Court Opinion

ID: 9446528
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-03 21:57:22.953442+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:30:41.186842
License: Public Domain

PER CURIAM.
An able petition for rehearing has been filed which insists that our opinion too narrowly applies the rule of the Jencks case, 353 U.S. 657, 77 S.Ct. 1007, 1 L.Ed. 2d 1103. Any such intention is disavowed. However, at the trial defendants made no great point of the request for these statements in the only two instances where it was denied. There had been fourteen investor witnesses upon the the stand before any such attempt was made to see answers to any questionnaire. The point made at the trial may well have been that defendants were claiming the government influenced the investor witnesses by the form of letter and the questionnaire. In any event, one of these transmittal letters and the blank form of the questionnaire were read to the jury by the defense.
Defendants did not specify these rulings as error on this appeal, and only raised the point by a supplemental brief after the announcement of Jencks.
This last circumstance is no reason for denying relief if the rights of a defendant have been violated. But this Court should not frustrate justice to satisfy a formalistic pattern. All these matters are relative. Denial of the right of cross-examination is error. Yet limitation of cross-examination is within the sound discretion of the trial court. These principles shade into one another. However, if the trial court had ruled in the face of Jencks, a different situation might be presented.
It is not believed that Jencks requires conformity to a ritualistic taboo. The mere fact that a statement concerning an immaterial matter is not furnished to permit cross-examination of a minor witness is not ground for reversal in any and all events, as defendants seem to believe. Not that such is exactly the situation in the case at bar. It is probable, if the trial court were faced with the same question now, production would be compelled even if the rule of Jencks did not so require.
If we were to go to the full extent of the position of defendants and hold the ruling was plain error, still a reversal would not be justified in our opinion. For, if all the investor witnesses had been excluded, there was overwhelming evidence not only to justify conviction, but almost to compel a finding of guilt.
The petition for rehearing is denied.