declaration in this case. The court rebuffed these suggestions by stating that [t]he cat is out of the bag and that what is done cannot be undone. In its written opinion denying Lara's motion to dismiss, the court stated that, [i]n view of all the circumstances, cautioning the jurors as to their ability to render a verdict discarding any reference to the Bible would have been self-defeating. We do not understand the basis for these generalities. Although a more developed record might have supported findings that the Bible had played a central role in deliberations and that individual jurors would not have been able to disregard its influence, we see no basis for such findings in this record. See Razmilovic, 507 F.3d at 139 (finding mistrial declaration to be an abuse of discretion when nothing in the record . . . suggest[ed] why the use of any of [the alternatives to mistrial suggested by the defendant] would have created a risk that the jury would reach a verdict that would not reflect its 'considered judgment' (quoting Washington, 434 U.S. at 509, 98 S.Ct. 824)). We cannot assume, as the district court apparently did, that individual voir dire of the jurors and a curative instruction would not have eradicated the risk of prejudice in this case. See Toribio-Lugo, 376 F.3d at 39 (Where there is a viable alternative to a mistrial and the district court fails adequately to explore it, a finding of manifest necessity cannot stand.). As a second legal misconception, the court treated the Bible in the jury room as qualitatively different from other types of extraneous materials or information that may taint a jury's deliberations. [10] At times in the colloquy with counsel, the court appeared to invoke a per se rule that the presence of the Bible in the jury room, combined with the mention of it by a juror during deliberations, produces a taint so egregious that it cannot be cured. [11] No such per se rule exists in this  or any other  circuit. We have never decided a case involving a Bible in a jury room, nor has the Supreme Court. Moreover, our sister circuits have addressed the prejudice arising from a Bible in a jury room only in habeas cases where the jury's discussion of the Bible was discovered after the jury had returned a verdict. See, e.g., Fields v. Brown, 503 F.3d 755, 781-82 (9th Cir.2007) (en banc) (denying habeas relief where jury considered, during the penalty phase of a capital case, Biblical references that exposited general, well-known themes that cut both in favor of and against imposition of the death penalty); Robinson v. Polk, 438 F.3d 350, 366 (4th Cir.2006) (holding that state postconviction court did not act unreasonably in determining that jury's reading of Bible passages during sentencing deliberations in a capital case did not violate petitioner's Sixth Amendment rights); McNair v. Campbell, 416 F.3d 1291, 1308 (11th Cir.2005) (denying habeas relief where state court supportably found that two Bible passages were read during jury deliberations and that [n]either of these scriptures contain material which would encourage jurors to find a defendant guilty or to recommend the death penalty). These cases, which arise in an entirely different procedural context, are of limited utility here. Nonetheless, against this legal backdrop, the district court attached undue significance to the presence of the Bible in the jury room. See United States v. Frabizio, 459 F.3d 80, 91 (1st Cir.2006) ([A]n abuse of discretion occurs when a relevant factor deserving of significant weight is overlooked, or when an improper factor is accorded significant weight, or when the court considers the appropriate mix of factors, but commits a palpable error of judgment in calibrating the decisional scales.). None of the cases from our sister circuits even hint at a per se rule that juror discussion of the Bible in the jury room during deliberations creates an incurable taint that forecloses any possibility of curative instruction and requires a mistrial. Because no special rule exists when the Bible is involved, the district court had a duty to investigate the colorable claim of juror taint in this case and explore and exhaust the alternatives to mistrial, just as it would in other situations where extraneous materials have been brought into the jury's deliberations. See Bradshaw, 281 F.3d at 289-90; Corbin, 590 F.2d at 400. The investigation it conducted fell far short of that requirement. The decision to declare a mistrial on the basis of this record was an abuse of discretion.