Opinion ID: 2820053
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: fourth carines prong

Text: The fourth Carines prong embodies the general rule that an appellate court will not correct errors that a party failed to raise below. Reversal is required only in the most serious cases, those in which the error contributed to the conviction of an actually innocent person or otherwise undermined the fairness and integrity of the process to such a degree that an appellate court cannot countenance that error. See Olano, 507 US at 736 (“[T]he discretion conferred by [the fourth prong of the plain-error standard] should be jurors,” State v Vogh, 179 Or App 585, 596; 41 P3d 585 (2002) (emphasis added). (d) The dissent’s repeatedly expressed characterization of the oath as being literally “indispensable” is incompatible with its own recognition that a defendant deprived of this right is not entitled to relief unless the plain-error test is satisfied. (e) The dissent’s theory that “the structural nature of the error presumptively establishes the fourth prong” is inconsistent with this Court’s recent holding in Vaughn, 491 Mich at 654, 667, that even with regards to a structural error, “a defendant is not entitled to relief unless he can establish . . . that the error . . . seriously affected the fairness, integrity, or public reputation of judicial proceedings” and that “[w]hile ‘any error that is “structural” is likely to have an effect on the fairness, integrity or public reputation of judicial proceedings,’ the plain-error analysis requires us to ‘consider whether an error “seriously” affected those factors.’ ” Quoting Barrows v United States, 15 A3d 673, 679-680 (DC, 2011). 8 employed in those circumstances in which a miscarriage of justice would otherwise result.”) (quotation marks and citation omitted). A recent example of this Court’s application of the fourth Carines prong can be found in Vaughn. In Vaughn, this Court addressed an unpreserved claim that the trial court violated the defendant’s Sixth Amendment right to a public trial when it closed the courtroom before jury voir dire. Agreeing with the defendant that his claim satisfied the first three prongs of the Carines test, we nonetheless concluded that reversal was not appropriate under the fourth Carines prong because the underlying purposes of the public-trial guarantee were alternatively maintained. Vaughn, 491 Mich at 664-669. These goals, at least in the context of jury voir dire, included “ensuring a fair trial” and “reminding the prosecution and court of their responsibility to the accused and the importance of their functions[.]” Id. at 667. With these goals in mind, this Court reviewed the transcript of the proceedings and concluded “that both parties engaged in a vigorous voir dire process, that there were no objections to either party’s peremptory challenges of potential jurors, and that each party expressed satisfaction with the ultimate jury chosen.” Id. at 668. We also observed that the presence of the jury venire, which was derived from and representative of the public, helped to ensure that the proceedings were subject to a substantial degree of continued public review. Id. From our intensive review of the record, we could not conclude that the erroneous closure “seriously affected 9 the fairness, integrity, or public reputation of judicial proceedings,” id. at 668-669, and therefore declined to grant relief. 5 (Quotation marks and citation omitted.) As evidenced by Vaughn, the fourth Carines prong is meant to be applied on a case-specific and fact-intensive basis. See also Puckett, 556 US at 142 (“[A] per se approach to plain-error review is flawed.”) (quotation marks and citation omitted). The operative inquiry is whether the trial court’s error of failing to properly swear the jury in the particular case “seriously affected the fairness, integrity, or public reputation of judicial proceedings.” Carines, 460 Mich at 774. It is to that inquiry that we now turn. 5 That is emphatically not to say that we viewed the Sixth Amendment right to a public trial as “meaningless” in Vaughn, just as we are in no way suggesting in the present case, contrary to the dissent’s contention, that the right to a properly sworn jury is a “meaningless” right that can be “easily . . . dispensed with.” Each is a critical right that serves a critical function within our criminal justice system. However, not every violation of every such right must result in an automatic reversal of a defendant’s conviction. See People v Beach, 429 Mich 450, 491; 418 NW2d 861 (1988) (“We require a fair trial, not a perfect trial.”); People v France, 436 Mich 138, 142, 161; 461 NW2d 621 (1990) (noting that this Court abolished the “strict rule requiring reversal of a conviction in the event of communication with a deliberating jury outside the courtroom and the presence of counsel” because the “rule of automatic reversal does not serve the best interests of justice and, in many instances, it may very well serve to defeat justice”). Contrary to the dissent’s contention, we give considerable “meaning” to the oath by requiring that it be given, by recognizing that if it is not given a material error has occurred, and by assessing the need to reverse because of the error by comparing the purposes served by the oath with the alternative means by which those purposes have been furthered. We further give “meaning” to the oath by our recognition that alternative means of furthering the purposes of the oath are imperfect alternatives that require careful judicial review and analysis. That is, we give “meaning” to the oath by recognizing that it constitutes the ideal and by comparing any alternative means of conduct with that ideal. 10