Court Opinion

ID: 9782119
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-30 17:59:34.462705+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:34:48.203110
License: Public Domain

LUMPKIN, Presiding Judge,
concur in result.
T1 I concur in the Court's decision to affirm the judgments and sentences in this case. However, I disagree with the Court's attempt to parse a single trial into two separate trials.
12 A jury hears and decides guilt in a capital trial prior to proceeding into the bifurcated sentencing stage of the trial. 21 0.8.2001, § 701.10(A). During the second *606stage, additional evidence is presented as to the aggravators alleged and any mitigating evidence the defendant may present. 21 0.8. 2001, $ 701.10(C). The sentencing stage is before the same jury that decided guilt. 21 § 701.10(A).
T3 It is humanly impossible for jurors to wipe their minds clear of the evidence admitted during the guilt stage. The Court today finds error in the fact the State asked to have all first stage evidence admitted into the sentencing phase of the trial, While I recognize this has become a rote process in criminal trials, I can find no need or reason for it. The jury is at liberty to consider all the evidence admitted during trial See 21 0.98.2001, § 701.10a(4) (providing that in cases where the Court has ordered a case remanded for resentencing, "[all exhibits and a transcript of all testimony and other evidence properly admitted in the prior trial and sentencing shall be admissible in the new sentencing proceeding.") The sentencing stage evidence is in addition to the evidence presented during the guilt stage, not instead of that evidence. The idea that the jury must divorcee themselves from the evidence presented during the guilt stage before considering the additional evidence admitted during the punishment stage, defies common sense. We should not engage in legalistic word gymnastics and thereby disregard the realities of the actual trial process. I find no error in the jury considering the first stage evidence while deciding punishment.