Court Opinion

ID: 9466845
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 01:30:28.033414+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:40:00.715179
License: Public Domain

BOWNES, Circuit Judge
(dissenting).
At the outset, I suggest that when we say that we are determining whether a nondisclosure “could ... in any reasonable likelihood have affected the judgment of the jury,” Napue v. Illinois, 360 U.S. 264, 271, 79 S.Ct. 1173, 1178, 3 L.Ed.2d 1271 (1959), we are engaging in a legal fiction. We are really deciding whether it would have affected our own judgment. There is no way that we can determine how twelve jurors would have reacted if the state had lived up to its duty of conducting a fair prosecution by revealing the full details of the deal when Carita took the stand. The real question is whether the defendant was deprived of a fair trial.
The basic facts are undisputed. Prior to testifying, a New Hampshire sheriff, with the assistance of the state’s Attorney General’s office, promised Carita that, in return for testifying, certain steps would be taken to protect him. At the close of direct examination, the trial prosecutor deliberately asked Carita whether any promises or inducements had been made. His negative answer was a flat lie. At this point, the prosecutor had a duty to immediately disclose to the judge and jury the bargain that had been struck between the state and the witness. The failure to do so was compounded when the prosecutor in closing argument again stated that there was no deal.
The suggestion made on appeal that the trial prosecutor did not know of the promises made to Carita by the state cannot be taken seriously. If he did not know, then he was either grossly negligent or the members of his office who actively participated in the bargaining concealed it from him. Either way, the New Hampshire Attorney General’s office presents a sorry picture.
I agree with my brethren that the cross-examination did inform the jury that some sort of a bargain had been made prior to the witness testifying. It is anomalous that what saves the verdict for the state is the cross-examination of defense counsel. Had defense counsel relied on the integrity of the state and not explored the issue of state promises in return for testimony, there is no doubt that a new trial would be required. If it were not for the prosecutor’s remarks in closing argument, I would agree that, despite the palpable misconduct of the Attorney General’s office, the defendant, due to the cross-examination of his attorney, received a fair trial. However, for me, the direct suggestion by the prosecutor to the jury at the close of the case that there was no deal tips the scale. In my opinion, defendant was deprived of his sixth amendment right to a fair trial because of prose-cutorial misconduct.