Court Opinion

ID: 9561738
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 18:14:55.256756+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:14:19.385155
License: Public Domain

Beasley, Chief Judge,
concurring specially.
I agree with the logic of the dissent, but we are governed by Chastain v. State, 255 Ga. 723, 724 (2) (342 SE2d 678) (1986), which derives from earlier cases cited therein. See, in addition, Norman v. State, 255 Ga. 313, 316 (3) (338 SE2d 249) (1986); Davis v. State, 242 Ga. 901, 903 (3) (252 SE2d 443) (1979); Shaw v. State, 102 Ga. 660, 666 (5) (29 SE 477) (1897); Keller v. State, 102 Ga. 506, 508 (1) (31 SE 92) (1897).
The common law, and now statutory, right of sequestration is “a substantial and positive right.” Poultryland v. Anderson, 200 Ga. 549, 562 (2) (37 SE2d 785) (1946). The object of the rule is “to prevent one witness from being taught by another as to the testimony he should give.” Id. at 561-562 (2). It serves the truth-finding process by recognizing that witnesses are subject to being even subconsciously influenced by what another testifies under oath. The rule prevents an innocent shading as well as a deliberate falsification of testimony based on another’s testimony. See also O’Kelley v. State, 175 Ga. App. 503, 504 (1) (333 SE2d 838) (1985). Poultryland illustrates its application in civil cases; its application in criminal cases such as this one is even more critical because upon its proper application depends a person’s liberty.
As recognized by the dissent, the trial court may permit a witness to remain in the courtroom to advise the non-objecting party in the presentation of its case. Poultryland, supra. In this instance, the nature of the unsequestered witness’s testimony was not directly the alleged transaction. The witness was not a witness to it or involved in it. His testimony related instead to Mitchell’s inculpatory statement, which he obtained when she was arrested two months after the event and brought to the police station. The statement itself did not constitute a confession as to the particular sale charged but rather is constituted simply of defendant’s signature below the handwritten notation of the officer: “Admits having sold cocaine before, but says it *881wasn’t hers.”
Identity of Mitchell as the seller of cocaine to Agent Dalton, who saw the seller only on that one brief occasion, was the primary issue in the case, and there was conflicting evidence such as the description of the seller and of the house where the transaction occurred. The court did not specifically instruct the jury to consider the effect of witness Perry’s hearing of others’ testimony on weight and credit of that witness’s own testimony. See Johnson v. State, 258 Ga. 856, 857 (4) (376 SE2d 356) (1989), which recognizes the ameliorative effect of such a charge.
Although the record does not reveal the cause of the first mistrial, it does reflect that the jury at this second trial deliberated nearly four and one-half hours before reaching a verdict of guilty. Thus it is evident that the jury did not easily reach its verdict despite the trial being short. I find no clues which would lead to the conclusion that the non-sequestration was harmless. Denial of the right conferred by statute is “presumptively injurious.” Hall v. Hall, 220 Ga. 677, 679 (1) (141 SE2d 400) (1965). Compare Johnson, supra at 857 (4).
Nevertheless, we must defer to the trial court’s discretionary allowance. Although no “proper foundation for an exception to the sequestration rule” was expressly laid by the State, see Davis, supra at 904, and Norman, supra at 316, Chastain did not require it. It was enough in Chastain that the witness was the prosecutor, and Perry was identified as the prosecutor on the indictment. If a reason must be shown as well, we must assume that the court, which was aware of the prior trial, regarded the same basis as existing again, that the witness was needed to assist in the orderly presentation of the State’s case.