Court Opinion

ID: 9853627
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 05:51:20.270801+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:19:56.516114
License: Public Domain

Littlejohn, Chief Judge,
concurring and dissenting.
I concur in the views expressed in the majority opinion as relates to I. Constitutionality and as relates to II. Adequacy of Indictments. I would affirm the convictions, sustain the objection to the sentences imposed and remand for resen-tencing only.
I respectfully dissent as relates to that portion of the majority opinion which treats the subject of III. Pros-ecutorial Misconduct.
The majority opinion makes a very drastic ruling in holding that the solicitor is guilty of prosecutorial misconduct. The opinion states that the defendant has been deprived of “... the most sacred constitutional right guaranteed to every criminal defendant...” Normally, misconduct on the part of a prosecuting attorney does not occur in the presence of the judge. Those actions of which the appellant complains occurred in the presence of the judge. Misconduct on the part of an attorney is a violation of the Code of Professional Responsibility and warrants a sanction by the Board on Grievances and Discipline. Could it be also argued that the rulings of the judge amounted to misconduct? I think not.
In actuality, the majority opinion does not point out specific error on the part of the judge who was charged with the duty of seeing that the defendant received a fair trial. The opinion at most reverses the solicitor insofar as pros-ecutorial misconduct is concerned.
Having pointed out the can of worms which the majority opinion would open, I now turn to the merits of the appeal. *570The majority opinion recognizes the fact that .. in South Carolina a wide latitude is permitted in cross examination.” In trying a case, the trial judge has a broad discretion, and I would not herein hold that the judge abused that discretion under the circumstances of the case.
We are dealing with some forty different publications distributed by the appellant. The magazines which were exhibited in the trial court are before our Court for scrutiny. The trial judge held that these were not protected by the First Amendment to the Constitution. I agree. There was left to the jury the question of whether these publications were or were not obscene as defined in statutory law of this state. Section 16-15-260 Code of Laws 1976 et seq. It is well established that obscene materials are not protected by the First Amendment of the constitution of the United States, or the corresponding provision of the Constitution of South Carolina.
The magazines leave little to one’s imagination. They were patently obscene, and I do not understand the majority opinion to contend otherwise. If a directed verdict of guilty were in order under our procedures, the same might appropriately have been granted. I appreciate the fact that obscenity is not easy to define; but under any of the definitions known to the law, these magazines were obscene. The decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States has made the law of obscenity difficult to enforce. The opinions of that court speak in terms of “average person,” “contemporary community standards,” “prurient interest,” “patently offensive,” “normal sexual acts,” “lewd exhibition,” and “serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value.” In order to apply the law, a lay juror needs only to understand these. Such terms inspired Justice Potter Stewart to comment that obscenity is difficult to define, but “I know it when I see it.” The jury knew it when it saw it, and I know it when I see it.
Questions and comments of the solicitor quoted in the majority opinion and found to be obnoxious occurred during the cross examination of witness Robert Theodore McIIvenna. This witness testified that he was a Methodist preacher from California and was a sexologist. It took seventy pages to qualify him to proceed to testify as an expert. *571He stated that he had testified in about three hundred obscenity trials, always for the defendant except on five occasions. The judge qualified him to testify as an expert as relates to definitions included in §§ 16-15-260(1) and (3) and (b) and (e). Those sections read as follows:
(1) that the average person, applying contemporary community standards would find that the matter taken as a whole, appeals to the prurient interest, and
(3) that the matter taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political, educational, or scientific value.
(b) ‘Prurient Interest’ means a shameful or morbid interest in nudity, sex or excretion and is reflective of an arousal of lewd and lascivious desires and thoughts.
(e) ‘Community Standards’ used in determining prurient appeal, patent offensiveness or suitability for minors are the standards of the State of South Carolina.
It was his expert testimony that these magazines, which he had seen, were not obscene. While I doubt that his testimony was competent and should perhaps have been excluded, the state did not seriously object to this testimony and it was of course before the court. It was during the testimony of this witness that the solicitor is alleged to have become over zealous.
These obscenity cases are normally defended with much zeal by attorney specialists who travel throughout the United States trying these cases and carrying with him expert witnesses. A solicitor is allowed wide latitude: and if his zeal equals that of the defending attorney, he should not be criticized.
In the recent case of The State v. Gaskins, 284 S. C. 105, 326 S. E. (2d) 132 (1985), we refused to reverse, even in a capital punishment case, in spite of the fact that there was error where the error was of no real consequence. Here, I am of the opinion that the defendant received a fair trial, even if not a perfect one or a satisfactory one.
I would affirm the conviction and remand the case to the Court of General Sessions of Horry County for the purpose of imposing seven sentences representing violations of the law for delivering magazines to seven separate stores.