Court Opinion

ID: 9722827
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 09:51:46.337158+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:08:14.044080
License: Public Domain

ROBERTS, Judge
(dissenting in part).
I concur in the judgment in this case and in part with the court's opinion. As a matter of federal constitutional law, this court has a choice between a rule whereby the judge finally determines voluntariness and a rule under which the jury passes on voluntariness, but only after the judge has found that the confession or admission was voluntary. I think that an accused is entitled to have the jury also determine the issue of voluntariness under proper instructions along with other factual issues. The Constitution of this State, Art. VI, § 7, provides: "In all criminal prosecutions the accused shall have the right * * * to a speedy public trial by an impartial jury of the county or district in which the offense is alleged to have been committed." In other words, the "Massachusetts" rule is in my judgment the sounder and better rule and more consistent with constitutional rights of an accused preserved by the Constitution of this State.