Court Opinion

ID: 9467916
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 01:59:36.014032+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:40:35.499738
License: Public Domain

J. BLAINE ANDERSON, Circuit Judge,
concurring:
I concur in the result reached in Judge Wright’s opinion largely because a review of the record affirmatively indicates that defendant had a fair trial and was represented by able counsel. I would not adopt a per se rule requiring reversal simply because of the failure of a trial judge to define reasonable doubt in the precise manner suggested by appellant’s counsel.
No assertion is made by appellant’s counsel that he was in any way restricted or obstructed during his closing argument in arguing the reasonable doubt standard and an amplified definition to the jury. The record here does in fact reflect that counsel did fully and accurately expound on the subject in his closing argument. This is not to say that argument on a subject not forti*612fied by a proper instruction will cure error where a proper instruction is required, but was not given. See United States v. Bernard, 625 F.2d 854, 857 (9th Cir. 1980). It is, however, a proper factor to consider in this case where an essential instruction was given, but is asserted to be insufficiently elaborate.
Furthermore, by concurring, I do not approve of nor agree with the thought expressed by some judges and scholars that attempts to define reasonable doubt are generally fruitless. The phrase “proof beyond a reasonable doubt” is not a self-defining term. It is a nebulous and generalized concept. It is the core feature of every criminal trial. In my view, based upon my experiences, jurors do derive a benefit from a proper definition. It furnishes at least some standard against which they can measure the proof in a particular case. A proper definition furnishes the jury with a concept which they can relate to their otvn decision-making processes in their daily personal and business lives. It does not answer the question to assert that the “concept of the term is one of common usage and acceptance.” That is an unsupported conclusion. The terms “beyond a reasonable doubt” and the “presumption of innocence” as such, may be in common usage by the populace of this nation, but there is no demonstrable or reliable evidence, to my knowledge, that a reasonably appropriate definition is in common usage or well understood by prospective citizen jurors. I strongly suspect that no lay juror, without the assistance of a defining instruction, could state the concept in such a fashion as to satisfy the prosecutor, defense,counsel, nor the judges of this court. It is' quite likely no two jurors would define it in the same way.
In short, jurors need all of the assistance we can provide to them to aid them in performing their vital and solemn tasks. In my view, it is better practice for trial judges to adhere to standard instructions which have been consistently approved by many courts (See, e. g., Annotations, 1 Devitt and Blackmar, Federal Jury Practice and Instructions § 11.14 (3d ed. 1977)) than it is to yield to entreaties to short-cut or streamline in such an important area of trial conduct. I use the “better practice” language with all due respect for the views of Judge Wallace expressed in his concurring statement in United States v. Bernard, supra, at 861.
In my view, the trial judge should have given the more elaborate standard and approved reasonable doubt instruction. To have done so would have expended only 30 seconds more time and would have effectively eliminated a troubling issue on appeal. Nevertheless, based on this record, I am not convinced that reversible error occurred.