Court Opinion

ID: 9670702
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 03:24:25.110616+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:16:05.994883
License: Public Domain

MESCHKE, Justice,
concurring.
I join in the majority holding that what the presiding juror told the other jurors about this drug defendant’s associations was extraneous prejudicial information that invalidated the verdict. I write separately, however, to express some reservations and to record my understanding of the narrow scope of this holding.
Most information that a juror brings into the jury room will be generalized knowledge, including personal knowledge about a party to the case. Ordinarily, NDREv 606(b) does not permit affidavits, evidence or testimony by a juror about the jury’s discussions, even when some personal knowledge about a party was disclosed by one juror to the others. In nearly all counties in our state, it would be next to impossible to otherwise have a valid jury verdict, because most jurors know something about every other person in the county, their families, or their businesses.
Each juror’s acquaintanceship with the parties or their backgrounds should be probed during selection of the jury. Then, if a juror lies about knowledge of a party but later reveals it in jury deliberations, juror affidavits would often be allowable to impeach the verdict. See 3 Weinstein’s on Evidence ¶ 606[04], p. 606-41 and 42 (1994) (footnote omitted):
Where the comments indicate that the juror had preconceived notions of liability or guilt or personal knowledge about the facts in issue, the statements may be admissible not because they are not prohibited by Rule 606(b), but as tending to prove that the juror lied on the voir dire, a separate question from that of impeachment of verdicts. See ¶ 606[02], supra. Even so, cases in which this is alleged must be scrutinized carefully.
The record in this case does not include the jury selection process or show what this defendant did to guard against a juror’s knowledge about him, or his business associations. No argument was made to us on this aspect, one way or the other. Ordinarily, though, if a party fails to adequately probe a prospective juror’s acquaintanceships with the parties, their families, or their businesses, I believe that party should not be able to complain about any later jury discussion of it.
Here, the vice of this extraneousness invalidates the verdict. In a criminal case, a defendant should not be convicted on evidence of guilt by association. See Zander v. S.J.K, 256 N.W.2d 713, 716 (N.D.1977) (reversing juvenile’s delinquency adjudication for vandalism where he was “implicated in the acts of vandalism simply because he drove his companions to and away from the rest area, and because he was present [though not active] when it was vandalized.”). The federal precedents discussed in the majority opinion seem to largely turn on this consideration. The guilt-by-association aspect of this extraneous information tips the scales for me, in an otherwise close and difficult ease.
Ordinarily, general information that a juror is able to take into the jury room, even personal knowledge about parties to the case (unless it comes to him from an outside source during the trial), is neither extraneous or prejudicial. Instead, a juror’s prior personal knowledge is usually a matter “concerning the juror’s mental processes.” Nevertheless, I join the majority opinion in this case.
VANDE WALLE, C.J., concurs.