Court Opinion

ID: 9535387
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 04:48:43.884393+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:33:14.185778
License: Public Domain

Levin, J.
(dissenting). I agree with the signers of the lead opinion that where it appears that the defendant will rely on terms of a plea agreement to impeach the credibility of an accomplice, the prosecutor should ordinarily be permitted to bring out the terms of the plea agreement during the direct examination of the accomplice.
i
The recitation of the terms of the plea agreement in the instant case was, however, incomplete. The judge advised the jury that Luna had "entered a plea to murder in the second degree and the Court accepted that plea.” That did not fully reflect all the terms of the plea agreement. The plea agreement included that "the prosecutor would recommend that the Court stay within the guidelines in sentencing” Manning.
Neither the prosecutor nor Manning’s lawyer1 adverted, on direct or cross-examination of Luna or during closing arguments, to this aspect of the plea agreement, or to the difference between the mandatory life sentence without possibility of parole, required by law to be imposéd had Luna been convicted of first-degree murder, and the sentence, any term of years or life with possibility of parole after ten years, that could be imposed in consequence of Luna’s plea of guilty of second-degree murder.
The guideline sentence for Luna, who like Manning had no prior criminal record, was 120 months (ten years) to life. Luna was actually sentenced to ten to twenty years._
*51One of the consequences of the trial court’s decision, after Luna pled guilty, not to grant a severance (mistrial) and a new trial to Manning was that Luna was not sentenced until after Manning was convicted. The jury thus was not informed and was left to "speculate” regarding the extent of the consideration Luna actually received.
The lead opinion states that withholding from the jury the identity of the lesser offense, second-degree murder, of which Luna had pled guilty "could have confused and misled the jury” which then may have "incorrectly speculated that Luna had somehow wriggled out of accepting criminal responsibility for the events to which he testified and had pleaded guilty of some other lesser or entirely different offense,”2 and "that inviting such speculatation is both the purpose and the function of the request to suppress”3 that Luna had pled guilty of second-degree murder. The jury was, however, left to speculate regarding the sentence to be imposed on Luna.
To be sure, immediately before accepting Luna’s plea, the judge informed him that there had been no agreement with regard to the "possible sentence.” Nevertheless, the judge sentenced at precisely the guideline ten-year minimum sentence.
The jury should have been informed, to avoid "confusing,” "misleading” and "speculation,” that a person sentenced to a ten-year minimum sentence will ordinarily be paroled upon serving the ten years less good-time credits, and accordingly would ordinarily be paroled after approximately eight years.
II
The lead opinion states that "[i]n exchange for *52his plea of second-degree murder, and his testimony, the prosecutor dismissed the remaining charges.”4 (Emphasis supplied.) If, as the signers of the lead opinion apparently, with some justification, conclude, a part of the plea agreement was that Luna would testify, that was another aspect of the plea agreement not disclosed to the jury. Nor was the significance of that aspect of the plea agreement disclosed.
If an unstated or implicit condition of the plea agreement was that the prosecutor would recommend sentencing within the guidelines only if Luna gave "truthful” testimony and that, if he did not, the prosecutor would not so recommend, the significance of that condition should have been stated to the jury lest it be confused or misled. If, although there was no explicit "agreement” on the possible sentence, the general practice of the court is to sentence in accordance with the prosecutor’s recommendation if the prosecutor concluded that the testifying accomplice had, in accordance with the unstated but implicit condition, given "truthful” testimony, that practice should have been disclosed to the jury in order to avoid confusing and misleading it. If Luna could only obtain the benefit of the plea bargain and the ten-year minimum sentence, parolable after approximately eight years, by iterating statements that coincided with the prosecutor’s version of the truth, the jury should have been so informed.
hi
Also not disclosed to the jury was that a plea bargain5 was offered to Manning. Ordinarily negotiations for settlement — and sentencing ranges *53also — are not admissible in evidence. Where accomplice testimony is offered against another participant after a plea bargain, there is an innuendo that the prosecutor — who may reduce the charged offense only to serve the ends of justice — believes that the testifying accomplice is telling the truth in implicating the defendant still on trial as the more grievous offender.
The courts admit evidence, otherwise inadmissible, on the ground that the "door has been opened.” The bargain offered Manning, ordinarily inadmissible, should have been admitted to counter the innuendo that the prosecutor had concluded that Manning was more guilty than Luna and therefore had not offered Manning a plea bargain, and so that Manning could counter Luna’s statement, that he pled guilty because he was, "we’re,”6 guilty, with the statement that he, Manning, had rejected the plea bargain because he was not guilty of murder.7
IV
Luna gave conflicting statements.
The evidence of an accomplice, especially in the context of a plea agreement, may be unreliable. In People v McCoy, 392 Mich 231, 236-237; 220 NW2d 456 (1974), this Court recognized that a defendant has the right to have the judge caution the jury concerning the use of accomplice testimony. In an early case this Court said:
We think it is the duty of a judge to comment upon the nature of such testimony [of an accomplice], as the circumstances of the case may re*54quire; to point out the various grounds of suspicion which may attach to it; to call their attention to the various temptations under which such witness may be placed, and the motives by which he may be actuated; and any other circumstances which go to discredit or confirm the witness, all of which must vary with the nature and circumstances of each particular case. [People v Jenness, 5 Mich 305, 330 (1858).]
