Court Opinion

ID: 9626511
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 08:15:14.794964+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:01:58.892658
License: Public Domain

RABINOWITZ, Justice,
(concurring).
I agree that Chimel1 requires the holding that appellant’s Fourth Amendment rights were abridged by the actions of the Juneau law enforcement authorities in conducting a warrantless search of the apartment in question and their seizure of three marijuana cigarettes. The Supremacy Clause of the United States Constitution binds us to apply Chapman’s 2 harmless-constitutional-error rule. Thus, the pivotal question before us is whether “ ‘there is a reasonable possibility that the evidence complained of might have contributed to the conviction.’ ”3 *146Before the trial court’s admission of the three marijuana cigarettes can he held harmless, this court “must be able to declare a belief that it was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.”4
Assuming no change is imminent in the federal rule as presently formulated, then in most factual situations I can perceive no real distinction between the federal automatic reversal rule for errors of constitutional dimensions and the harmless-constitutional-error rule adopted in Chapman. I read Chapman as fashioning a rigorous test of harmlessness which approximates in its stringency the very rule it purports to supplant.
Application of Chapman to the facts appearing in this record and in particular to the legal issue of whether appellant’s convictions of possession and sale to a minor on December 3 were lawful requires reference to Justice Harlan’s concurrence in Bumper v. North Carolina.5 In this particularly relevant opinion, Justice Harlan said:
In determining whether a criminal defendant was convicted “according to law,” the test is not and cannot be simply whether this Court finds credible the evidence against him. Crediting or discrediting evidence is the function of the trier of fact, in this case a jury. The jury’s verdict is a lawful verdict, however, only if it is based upon evidence constitutionally admissible. When it is not, as it is not here, reversal rests on the oldest and most fundamental principle of our criminal jurisprudence— that a defendant is entitled to put the prosecution to its lawful proof.6
In this same opinion Justice Harlan more precisely articulated the contours of the Chapman harmless-constitutional-error rule in the following manner:
But the question cannot be whether, in the view of this Court, the defendant actually committed the crimes charged, so that the error was “harmless” in the sense that petitioner got what he deserved. The question is whether the error was such that it cannot be said that petitioner’s guilt was adjudicated on the basis of constitutionally admissible evidence, which means, in this case, whether the properly admissible evidence was such that the improper admission of the gun could not have affected the result.7
Similarly, in the case at bar the controlling test is not whether we, at the appellate level, choose to disbelieve appellant or find the prosecution’s witnesses more believe-able. Equally irrelevant are our individual impressions concerning appellant’s guilt or innocence, that the appellant has in fact a prior criminal record, or that a retrial will be costly to the state and carries with it the possibility that evidence will have been lost in the interim or has become more difficult to marshall. These latter factors involve policy considerations which were resolved by Chapman’s harmless-constitutional-error rule and now lie beyond the reach of independent examination by the judiciaries of the states. Prior conviction of crime is not substantive evidence of guilt. This impeachment evidence, as well as belief in the accused’s guilt, have diminished relevancy, if any relevance at all, given Chapman’s test of harmlessness beyond a reasonable doubt. In short, I cannot find beyond a reasonable doubt that the state’s use of the three illegally seized marijuana cigarettes did not possibly affect the jury’s verdicts relating to the December 3 possession and sale charges. I therefore concur in the court’s reversal of these two counts and am in agreement with all other aspects of the majority’s opinion.

. Chimel v. California, 395 U.S. 752, 89 S.Ct. 2034, 23 L.Ed.2d 685 (1969).

. Chapman v. California, 386 U.S. 18, 24, 87 S.Ct. 824, 17 L.Ed.2d 705, 710-711 (1967).

. Id. at 23, 87 S.Ct. at 827, 17 L.Ed.2d at 710, quoting from Fahy v. Connecticut, 375 U.S. 85, 86-87, 84 S.Ct. 229, 11 L.Ed.2d 171, 173 (1963).

. Id. at 24, 87 S.Ct., at 828, 17 L.Ed.2d at 711.

. 391 U.S. 543, 88 S.Ct. 1788, 20 L.Ed.2d 797 (1968).

. Id. at 552, 88 S.Ct., at 1793, 20 L.Ed.2d at 804.

. Id. at 553, 88 S.Ct., at 1794, 20 L.Ed.2d at 805.