Court Opinion

ID: 9586062
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 23:06:51.761987+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:24:19.676120
License: Public Domain

Fletcher, Presiding Justice,
dissenting.
Because the trial court’s instructions to the jury during its deliberations in the sentencing phase were improperly coercive, I dissent.
It is a fundamental precept that a jury’s verdict should be reached freely, without coercion or undue pressure; the jury must be “free from any seeming or real coercion on the part of the court.”3 This Court and the United States Supreme Court have recognized that the concern for an uncoerced verdict is especially important in a capital sentencing trial, in which the state is seeking the ultimate punishment.4 In reviewing a claim of jury coercion, an appellate court must examine the totality of the circumstances in order to determine if a trial court’s statements were coercive.5
On the second day of deliberations and after six hours of deliberations in the sentencing phase, the jury sent the judge a note that announced that it was at an 11 to 1 deadlock in favor of death and asked how to fill out the verdict form. The trial court read the note in open court and told the jury to continue its deliberations. After a lunch break and another three hours of deliberating, the jury sent a second note reiterating a “hopeless deadlock with no hope of resolution” and stating that “all minds are closed.” The trial court responded by giving an “Allen”6
7charge substantially similar to the one approved in Romine v. State7 and dismissed the jury for the evening.
*847The following morning at 9:00 a.m. the jury began its third day of deliberations in the sentencing phase. At 10:25 the trial court informed counsel that it had received a note from the foreman and one from juror Fisher. The note from the foreman sought a transcript of the voir dire and a definition of peijury and its penalties, even though peijury was not remotely relevant to the issues in the sentencing phase. The note from juror Fisher revealed that she felt that she was being singled out and specifically sought assistance from the trial judge in dealing with the foreman’s threat to review Fisher’s voir dire responses for peijury. In responding to these notes, the trial court identified Fisher by name. Despite the plea from Fisher alerting the trial court to the threats made against her, the trial court made only an ambiguous statement that it would not read the voir dire or define peijury.
These final two notes revealed a serious personal conflict within the jury room, which the evidence on remand confirmed. The foreman’s note strongly suggests a threat of a peijury prosecution against the holdout juror based on her responses during voir dire. Fisher’s note reveals that she was aware of the foreman’s concerns regarding her voir dire answers and was seeking some assistance from the court. The other jurors were also made aware of the peijury threat and against whom it was made when the trial court revealed the contents of the notes in open court before the whole panel and identified the holdout juror by name.
The most troubling aspect of this case is that the trial court ignored the specter of a peijury prosecution while forcing continued deliberations. The trial court has a duty to respond to jury questions and provide guidance when jurors’ threats to one another come to its attention.8 Here the trial court did nothing to inform the jury that it should not concern itself with peijury or other extraneous issues or that a juror’s response to voir dire questions was irrelevant to the current deliberations regarding a sentence. The statements the trial court did make provided little guidance to the jury. The explanation of a foreman’s duties was open-ended and did nothing to dispel the threat of a peijury prosecution against juror Fisher. The trial court’s response could not have prevented Fisher “from abandon [ing] an honest conviction for reasons other than those based upon the trial or the arguments of other jurors.”9 Fisher’s testimony on remand con*848firms that Fisher changed her vote not because of the arguments of the other jurors related to the evidence and the applicable law but because of the perjury threat and personal insults.
Additionally, even though the final two notes were the third declaration of a deadlock by the jury, the trial court returned the jury to its deliberations without making an inquiry as to whether the jury had made any progress since its first declaration of an 11-1 split for death. The record reveals that the trial court also failed to consider whether the jurors believed that further deliberations would be of assistance, whether the jury was so exhausted that the minority might be induced to vote for a verdict that they did not truly support, or the length and complexity of the trial.10 Instead the trial court required further deliberations without any instruction that each juror listen to and consider the views of the others and that a juror should not surrender honest convictions in order to be congenial or to reach a verdict solely because of the opinions of the other jurors. 11 The failure to include these cautionary statements weighs in favor of a finding of coercion.12
Another relevant circumstance is that the jury revealed the nature of its division and the trial court reiterated the precise division in its comments to the jury. In Brasfield v. United States,13 the United States Supreme Court held that it was reversible error for a trial court to ask a jury the nature of its split. A rationale for this rule is that the jury’s knowledge of the judge’s awareness of the exact division will color the jury’s understanding of any of the judge’s instructions.14 This danger is present even when the jury volunteers its division, as in this case.15 Fisher’s testimony on remand is illustrative of this problem. She testified that because the judge kept sending them back for more deliberations when the judge knew the vote was 11-1 for death, she (Fisher) believed the judge wanted her to vote for death.
*849Decided March 15, 1999 —
Reconsideration denied April 2,1999.
Carlton C. Carter, Tanya Greene, Julian M. Treadaway, Ray B. Gary, Jr., for appellant.
Benjamin F. Smith, District Attorney, Jack E. Mallard, Debra H. Bernes, Nancy I. Jordan, Assistant District Attorneys, Thurbert E. Baker, Attorney General, Mary Beth Westmoreland, Deputy Attorney General, Susan V. Boleyn, Senior Assistant Attorney General, for appellee.
Another circumstance to consider is that after the court responded to the final two notes, the jury reached its verdict in less than four hours, which included a lunch break. This time period of approximately three hours is not long enough to dispel any concerns regarding coercion, especially in view of the fact that the jury’s deliberations for the previous IOV2 hours over three days had produced no signs of progress.16
Considering the totality of these circumstances, I conclude that the trial court’s failure to address directly the threat against the holdout juror coupled with its insistence that the jury continue deliberating without meaningful guidance resulted in a coercive effect and I would reverse and remand for a retrial of the sentencing phase.
I am authorized to state that Chief Justice Benham and Justice Sears join in this dissent.

