Court Opinion

ID: 9648172
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 14:07:03.644924+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:11:56.819073
License: Public Domain

WILLIAMSON, Chief Justice
(dissenting).
I would sustain the exception to the refusal to grant a mistrial.
The State offered the witness Palmer who repeatedly refused to answer on the ground that he would thereby incriminate himself. The pertinent parts of the record are included herein. (1) In my opinion inferences which might reasonably be expected to be drawn by the jury from the examination of the witness were prejudicial and were not erased by the instructions to the jury.
For convenience I set forth certain bases for my reasoning:
First: The witness Palmer had the right under the circumstances to invoke the privilege by refusing to testify. The Court made it amply clear that Palmer was acting within his constitutional rights. Fifth Amendment, U. S. Constitution; Art. I, Sec. 6, Maine Constitution.
Second: The right to invoke the privilege was the right of the witness, and not the right of the defendant. I pass the question whether Palmer was properly considered a hostile witness subject to the techniques of cross examination. Hostility of a witness is not determined, as I see it, by the valid invoking of a constitutional right. My dissent, however, does not rest on this point.
Third: The State offered the witness to establish material facts bearing upon the defendant’s guilt. Otherwise there would have been no purpose in placing him upon the stand. In short, if Palmer had answered the leading questions affirmatively, the State would thereby have added evidence of value, i. e. the substance of Palmer’s statement to the police, to substantiate the charge against the defendant.
Fourth: The prosecution did not know when the witness took the stand that he would invoke the privilege.
As I read the record, shortly after the start of the direct examination the prosecution knew, or plainly should have known, that the witness would refuse to answer questions and would be within his constitutional right in exercising the privilege. I place this point at the refusal to answer whether he made a statement to the police, and surely no later than at the refusal to answer whether the statement was in connection with the defendant Small.
Thereafter the prosecution sought to get before the jury the substance of the statement not by admissible evidence but through the questioning.
It is said that the witness did not testify at all except in answer to a few innocuous questions (1). Strictly it is correct to say that a question with no answer, as here, equals- no testimony. The root of our problem, I suggest, is deeper.
*270When the course the witness would pursue became apparent, the State, in my view, committed error in pressing the examination. I have no concern for the witness. He chose to remain silent, in the exercise of his privilege, and must bear whatever inferences we may care to draw from his conduct.
I am, however, unable to escape the conclusion that the repeated blows of the prosecuting attorney’s leading questions forced home to the jury the points which the State unsuccessfully sought to extract from the lips of the witness.
If it be said that the jury did not know the examination was from a statement by the witness, it is sufficient, as I see it, to note the early inquiry about such a statement. Further, the Court said that “the County Attorney was reading the questions from a written and signed statement.” The Court knew the fact, whether or not it was known to the jury; and the fact bears on the course and purpose of the questioning.
I conclude, therefore, that there was prejudicial error by the prosecution in the repeated questioning of the witness Palmer. The jury, quite naturally it seems to me, might infer that the prosecution was asking questions to which it had reason to expect affirmative answers, and that the witness was hiding facts harmful to the defendant.
Palmer’s refusal to testify could not, of course, properly be the basis of findings against the defendant; and yet this may have been the result upon this record.
Was the prejudicial error in the examination cured by the charge ? The instructions were unexceptionable. The Court did all that could be done at that stage of the case to remove the questioning of Palmer from the minds of. the jurors.
I firmly believe that in most cases the Court may correct errors arising at trial by instructions to the jury, and that jurors “take the law” from the Court. There comes a point, however, at which fair minded men and women would find it difficult, if not impossible, to exclude from their minds the repeated leading questions directly bearing on guilt of the accused with the repeated refusal of the witness to testify on the ground of self incrimination.
I think the critical point was reached and passed in the case at bar.
In my view the case comes within the principle of Douglas v. State of Alabama, 380 U.S. 415, 85 S.Ct. 1074, 13 L.Ed.2d 934 (1965). The differences in fact do not seem to me sufficient to make the principles here inapplicable. See also: Namet v. United States, 373 U.S. 179, 83 S.Ct. 1151, 10 L.Ed.2d 278 (1963); Fletcher v. United States, 118 U.S.App.D.C. 137, 332 F.2d 724 (1964); United States v. Maloney, 262 F.2d 535 (CA-2-1959); Com. v. Granito, 326 Mass. 494, 95 N.E.2d 539 (1950); State v. Dinsio, 176 Ohio St. 460, 200 N.E.2d 467 (1964); Anno. 86 A.L.R.2d 1443.
The cases above, I add, give more weight to the effectiveness of the “curative charge” than do I on the present facts.
On reading again the record (1), I remain convinced that the shield against self-incrimination properly in Palmer’s hands under both Federal and State Constitutions, became through error a sword in the hands of the State against the defendant; that the error was not cured by the charge; and that the defendant should be entitled to a new trial.
On the other issues in the case, I join in the opinion of the Court.
