Court Opinion

ID: 9575838
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 21:17:42.380573+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:50:12.341098
License: Public Domain

SHENK, J.
I dissent.
That the evidence is sufficient to support the verdict is beyond question. The determination of the credibility of the witnesses, that is, the truth or falsity of their testimony, is of course within the exclusive province of the trier of fact and the jury should be so instructed. (Pen. Code, §1127.) It was so instructed in this case. It is properly held by the majority that the testimony of the witnesses for the prosecution was not inherently improbable.
Misconduct on the part of the prosecuting attorney is held to be one of the reasons requiring a reversal. It appears that in cross-examining the defendant’s wife remarks were made by the prosecuting attorney which intimated that the defendant had used names in the past other than Lyons and Leibowitz. This line of questioning was apparently not deemed objectionable at the trial for no objection to it was there made. It is first urged on appeal. If an objection had been interposed at the trial it is reasonable to assume that any possible ill effect of those remarks could have been obviated by a request to the court to instruct the jury to disregard them. It is well established that if such an objection is not raised in the trial court it cannot be urged for the first time on appeal. (People v. Hampton (October 1956), ante, pp. 239, 240-241 [302 P.2d 300]; People v. Byrd, 42 Cal.2d 200, 208 [266 P.2d 505] ; People v. Sampsell, 34 Cal.2d 757, 764 [214 P.2d 813]; People v. Codina, 30 Cal.2d 356, *325362 [181 P.2d 881] ; People v. Tolson, 109 Cal.App.2d 579, 582 [241 P.2d 32].)
Prejudicial error is held to have resulted from the giving of an instruction cautioning the jury with regard to the testimony of the witnesses for the prosecution. In addition to the cautionary instruction taken from California Jury Instructions Criminal No. 527 (CALJIC pp. 436-437) there was added in the handwriting of the trial judge the language which appears in the 1953 Pocket Part to CALJIC at page 153. This language was so added to the instruction to make it conform to the completed and approved CALJIC form. The completed instruction, with the portion objected to on the ground that it is in the handwriting of the trial judge being italicized, reads as follows:
“It is not essential to a conviction in this case that the testimony of the prosecuting witness be corroborated by other evidence, provided that from all the evidence you are convinced beyond a reasonable doubt and to a moral certainty of the defendant’s guilt. However, a charge such as that made against the defendant in this case is one which, generally speaking, is easily made, and, once made,, difficult to disprove even if the defendant is innocent. Prom the nature of a case such as this, the complaining witness and the defendant usually are the only witnesses. Therefore I charge you that the law requires that you examine the testimony of the prosecuting witness with caution.
“In giving this instruction I do not mean to imply an opinion of my own as to the credibility of any witness and the fact that the charge here made is one difficult to disprove should not deter you from rendering a verdict of guilty, if you are convinced "beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant is guilty.”
An instruction in substantially the same language as the above with the italicized portion added to the original instruction was approved in People v. Westek, 31 Cal.2d 469, 481-482 [190 P.2d 9]; People v. Ernst, 121 Cal.App.2d 287, 295-296 .[263 P.2d 114]; People v. Ahsbahs, 77 Cal.App.2d 244, 250-251 [175 P.2d 33]; and People v. Arechiga, 72 Cal.App.2d 238, 240-241 [164 P.2d 503], As stated in the Westek case, language such as that added to the instruction does not “weaken, modify or detract from that portion of the instruction in which [the jurors] were told to examine with caution the testimony of the prosecuting witness. . . . By the language complained of the court did not indicate any opinion *326of its own as to the guilt or innocence of appellant, but in fact it emphasized the duty of the jury to be convinced beyond a reasonable doubt before returning a verdict of guilty. ’ ’
If the addition had been made in typewriting it is assumed that no valid objection to it could have been made at the trial or on appeal. It then would have been in the approved form under the Westek case. Now, because the modification was made in the handwriting of the trial judge, the judgment is reversed for the stated reason that it carried to the jury the implication that the judge believed the defendant guilty.
It is the duty of the trial judge to cause the instructions to conform to the law as applied to the facts. (Pen. Code, §§ 1127, 1176.) To accomplish this it is common practice for the judge in his own handwriting to modify a proposed instruction by correction, amendment, addition, or deletion. Completed instructions must be prepared in advance of or at the time of charging the jury. Requested instructions are required to be submitted to the judge before the first witness is sworn. Additional instructions may be requested immediately before argument to cover questions of law developed by the evidence. Every proposed instruction must be endorsed in the handwriting of the judge showing his action thereon. If a modification is made by addition or deletion it is frequently done by the judge in his own handwriting. He then endorses on the instruction “Given as modified.” The jury is permitted to take the instruction to the jury room with the signature of the trial judge endorsed thereon. (Pen. Code, § 1137.)
What would the majority of the court have the trial judge do when he is convinced that a proposed instruction is good in part but needs modification? If it is partly good and partly erroneous or incomplete, is the trial judge bound to refuse it in its entirety, as he has the right to do ? From the time proposed instructions are considered, which may be not until the first witness is sworn, to the close of argument, the trial judge is engaged at least in part in the delicate task of determining the law applicable to the facts of the case and approving or modifying instructions accordingly. If he is prevented from modifying a proposed instruction in his own handwriting, must he suspend proceedings, call in a stenographer, and have the modification done in typewriting? This would seem to be the requirement from now on. The test on appeal should be, is the instruction as modified free from error? Here it is not erroneous. To my mind the restrie*327tion now placed on trial judges in the preparation and submission of instructions is unnecessary and unduly burdensome in the administration of justice in both criminal and civil courts. In my opinion no substantial reason is given for a reversal on any ground. The defendant had a fair trial and the judgment should be affirmed.
Gibson, C. J., and Spence, J., concurred.
Respondent’s petition for a rehearing was denied December 19, 1956. Gibson, C. J., Shenk, J., and Spence, J., were of the opinion that the petition should be granted.