A criminal jury instruction provides that accomplice testimony should be examined "closely” and accepted "only with caution and care,” that the jury may consider "any reward or inducement offered which may have caused him to testify falsely,” that the court should state what the evidence has shown and enumerate or define the reward,8 and that the jury may "consider whether the testimony was affected by the witness’s being granted immunity from punishment, receiving a promise of leniency, or being allowed to plead guilty to a lesser offense.”9 Such an instruction was not given in the instant case. Nor, I acknowledge, does it appear that such an instruction was requested.
v
The lead opinion states that it is necessary to modify the voucher rule to permit reference to a plea agreement in the circumstances of this case. The voucher rule, as set forth in MRE 607(2)(A), bars the calling party from "attack[ing]” the credibility of a witness. The lead opinion states that the jury was properly permitted to draw a "rehabilitating inference of Luna’s credibility from the fact that he had formally accepted criminal responsibil*55ity for his actions.”10 If the plea agreement was admitted for that purpose, it was not admitted as an "attack” on Luna’s credibility, and the voucher rule was not violated. There is no need to modify MRE 607(2)(A) in order to permit a prosecutor to elicit on direct examination the terms of the plea agreement.
VI
The lead opinion concludes that the jury should have been permitted to draw the rehabilitating inference that Luna had accepted criminal responsibility for second-degree murder, and that the prosecutor properly argued that Luna would not have accepted responsibility for second-degree murder unless he had in fact committed second-degree murder, although, by accepting the plea agreement offered by the prosecutor and performing in accordance with the prosecutor’s understanding of the agreement, Luna was in effect sentenced, in exchange therefor, to serve approximately eight years rather than risking life in prison without possibility of parole.
This Court does not know whether Luna or Manning or either of them told the truth, and cannot determine to what extent Luna’s testimony was shaped by the consideration that was offered and delivered.11
When faced with the alternatives of life in prison without possibility of parole and a far lesser *56sentence, even a person who does not truly believe himself guilty of the charged offense or the lesser plea bargain offense might — possibly on the advice of counsel — agree to whatever the prosecutor demands, lest he spend the rest of his life in prison. Since neither this Court nor the jury can determine — and in all events it is not an, or the, issue— whether Luna truly accepted criminal responsibility for second-degree murder or rather simply accepted punishment of approximately eight years, Luna’s plea of guilty of second-degree murder, rather than of some other lesser offense which would have carried a like minimum term, is of little probative value in rehabilitating Luna’s credibility or otherwise.
I agree therefore with the other dissenting justices that there was no need to inform the jury of the lesser offense, second-degree murder, of which Luna pled guilty. The crux of the plea agreement is not the offense of which Luna pled guilty, but that he had pled guilty of an offense and in return for that plea and his testimony (or "truthful” testimony) he would probably be sentenced to serve approximately eight years, rather than risking life in prison without possibility of parole.
VII
The lead opinion states that the decision whether to grant or deny a motion for mistrial rests in the trial court’s sound discretion, and then dismisses the dissenting opinion without further ado or discussion of what the trial court should consider in informing the exercise of that discretion.
The American Bar Association standard on severance of defendants provides that the court should grant a severance during trial, with the *57consent of the defendant to be severed, where "severance is deemed appropriate to promote a fair determination of the guilt or innocence of one or more defendants,”12 and that in deciding whether severance is required, the court should consider the risk of guilt by association and inconsistent defenses escalating into cross accusations between defendants.13
No reason for not granting a severance (mistrial) appears except the time investment in four days of trial. Surely severance could not properly be denied to delay sentencing Luna until he gave what the prosecutor believed to be "truthful” testimony, or to withhold from the jury the exact sentence concession that he actually received, or to send a message to wise guys who do not accept plea bargains that are a "gift.”
The justice system operates, on the whole, fairly. The appellate courts must, however, vigilantly supervise the expedients, including plea bargaining, developed to move the docket, in the administration of justice, to guard against possible and potential manipulation. In the instant case the prosecutor, armed by the state with far greater resources than the defense, outmaneuvered the defense. The jury was not fully informed of what had actually occurred and of the significance of what had actually occurred. Manning did not receive a fair trial.
The justice system is overburdened, but the four days invested in the joint trial is but a fraction of the over twenty thousand days (55 years) that Manning is likely to be imprisoned without possibility of parole._
*58A fair determination of Manning’s guilt or innocence on the question whether he is guilty of first-degree or second-degree murder or some lesser or other offense requires that he be retried after Luna has been sentenced so that the true consideration for his testimony may be revealed, and confusion, misleading, and speculation avoided. This One Court of Justice can spare him four more days even if the evidence at the retrial proves to be, and I doubt it would be, entirely repetitious of the evidence at the joint trial.

 It does not appear whether Manning’s lawyer was informed of the sentence recommendation term of the plea agreement.

 Ante, p 10.

 Ante, p 10.

 Ante, p 4, n 2.

 The nature of the bargain offered to Manning does not appear.

 Ante, p 6, n 4.

 And, possibly, that Luna had accepted the plea bargain because he was guilty.

 See parts n and in, supra.

 CJI 5:2:03.

 Ante, p 10.

 In People v Wolcott, 51 Mich 612, 615; 17 NW 78 (1883), this Court held inadmissible a confession obtained "by impressing upon the mind of the respondent that it would be better for him, or he would get off easier if he made confession. ... No reliance can be placed upon admissions of guilt so obtained; for the very obvious reason that they are not made because they are true, but because, whether true or false, the accused is led to believe it is for his interest to make them.”

 ABA Standards for Criminal Justice (2d ed), Standard 13-3.2(b)(ii), p 13-34.

 Commentary on Standard 13-2.2, pp 13-17 to 13-21, Standard 13-3.1, pp 13-30 to Í3-34, and Standard 13-3.2, pp 13-35 to 13-38.