Court Opinion

ID: 9534056
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 04:36:35.864716+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:29:24.072033
License: Public Domain

STEWART, Justice:
(concurring in part and dissenting in part).
I concur in the result and in the majority opinion, except for one point.
The Court states that in future cases trial courts should use special verdicts or general verdicts with interrogatories in RICE cases. I submit that that procedure, without a defendant’s permission, would result in a fundamental change in the criminal law and would prejudice a defendant’s right to trial by jury as it has historically existed. The Court’s rationale for the new procedure is that “[ajppellate review of such cases would be greatly enhanced by a form of verdict which would allow the appellate court to determine on which of the various theories the jury based its decision.” See Utah Code Ann. §§ 76-10-1601 to -1609; Utah R.Civ.P. 49 (made applicable to criminal cases by Utah R.Civ.P. 81(e)); cf. State v. Lafferty, 749 P.2d 1239, 1260 & n. 16 (Utah 1988). The Court is quite correct that the procedural reform it suggests would facilitate appellate review, but that is not a sufficient justification, in my view, for the potential damage to the right of trial by jury.
What is at stake is the principle that a defendant is entitled to a general verdict of guilty or not guilty in a criminal case. From time immemorial, general verdicts have been rendered in criminal cases and courts operating in the common law tradi*112tion have viewed the general verdict as an important device which allows juries to protect against overly harsh or rigid applications of the law. By the procedural device of a general verdict, a jury can more easily assert the ethical standards of the community against oppressive applications of the law than it can if it is required to respond only to specific and narrow factual inquiries. The point was explained by Judge Newman in a concurring and dissenting opinion in United States v. Ruggiero, 726 F.2d 913, 925-30 (2d Cir.), cert. denied, 469 U.S. 831, 105 S.Ct. 118, 83 L.Ed.2d 60 (1984):
Various considerations underlie the opposition to jury interrogatories in criminal cases. There is apprehension that eliciting “yes” or “no” answers to questions concerning the elements of an offense may propel a jury toward a logical conclusion of guilt, whereas a more generalized assessment might have yielded an acquittal. The possibility also exists that fragmenting a single count into the various ways an offense may be committed affords a divided jury an opportunity to resolve its differences to the defendant’s disadvantage by saying “yes” to some means and “no” to others, although unified consideration of the count might have produced an acquittal or at least a hung jury_ In general, those opposing interrogatories fear that any particularization of the jury’s decisionmaking will risk interferences with the jury’s romantic power of nullification, or as Learned Hand felicitously phrased it, “tempering [the law’s] rigor by the mollifying influence of current ethical conventions.” United States ex rel. McCann v. Adams, 126 F.2d 774, 776 (2d Cir.), rev’d on other grounds, 317 U.S. 269, 63 S.Ct. 236, 87 L.Ed. 268 (1942).
Id. at 927 (footnote omitted). Another authority has written:
“It is one of the most essential features of the right of trial by jury that no jury should be compelled to find any but a general verdict in criminal cases, and the removal of this safeguard would violate its design and destroy its spirit.”
United States v. Spock, 416 F.2d 165, 181 (1st Cir.1969) (quoting G. Clementson, Special Verdicts and Special Findings By Juries 49 (1905)). Other historical materials and analyses are referred to and discussed in United States v. Spock, 416 F.2d at 180-83.
Speaking of jury interrogatories and special verdicts generally, Justices Black and Douglas wrote:
Such devices [i.e. special verdicts and jury interrogatories] are used to impair or wholly take away the power of a jury to render a general verdict. One of the ancient, fundamental reasons for having general jury verdicts was to preserve the right of trial by jury as an indispensable part of a free government. Many of the most famous constitutional controversies in England revolved around litigants’ insistence, particularly in seditious libel cases, that a jury had the right to render a general verdict without being compelled to return a number of subsidiary findings to support its general verdict. Some English jurors had to go to jail because they insisted upon their right to render general verdicts over the repeated commands of tyrannical judges not to do so. Rule 49 [of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure] is but another means utilized by courts to weaken the constitutional power of juries and to vest judges with more power to decide cases according to their own judgments.
Statement of Mr. Justice Black and Mr. Justice Douglas on the Rules of Civil Procedure and the Proposed Amendments, 31 F.R.D. 617, 618-19 (1963). Rule 49 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure is almost identical to Rule 49 of the Utah Rules of Civil Procedure, the only differences being cosmetic in nature. Compare Fed.R.Civ.P. 49 with Utah R.Civ.P. 49.
Although the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure adopted special verdicts and jury interrogatories in civil cases, and so have the Utah Rules of Civil Procedure, neither jurisdiction has adopted those devices in criminal cases, and I would not do so now in the manner proposed. I readily concede the difficulty in having to review a RICE conviction for sufficiency of the evidence *113without knowing what theory or theories provided the foundation for conviction. Typically, RICE cases are tried on alternative theories of liability, thereby compounding the complexity of judicial review, but that does not, in my view, warrant forcing a jury into a form of decision making that will in effect deprive it of its “equity” or “mercy” functions.
I would, however, agree that the reform proposed would be appropriate if the use of special verdicts and jury interrogatories was contingent upon the defendant’s consent. That is, jury interrogatories and special verdicts may be used at the defendant’s behest to enhance the accuracy of the fact finding process. The prosecution, of course, is not entitled to the same option since it does not have a constitutional right to a jury trial.
In United States v. Coonan, 839 F.2d 886 (2d Cir.1988), the court approved the use of a special verdict in a criminal case, but only with the defendant’s consent. The majority cites Coonan as authority for its position, but fails to note that the defendant’s consent in Coonan was obtained before departure from the standard procedure of using a general verdict. Furthermore, the use of the special verdict in Coo-nan was to ensure the defendant of fair and accurate fact finding, not to assist an appellate court’s review function.
Utah law does not support the majority’s unsolicited innovation. State v. Lafferty, 749 P.2d 1239, 1260 & n. 16 (Utah 1988), simply indicated that specific findings should be made under certain circumstances in the penalty phase of capital homicide cases. Furthermore, the majority’s reliance on Rule 81(e) of the Utah Rules of Civil Procedure is misplaced in my view. The rules of civil procedure were not intended to effectuate a basic change in criminal procedure. Moreover, Rule 21 of the Utah Rules of Criminal Procedure specifically deals with verdicts and verdict forms in criminal cases, and it does not authorize special verdicts or jury interrogatories.