Court Opinion

ID: 9633190
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 11:37:20.083181+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:08:30.513001
License: Public Domain

STRUCKMEYER, Justice
(dissenting).
I do not agree with the disposition by the majority of the admitted error in the State’s comment to the jury on defendant’s silence after his arrest.
The State’s argument called upon the jury in this language to find the defendant guilty because he chose to exercise his constitutional rights:
“Officer Flaaen then advised the defendant that he was under arrest * * *. And the defendant said nothing * * *. Now, if he were arrested for armed robbery he would have said something — if he were not guilty. * * * But you hear Officer Galbreath later on, * * * say that he was present when Ernie Flaaen advised him of his rights —the Miranda rights — and the defendant chose not to answer, or chose not to say anything.”
There are some constitutional rights so basic to a fair trial that their infraction can never be treated as harmless error, Chapman v. California, 386 U.S. 18, 23, 87 S.Ct. 824, 828, 17 L.Ed.2d 705, 710 (1966), as, for example, the right to the advice of counsel, Gideon v. Wainwright, 372 U.S. 335, 83 S.Ct. 792, 9 L.Ed.2d 799, 93 A.L.R.2d 733 (1962), and the right to be free of the compulsion to be a witness against oneself, Payne v. Arkansas, 356 U. S. 560, 78 S.Ct. 844, 2 L.Ed.2d 975 (1958); Chapman, supra, footnote 8.
There are cases, of course, such as Harrington v. California, 395 U.S. 250, 89 S.Ct. 1726, 23 L.Ed.2d 284 supra, where it is pos*7sible to examine the erroneously admitted evidence and conclude on the sheer weight of the other evidence of guilt that its admittance was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. But this is not such a case. Here, the jury was told to infer guilt, thereby penalizing the defendant because he exercised his constitutional rights to seek the advice of counsel and against self-incrimination. If a defendant can be so penalized, the meaning and vitality of the words of the Constitution have been reduced to impotence. I would reverse the judgment of conviction.