Court Opinion

ID: 9558968
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 17:19:40.389297+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:09:40.965346
License: Public Domain

Roe, J.
(specially concurring)—In this complicated case originally involving five defendants, four were found guilty of both manslaughter and assault. This court found various errors and ordered a reversal. It did not address the question of sequestration of the jury because it was unlikely that the same conditions prevailing at the first trial would occur at a retrial because of the passage of time.
This court held that tapes of statements made by the defendants to the sheriff's office did not strictly conform to the requirements of RCW 9.73, and thus were inadmissible over the objections of the defendants. The Supreme Court agreed. This court found that it was error to give to the jury as listening aids transcripts of the tapes prepared by the prosecuting attorney's office when such transcripts were not shown to have been accurate. The Supreme Court agreed that was also error.
As to the error involving the tapes, such was found reversible under State v. Wanrow, 88 Wn.2d 221, 559 P.2d *840548 (1977), involving an interpretation of the same statute and a recording which had been volunteered by the defendant over the telephone in reporting to the police. In that case the admission of the tape recording was found prejudicial error. There was no discussion or citation of the test employed to determine if it was prejudicial. However, in the same opinion on page 237, in discussing the test for rejecting an instruction containing an erroneous statement of the law to furnish grounds for a reversal, the court stated, quoting from State v. Golladay, 78 Wn.2d 121, 139, 470 P.2d 191 (1970):
A harmless error is an error which is trivial, or formal, or merely academic, and was not prejudicial to the substantial rights of the party assigning it, and in no way affected the final outcome of the case.
(Italics mine.) This same test of trivial, formal or merely academic was reaffirmed in State v. Stephens, 93 Wn.2d 186, 190, 607 P.2d 304 (1980), and again in State v. Thacker, 94 Wn.2d 276, 283, 616 P.2d 655 (1980), which involved not an instruction but a transcript of a sworn statement of a witness and its possible effect on the jury.
The Supreme Court in this case at bench used a different test and held "that error is not prejudicial unless, within reasonable probabilities, had the error not occurred, the outcome of the trial would have been materially affected." State v. Cunningham, 93 Wn.2d 823, 831, 613 P.2d 1139 (1980). Under that test the court agreed that there was error but found such error was harmless, stating at page 831: "[T]he jury could have reached no other rational conclusion than that defendants . . . were guilty as charged."
Even though the Supreme Court had the same record before it as this court, nevertheless it was remanded to this court for a determination of whether there was error in the failure to sequester the jury, thus making another review of this decision possible. Error in failure to sequester the jury *841was based upon alleged prejudicial pretrial and in-trial publicity. The purpose of a change of venue or sequestering the jury is to deny such probable prejudice and to ensure that a defendant will be convicted upon the evidence properly admitted in court. The critical issue is the inflammatory nature of the publicity, State v. Crudup, 11 Wn. App. 583, 524 P.2d 479 (1974).
Since the Supreme Court has held that independent of the erroneous admission of the tapes of two of the defendants and the erroneous use of unauthenticated "transcripts" of such tapes, "the jury could have reached no other rational conclusion than that defendants . . . were guilty as charged”, State v. Cunningham, supra at 831, I fail to see how any other out-of-court impressions of evidence the jury may have received could have affected the outcome of the trial. In effect, the error, if any, of the jury having received inadmissible evidence outside the courtroom would a fortiori be harmless.
Another factor in sequestration of the jury which merits attention is possible attacks on the character of the defendants by showing involvement in previous criminal activities and convictions which put their character in issue. Thus, a jury might convict on the basis of past crimes or associations. There is no evidence this religious group had any previous convictions for any crime; none were reported. Hence, that question which arises in that sequestration issue is not present in this case.
Having reviewed the record again as to the failure to sequester the jury which was requested by both plaintiff's and defendants' counsel, I find no reversible error.
This court also found that the prosecution’s attempt to convict for both assault and manslaughter arising from the same acts violated the constitutional prohibition against double jeopardy. The State did not challenge this court's disposition of the double jeopardy issue on further appeal *842to the Supreme Court. Hence, I would remand for proceedings consistent with that holding.
Reconsideration denied January 8, 1981.
Review denied by Supreme Court March 13, 1981.