Court Opinion

ID: 7815559
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2022-09-07 17:34:53.73799+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T16:30:35.398117
License: Public Domain

Paul Ward, Associate Justice, dissenting. Although I .agree with the majority that portions of Instruction No. 9, as pointed out by the majority, were not proper, and .although I further agree with the majority that appellant’s ■objection was sufficiently specific to call the court’s attention to the erroneous part of the instruction, still it is my opinion that under the state of the record in this case the judgment of the trial court should be affirmed. One. Other instructions of the court contained what appellant asked for. Instruction No. 2 told the jury that the defendant is entitled to the benefit of a reasonable doubt. In Instruction No. 8 the court told the jury that if they had any reasonable doubt as to the guilt of appellant of any degree of homicide or manslaughter they should acquit him. In the same instruction the court also told the jury that in determining the guilt or innocence of appellant they should consider all instructions given by the court. We have uniformly held that instructions need not be duplicated. Two. Moreover, and most important in my judgment, it appears from the record that appellant waived any possible error that the court may have committed in the giving of the questioned instruction. Wien the court had finished giving Instruction No. 9, which consisted of some five or six separate paragraphs, appellant made the specific objection that the court refused to add that if the evidence adduced by the defendant created a reasonable doubt in the minds of the jurors then the defendant should be acquitted. Following this the court made this comment: “The court holds that the general instruction on reasonable doubt would not only reach self-defense and burden of proof but also the evidence and all other issues in this case”. Apparently, appellant was satisfied with the court’s statement because no other instruction was asked for and no further objection was made. In my judgment the court’s statement removed all possibility of error. We assume that the statement of the court was made in the presence of the Jury and consequently amounted to a compliance with appellant’s request. If it was not made in the presence of the jury, then appellant could have requested that it be reduced to writing and presented to the jury, but no such request was made by appellant. This silence on the part of appellant amounted to trapping the trial court into error. We have repeatedly refused to allow this to be done. The situation in this case can easily be distinguished from that in the case of Cogburn v. State, 76 Ark. 110, 88 S. W. 822, which is relied on so heavily by the majority. Li the Cogburn case it appears that the reversible error consisted of the court allowing the Prosecuting Attorney to argue to the jury the preponderance rule even though the jury had been instructed to the contrary. If such argument was made by the Prosecuting Attorney in the case under consideration the defense attorneys had a ready and adequate remedy. They could have pointed out the other instructions of the court referred to above and they could have, in particular, referred to the explanation of the court copied above in which the court stated that the "reasonable doubt” rule applied to self-defense.