(1)
THE RECORD
At the request of the Court, the witness Palmer was advised of his constitutional rights by a member of the Bar. He was then called, sworn and testified as follows:
To each unanswered question he stated, “I refuse to answer on the ground that it might incriminate me”.
*271“DIRECT EXAMINATION
BY MR. STEARNS: (County Attorney)
Q Speak right up, Mr. Palmer. State your full name.
A Richard Alfred Palmer.
Q How old are you ?
A 26.
Q Where do you reside ?
A Thomaston State Prison.
Q How long have you been in Thom-aston State Prison?
A 22 days.
Q Where did you reside formerly to Thomaston State Prison?
A I was at 107 Sheridan Street and at 108 High Street.
Q When you lived at 108 High Street, did you live alone?
Q Now, on June 4th, 1964, did you have occasion to he in the Portland Police Station?
Q On that day, did you make a statement to the Portland Police ?
Q Was this statement that I ask you about in connection with a case against Clifford J. Small, III?
Q On the night or the early morning hours of June 4th, 1964, was Clifford J. Small, III, in your car?
Q Do you know Clifford G. Small, III?
A Yes, sir.
Q See him in the Courtroom now?
A Yes, sir.
Q Point him out to the Jury.
A Gentleman right over there, sitting down. (Indicating)
Q Did you leave Clifford Small off at the corner of State and Congress Streets ?
Q Did you see him later at the Forest City Diner?
Q Were you at the Forest City Diner about 1:30, 2:00 on the morning of June 4, 1964?
Q Did Clifford Small come into the Forest City Diner after you left him off uptown?
MR. TEVANIAN: (Counsel for Defendant) If Your Honor please, I submit this man has taken the Fifth Amendment. It seems to me my brother is using leading questions and getting to the Jury what he probably may have hoped this man’s testimony would be. I object to the form of the questions.
THE COURT: I think under the circumstances the degree of leading being indulged in is permissible under the rules. Overruled.
Q I ask you, down in the Forest City Diner shortly after you left Mr. Small off uptown, did he give you some money ?
MR. TEVANIAN: I would object, if Your Honor please, to the form of the question on the grounds that my brother is by his leading—
THE COURT: Overruled.
Q Did he give you some money down there ?
Q Did you see any policeman down in the Forest City Diner?
Q Did you tell .Mr. Small to go to the men’s room down there that night because there were policemen outside ?
‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡
Q While you were down at the Forest City Diner with Mr. Small at about *2722:15 in the morning of June 4th, 1964, didn’t he say to you he smashed a guy ?
MR. TEVANIAN: I object, Your Hon- or, and I have a motion I would like to make at side bar.
THE COURT: Overruled. ■ The witness may answer.
MR. TEVANIAN: Might my objections be noted to all this line of questioning in this matter?
THE COURT: Certainly. I don’t think you can do that under the rules. I think you will have to make them. Your objection to this question is noted.
Q Now, after you got back down in the Forest City Diner, did you notice anything wrong with Mr. Small’s hand?
MR. TEVANIAN: I object.
THE COURT: Overruled.
MR. TEVANIAN: I have no questions. I would move the Court to instruct the Jury that all of the questions that were read into the record by my brother, the County Attorney, I would ask the Court to instruct the Jury they are to be disregarded and not to be construed in any form or manner as evidence in this case.
THE COURT: I don’t think this is an appropriate time for requested instructions. At a more appropriate time, the circumstances of this witness will be described to the Jury.
******
(In Chambers without the hearing of the Jury the following took place:)
******
MR. TEVANIAN: I would' like to make a motion for a mistrial that the questions read by the County Attorney are so harmful and prejudicial that they can’t possibly be cured by a charge. And the evidence is so weak it couldn’t possible sustain a conviction.
THE COURT: I deny your motion for a directed verdict. I am sure, for the record, you do not suggest that the County Attorney’s statements were without foundation. You are aware, I am certain, because you were shown the statement, that the County Attorney was reading the questions from a written and signed statement given by the witness at the Police Department at the time of his arrest, so it isn’t a situation of a prosecutor who asks wild questions without any basis. I deny your motion for a mistrial.”
FROM CHARGE TO JURY:
“In this case, also, a witness was called —I believe his name was Palmer. If I am correct in my recollection, he testified that at the moment he was an inmate of Maine State Prison. He testified as to his name, and in answer to a direct question testified that he knew this respondent. He was asked several other questions. In reply to those several other questions he responded in substance that he refused to testify on the grounds that to do so would tend to incriminate him. In common parlance, he invoked the provisions of the Fifth Amendment of the Constitution of the United States and the applicable provisions of the Constitution of Maine guaranteeing one against self-incrimination. In doing what he did, he was but exercising a constitutionally guaranteed right beyond giving his name, beyond stating that he once lived in Portland, or sometime lived in Portland — I think that is what he said —and beyond stating that he was presently an inmate at the Maine State Prison in Thomason, Maine, he gave no other testimony.” [The remainder of the charge on this point is quoted in the opinion of the Court.].