 Riggins v. State, 226 Ga. 381, 384 (174 SE2d 908) (1970); Moore v. State 222 Ga. 748, 753 (152 SE2d 570) (1966).

 See Riggins, 226 Ga. at 384; Lowenfield v. Phelps, 484 U.S. 231, 241 (108 SC 546, 98 LE2d 568) (1988) (“Any criminal defendant, and especially any capital defendant, being tried by a jury is entitled to the uncoerced verdict of that body”).

 Jenkins v. United States, 380 U.S. 445, 446 (85 SC 1059, 13 LE2d 957) (1965).

 See Allen v. United States, 164 U.S. 492 (17 SC 154, 41 LE 528) (1896).

 256 Ga. 521, 523 (350 SE2d 446) (1986).

 See Edwards v. State, 233 Ga. 625, 626 (212 SE2d 802) (1975); United States v. Norton, 867 F.2d 1354, 1364-1365 (11th Cir. 1989) (finding no coercion where juror wrote note stating he was under duress from other jurors and court advised juror he was not compelled to vote under duress); People v. Lavender, 502 N.Y.S.2d 439 (N.Y. App. Div. 1986) (reversing where juror reported assault threat by another juror and trial court failed to respond).

 McMillan v. State, 253 Ga. 520, 523 (322 SE2d 278) (1984).

 Romine, 256 Ga. at 526; Thornton v. State, 145 Ga. App. 793, 795 (245 SE2d 22) (1978).

 Romine, 256 Ga. at 523.

 See United States v. Berroa, 46 F.3d 1195, 1197 (D.C. Cir. 1995) (instructing jury that a juror should not surrender honest convictions is an important element of an “Allen” charge and should not be omitted); United States v. Spann, 997 F.2d 1513, 1519 (D.C. Cir. 1993) (Wald, J., concurring) (the “saving grace for the charge was its conscientious, repeated insistence that a juror not surrender an honest conviction”); Jiminez v. Myers, 40 F.3d 976, 981 (9th Cir. 1993) (failure to counterbalance questions and comments regarding jury’s division with instructions not to surrender sincere convictions supports finding of impermissible coercion).

 272 U.S. 448 (47 SC 135, 71 LE 345) (1926).

 See United States v. Sae-Chua, 725 F.2d 530, 531 (9th Cir. 1984).

 See Williams v. United States, 338 F.2d 530, 532-533 (D.C. Cir. 1964) (voluntary disclosure of numerical division).

 Compare Lowenfield, 484 U.S. at 240 (fact that jury returned death sentence soon after receiving supplemental instruction suggests the possibility of coercion).