Court Opinion

ID: 9444191
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-03 19:45:03.675318+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:29:45.629826
License: Public Domain

FRANK, Circuit Judge
(dissenting).
Defendant’s motion for new trial, made two days after verdict and before sentence, comes within the provision of Rule 33, Fed.Rules Cr.Proc. 18 U.S.C. which says that the trial judge “may grant a new trial to a defendant if required in the interest of justice.”
My colleagues, I think mistakenly, treat this as a ease where a defendant asserts that the trial judge abused his discretion in denying a new trial and where, accordingly, we are asked to reverse his order and to direct him to grant such a trial. My colleagues overlook the fact that here the trial judge declined to exercise any discretion at all because he believed that he had no power to do so. We should, I think, reverse and remand with directions to the judge to exercise such, discretion in whatever way he deems proper, just as we did in Harrison v. United States, 2 Cir., 7 F.2d 259, 262.
In each of the cases cited by my colleagues — other than Harrison v. United States, supra, which favors the defendant here, and Larrison v. United States, 7 Cir., 24 F.2d 82—the upper court has refused to reverse when the trial judge denied a motion for new trial for newly-discovered evidence. In such cases, the upper courts have said that they will not reverse for abuse of discretion unless it appears — from a finding by the trial judge or otherwise — that an important witness gave perjured testimony at the trial.1
But here the question is not whether we should hold erroneous the-judge’s exercise of discretion. The question here is this: Unlike United States v. Johnson, 327 U.S. 106, 66 S.Ct. 464, 90 L.Ed. 562, and Gordon v. United States, 6 Cir., 178 F.2d 896, 900, in each of which the trial judge found that the witness whose testimony defendant assailed had testified truthfully at the trial, here the trial judge explicitly stated that he could not ascertain whether or not the witness had lied (1) at the trial or (2) when he recanted his testimony at the trial or (3) when he recanted that recantation. The judge, having said that, in his opinion, the witness was “completely irresponsible,” went on to say that he wanted to grant a new trial but did not, solely because he was precluded from doing so by a "rule of law” which he regarded as forbidding him to use his discretion in such circumstances.2
There is no such “rule of law.” A trial judge, before entry of judgment and if the motion is timely made, has a wide discretion to order a new trial (as distinguished from ordering a directed verdict or entering a judgment n. o. v.); he may do so if he has serious doubts about the credibility of a major witness; when he exercises his sound discretion to order a new trial, his order is reviewable (if at all) only for “abuse of discretion.” See, e. g., Marsh v. Illinois Cent. R. Co., 5 Cir., 175 F.2d 498.
For cases holding that an appellate court must remand for the exercise of the trial judge’s discretion, to grant or refuse a new trial, where he mistakenly refrained from exercising it, see, e. g., in addition to our own decision in Harrison v. United States, supra; General American Life Ins. Co. v. Central Nat. *405Bank of Cleveland, 6 Cir., 136 F.2d 821, 823; Paine v. St. Paul Union Stockyards Co., 8 Cir., 35 F.2d 624, 627; Davies v. Home Trust Company, 8 Cir., 83 F.2d 124, 125.
Had the judge here granted a new trial, it could not possibly be said that he abused his discretion. For when, as here, a judge, after a trial, says he has the gravest doubts as to the credibility of an important witness — doubts here occasioned by newly discovered evidence which, if presented to a jury at a new trial might seriously shake their belief in that witness’ testimony — then, under the authorities, I think it clear that, if the judge granted a new trial, he would not be acting beyond his powers. For he would surely be acting “in the interest of justice.”
Consequently, I think that we should reverse and send the case back with directions to the trial judge to exercise his discretion, free of any supposed “rule of law” prohibiting him from doing so.

. See United States v. Johnson, 327 U.S. 106, 111, 66 S.Ct. 464, 90 L.Ed. 562; Gordon v. United States, 6 Cir., 178 F.2d 896, 900.

. The judge said: “As you can see, I am very much disturbed by this case. I agree with you 100 percent that the witness Camacho is completely irresponsible, and I have no reason to believe that on one occasion more than another he was telling the truth. And yet I am faced with the rule of law on an application for a new trial in a recantation case. In order that there be a new trial the Judges say that the Court must be reasonably well satisfied that the testimony given by the witness was false. * * * ” Later the judge said: “Well, if I could make the law I would have the case retried, but since I am bound by this rule I cannot say that I am reasonably well satisfied that Challenger’s testimony was false.”