Court Opinion

ID: 9544125
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 16:52:16.223985+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:12:03.886209
License: Public Domain

MAUGHAN, Justice
(concurring specially).
In concurring specially, I do so for the reason that the opinion of Mr. Justice El-lett applies our decisional law. However, I am constrained to say that an instruction on the burden of proof, in my view, is so central to every litigated matter, civil and criminal, that it should be mandatory, and given directly rather than peripherally. It should not depend upon whether it is offered. Some states have seen fit to legislate the mandate. Section 502, California Evidence Code, is as follows:
The court on all proper occasions shall instruct the jury as to which party bears the burden of proof on each issue and as to whether that burden requires that a party raise a reasonable doubt concerning the existence or nonexistence of a fact or that he establish the existence or nonexistence of a fact by a preponderance of the evidence, by clear and convincing proof, or by proof beyond a reasonable doubt.
Legislation here is not needed, for it is within the province of this court to declare rules of procedure.1 This case, I think, is a proper one to make such a declaration; and such an instruction, appropriate to this matter, could be as follows:
The defendant has the burden of establishing by a preponderance of the evidence all of the facts necessary to prove the following issues:
The matter at hand, I believe, is a good one through which this court could establish the procedural mandate. The matter could then be reversed and remanded for a new trial.

. 78-2-4, U.C.A.1953, as amended.