Court Opinion

ID: 9487762
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 12:25:35.797475+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:52:28.053559
License: Public Domain

OAKES, Senior Circuit Judge,
dissenting:
I am required to dissent. This was an emotionally super-charged retrial of a murder case in a rural area of New York State, where 83 percent of the 1417 members of the jury pool had been disqualified for cause, many as a result of prejudicial pretrial publicity involving evidence ordered suppressed by the New York Court of Appeals after the first trial. People v. Knapp, 57 N.Y.2d 161, 441 N.E.2d 1057, 455 N.Y.S.2d 539, rearg. denied, 58 N.Y.2d 779, 445 N.E.2d 219, 459 N.Y.S.2d 1030 (1982), cert. denied, 462 U.S. 1106, 103 S.Ct. 2452, 77 L.Ed.2d 1332 (1983). Particularly in light of these circumstances, I think it deprived the petitioner of his constitutional right to a fair trial to try the case in a church hall containing “holy pictures” and other religious artifacts, including but not necessarily limited to a crucifix along the path from the makeshift courtroom to the jury room.
That the trial was held in this location, as opposed to a high school gymnasium or other wholly secular meeting hall, seems to me constitutional error. It is not insignificant that both prosecution and defense objected to holding the trial in the church hall. And it is worth noting that the subject matter of the trial was not some relatively minor offense, such as credit card fraud or tax evasion, but, rather, that most emotionally charged offense — murder—one indeed involving a violation of the Sixth Commandment, “Thou shalt not kill.”1
The weakness of the rationalization on direct appeal for upholding the constitutionality of trial in such a place — followed without amplification by the panel majority in our habeas review — is glaring. The opinion of the Third Department, while conceding that “the church hall may not have been an ideal place for the trial” — it is hard to imagine anyone suggesting that it would have been ideal — goes on to say that “[e]ven traditional courtrooms are not devoid of religious symbols and artifacts and both jurors and witnesses are traditionally sworn with the phrase ‘so help you God.’ ” People v. Knapp, 113 A.D.2d 154, 160, 495 N.Y.S.2d 985, 989 (3rd Dept.1985), appeal denied, 67 N.Y.2d 945, 494 N.E.2d 123, 502 N.Y.S.2d 1038 (1986), cert. denied, 479 U.S. 844, 107 S.Ct. 158, 93 L.Ed.2d 97 (1986). The majority opinion in this case, after quoting the immediately preceding language in support of its decision, then states that “[ajbsent a demonstration that a constitutional error, if any, affected the factfinding process at trial, there is no basis to accord habeas relief.” Majority op. at 178. It is beyond my ken how a defendant could, under any circumstances, demonstrate an effect of this sort upon the factfinding process at trial. This is especially so when here the County Court “did not allow defense counsel to develop the record fully regarding the number, description and *182location of religious artifacts.” Knapp, 113 A.D.2d at 160, 495 N.Y.S.2d at 989.
I do not know where the Third Department, or our court in relying upon the language of the Third Department, has obtained the notion that “[ejven traditional courtrooms are not devoid of religious symbols and artifacts.” There is no evidence in the record as to this. I have tried in vain to recall a courtroom -that I have been in which contains religious symbols, pictures, or artifacts, or a courthouse the hallways of which are thus furnished. The closest I have been able to come — and it is not very close — is that the reverse side of the Great Seal of the United States, which is rarely, if ever, seen in a courtroom, bears the Latin motto “Annuit Coeptis,” meaning “He (God) has favored our undertakings.” And not only is this motto in Latin, and unfamiliar Latin at that, but it does not even contain the word “God”; it, rather, conveys the concept implicitly. This abstruse phrase, carried on the reverse of the familiar Seal, can hardly be said to have the immediacy of impact — it is not instinct with the threat of religious imprecations— that religious artifacts so readily evoke. A great many people, and I say this with full respect, may experience substantial internal pressure in response to religious pictures and artifacts. I do not believe we should place on the defendant the burden — one which I suspect would usually, if not always, be impossible to meet — of “demonstrating” this affirmatively. Our Founding Fathers thought church and state should be kept separate. The same holds true for church and courtroom.
I think a similar argument can be made in reference to the second point relied on both by the Appellate Division in affirmance and by the majority in denial of the petition for habeas, namely that “both jurors and witnesses are traditionally sworn with the phrase ‘so help you God.’ ” 113 A.D.2d at 160, 495 N.Y.S.2d at 989; majority op. at 178. First, there is no such requirement in the oath administered to jurors or witnesses in New York, nor has there been for some time. See N.Y.C.P.L.R. § 2309(b) and practice commentary C2309:2 (McKinney 1991) (oath or affirmation shall be administered in accordance with person’s religious or ethical beliefs). Second, while oaths have not been abolished, either by statute or constitutionally, theological belief has long been ruled out as a measure of a person’s capacity or competency to act as a juror or witness. See 6 Wigmore on Evidence § 1828, at 429-32 (Chadbourn Rev.1976); cf. Torcaso v. Watkins, 367 U.S. 488, 81 S.Ct. 1680, 6 L.Ed.2d 982 (1960) (holding that requiring belief in God as a requirement for holding public office is unconstitutional); Smith v. Coffin, 18 Me. 157 (1841) (Emery, J.) (condemning state statute requiring witness to believe in “the existence of a Supreme Being”). We have come a long way, it seems to me, from the days when a judge could address a witness by saying,
I charge thee, therefore, as thou will answer it to the Great God, the judge of all the earth, that thou do not dare to waver one tittle from the truth, upon any account or pretence whatsoever; ... for that God of Heaven may justly strike thee into eternal flames and make thee drop into the bottomless lake of fire and brimstone, if thou offer to deviate the least from the truth and nothing but the truth.
Jefferies, C.J., in Lady Lisle’s Trial, 11 How. St.Tr. 298, 325 (1685) (quoted in 6 Wigmore, supra, § 1816 at 383).
In conclusion, I agree emphatically with the statement of Judge Harry Edelstein in People v. Rose, 82 Misc.2d 429, 368 N.Y.S.2d 387, 391 (County Court 1975), that
selection as a court house or court room of a building or room dedicated to religion or permeated with religious symbols is inconsistent with the spirit and intent of the constitutional prohibitions of and fortifications against establishment of religion. U.S. Const, amend. I, amend. XIV, § 1; N.Y. Const, art. 1, § 3.
Since there was no showing whatsoever that some other, more suitable place for holding Knapp’s trial could not have been found, whether in Cooperstown or elsewhere in Ot-sego County, I believe that he should be retried for the reasons above stated.

. The Ten Commandments appear in two different places in the Old Testament, Exodus 20:1-17 and Deuteronomy 5:6-21. "Thou shall not kill” is the Sixth Commandment in Exodus, and the Fifth Commandment in Deuteronomy. Most Protestant, Anglican and Orthodox Christians and Jews follow the Exodus version, while Lutherans and Roman Catholics follow the Deuter-onomic version. See The Encyclopedia Americana International Edition, Vol. 26 at 469-70 (1992).