Court Opinion

ID: 9675963
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 05:11:06.023234+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:16:41.828726
License: Public Domain

PALMORE, Judge
(dissenting).
In Cowan v. Commonwealth, Ky., 407 S.W.2d 695, 698 (1966), we recognized that “no admonition can really assuage the prejudice that is done to a defendant on the merits of his case by disclosure of his past •felonies in the name of impugning his credibility,” and for that reason restricted this type of evidence to the bare essentials. By recognizing the limited practical effect of the customary admonition we did not, however, in any sense imply that it is not important. Indeed, it will be noted that the majority opinion carefully avoids saying that the failure to give it was not prejudicial. The majority opinion does not purport or intend to change the law that ordinarily a refusal to give the admonition when requested is a substantial error.
Why should the law be different when the defendant has made the disclosure voluntarily upon direct examination? If he does so, and in so doing does not ask for the admonition, then of course he can have no complaint. But if the Commonwealth wishes to delve further into the same subject, by what sensible logic does the defendant become disentitled to an admonition explaining to the jurors the limited purpose for which they must consider the evidence? Are we in a game, in which by the introduction of competent evidence a party deprives himself of the right to have the jury properly instructed that its purpose is limited to impeachment of his credibility?
I can understand that if a party introduces incompetent matter he cannot complain of cross-examination, or of rebutting or explanatory evidence, touching the same subject. This is a matter of admissibility. In this case we are not concerned with admissibility, but with the right of a party to have the jury advised of the special purpose for which admissible evidence is to be considered. I am rather surprised that the majority of the court should be befuddled by such a red herring as, “Well, you brought it up first.” What does that have to do with whether an admonition should be given? *873After all, the purpose of an admonition is to help the jury decide the case according to law. It is not a trading stamp.
Turpin v. Commonwealth, Ky., 74 S.W. 734, 25 Ky.Law Rep. 90 (1903), simply has no application to this case. In Turpin, the defendant was accused of having stolen a horse. Witnesses for the prosecution testified that a man answering to the defendant’s description had sold the horse at Cory-don, Kentucky, in the fall of 1902. The owner’s daughter testified it was stolen in October of 1902. The defendant testified that he had been arrested on September 22, 1902, and remained in jail until the trial, and that he had served a term in the penitentiary for housebreaking. The prosecution then produced further evidence to show that the correct date on which the horse had been sold was September 17, 1902, whereupon the defendant took the stand again and stated that he had returned to Henderson from the penitentiary on September 12, 1902, in a weak and sickly condition and remained in and about Henderson until after September 17, 1902. The opinion does not indicate that the prosecutor questioned the defendant on the subject of his previous conviction, as was done in this case, or that the defendant asked for an admonition, as he did in this case. But even so, it is readily apparent that in Turpin the defendant used the circumstances of his stay in the penitentiary as a part of his defensive story. They were explanatory of his actions and doings at and about the time in question, and therefore were recited “in aid of his defense,” as pointed out in the opinion. That is not the case here. There is no suggestion that this defendant’s previous conviction was introduced or even admissible for any purpose other than its bearing upon his credibility. This fact is not made different by his having admitted it himself in order to avoid the possible inference, upon its being later adduced by the prosecution, that he wished to conceal it.
The prejudicial effect of refusing the admonition is well illustrated by the following passage from the closing argument of the Commonwealth’s Attorney in this very case: “Now if you want to break this up in Allen County, find him guilty and give him ten years in the pen. * * * He’s been there once and he didn’t learn a lesson for the same crime, and now he tells us today that he didn’t do it.” (Emphasis added.) No admonition having been given the jurors, they were authorized to consider the prior conviction for any and all purposes, including the probability of guilt and the length of sentence to be imposed. This is not proper and it is not right. It runs contrary to the fundamental idea that a man ought not to be convicted by his previous record.
WILLIAMS, C. J., and EDWARD P. HILL, J., join in this dissent.