Court Opinion

ID: 9730398
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 15:11:20.482715+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:26:06.202987
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE GREIMAN, specially concurring: I concur with the majority and believe that the judgment of the circuit court should be affirmed. However, the majority has distinguished Remmer v. United States (1954), 347 U.S. 227, 98 L. Ed. 654, 74 S. Ct. 450. The majority suggests that in Remmer the contact was between a juror and an unidentified third party while here the defendant argues that the telephone call was made by a fellow juror upset by the fact that Bullock was uncooperative in making a unanimous vote in favor of conviction. The record does not establish that the alleged telephone call was made by a fellow juror or that, in fact, it had anything to do with Bullock’s service as a juror. I would distinguish Remmer for other reasons. In Remmer, the court’s focus was upon the fact that an FBI agent had been sent in to investigate the juror’s conduct in the midst of a trial and that such an investigation was bound to impress the juror and “very apt to do so unduly.” The court observed that “[a] juror must feel free to exercise his functions without the F.B.I. or anyone else looking over his shoulder.” Remmer, 347 U.S. at 229, 98 L. Ed. at 656, 74 S. Ct. at 451. The Remmer court was also mindful of the trial court’s failure to share with the defense the information regarding the contact with the juror although the prosecutor had been made aware of these events.