Court Opinion

ID: 9723147
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 10:04:02.031136+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:24:45.137774
License: Public Domain

V. J. Brennan, J.
(dissenting). In a case where defendant has failed to object to the admission of testimony concerning resistance to an alleged illegal arrest or to request a limiting instruction in this regard, I would not overturn defendant’s conviction for the crime of obstructing Deputy Kellogg in the legal performance of his duty. People v DerMartzex, 390 Mich 410; 213 NW2d 97 (1973).
In DerMartzex, the Michigan Supreme Court refused to overturn defendant’s conviction in a prosecution for assault with intent to commit rape where the complaining witness and the prosecutor at various times explicitly described evidence which would amount to separate criminal offenses for which defendant was not charged. In that case, as in the present situation, no objection to such testimony or characterization was made during *780trial and no request for a limiting instruction was made. In declining to reverse on this point, the Supreme Court observed that defense counsel may have failed to object or request a limiting instruction because he thought reference to any other crimes might be counter-productive to his defense on the crime charged.
I perceive no distinction between DerMartzex and the present case. Defendant was charged with obstructing Deputy Kellogg in the proper performance of his duty. The evidence presented at trial clearly supported this charge. To say that defendant’s conviction should be reversed because the trial court failed sua sponte to instruct that reference to defendant’s resistance to Deputy Kellogg’s allegedly illegal arrest, thereby supposing the jury may have convicted the defendant not of the charged offense but of another separate offense, does not seem consistent with the facts or with DerMartzex. If defendant was worried about references he himself made to a possible separate offense, I might expect him to object or at the least request a limiting instruction. In the absence of such action on defendant’s part, I do not believe the trial court should be reversed for not sua sponte so instructing.