Court Opinion

ID: 9456147
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 19:43:11.589358+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:34:51.665477
License: Public Domain

ELY, Circuit Judge
(dissenting):
I respectfully dissent. The trial judge did not make, as he was required to do, his own independent preliminary determination as to whether the lineup procedure was impermissibly defective and, if so, whether it tainted the testimony of the prosecution’s witnesses to the lineup. That such an independent determination is required is beyond doubt. The accused was without counsel when the lineup was conducted, and it is not controverted that he had not theretofore been adequately advised of his right to counsel. In these circumstances, the burden was upon the prosecution to convince the trial judge, prior to the introduction of the identifying testimony and “by clear and convincing evidence,” that that testimony had not been tainted by the lineup, if defective, and the investigative technique with which it was attended. United States v. Wade, 388 U.S. 218, 87 S.Ct. 1926, 18 L.Ed.2d 1149 (1967). See United States v. Phillips, 427 F.2d 1035 (9th Cir. 1970).
In his principal opinion, my Brother Kilkenny appears to recognize that the existing law comports with my expres*1256sions in the foregoing paragraph and that, accordingly, one of Parker’s significant rights was bypassed. Yet, the principal opinion upholds Parker’s conviction upon the rationale that the identifying testimony relating to the offense of April 30th could not have prejudicially affected Parker as to the charge pertaining 'to the May 23d offense. Not only is this conclusion unacceptable to me, it is, I think, positively inexplicable.
This is not a case in which the evidence of Parker’s guilt was overwhelming. I acknowledge that there was sufficient evidence, particularly circumstantial, to support the jury’s determination that Parker knowingly assisted in the robberies. But Parker did not himself rob the bank either on April 30th or May 23d. He testified that he had driven the robber to the bank as a favor, believing that the latter had a lawful purpose in being there, and the robber himself testified that Parker was innocent. Had the jury favored the direct testimony of these two men, over the prosecution’s opposing inferences, Parker’s acquittal would have followed as a matter of course. In effect, my Brothers have concluded that Parker would, beyond all reasonable doubt, have been found guilty of the May 23d offense even had the court conducted the required hearing and excluded the highly incriminating evidence pertaining to the offense of only a few days before. This conclusion requires the application of a degree of omniscience with which, I submit, none of us is endowed. Our own court has been pointedly reminded that we should not lightly say that error of constitutional dimension, under the test of Chapman v. California, 386 U.S. 18, 87 S.Ct. 824, 17 L.Ed.2d 705 (1967), is harmless beyond all reasonable doubt. Wilson v. Anderson, 379 F.2d 330 (9th Cir. 1967), rev’d sub nom. Anderson v. Nelson, 390 U.S. 523, 88 S.Ct. 1133, 20 L.Ed.2d 81 (1968).
I would remand the cause simply for the purpose of permitting the district judge to conduct the limited inquiry which I outlined in the beginning. If, after conducting such a hearing, the district judge determined that the challenged testimony was untainted, that should soon end the matter. If the judge should determine otherwise, then Parker is, in the interest of the fair and orderly administration of justice, entitled to a new trial uncorrupted by the introduction of the tainted testimony. Cf. Javor v. United States, 403 F.2d 507, 511 (9th Cir. 1968).