Court Opinion

ID: 9457814
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 20:33:47.532924+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:35:31.105815
License: Public Domain

KILEY, Circuit Judge
(dissenting).
I respectfully dissent. I start with the view that there is barely enough evidence prima facie to take to the jury the question of Grooms’ participation in the frustrated attempt of Figge and Bayer to escape arrest for the bank robbery.
The only evidence presented at trial is the testimony of officers Dummet and Hess identifying Grooms as driver of the Plymouth ear during the elusive maneuver to avoid the first roadblock. Dummet and Hess were unable to stop the Plymouth as it passed, but in pursuit caught up to the white Ford which they stopped. The officers arrested and handcuffed Figge who was in the Ford. During this time the Plymouth was driven to the second roadblock three miles distant from the first roadblock. Bayer was arrested running from the Plymouth which had overturned in attempting to avoid the second block.
The theory of the government’s proof was that some place between the roadblocks Grooms got out of the Plymouth, and Bayer got up from his Plymouth hiding place and took over as driver. If the Plymouth did not reach the second roadblock — three miles away — for 25 minutes, the theory would have some support. But there is nothing in the evidence to show that 25 minutes elapsed after the police stopped the Ford and arrested and handcuffed Figge, and the overturning of the Plymouth and Bayer’s arrest three miles away. The only testimony on that point is that of officers Dummet and Hess that it took 15 minutes for them to stop the white Ford and take Figge into custody. While the police were chasing Figge, the Plymouth was presumably speeding three miles toward the second roadblock. It was stipulated at trial that an officer at the second roadblock, if he testified, would have stated that the Plymouth was approaching at 90 miles an hour.
No one saw Grooms at the second roadblock, or until he appeared later in the day at the police station. Bayer’s fingerprints, not Grooms’, were on the Plymouth. Agent Stratton testified that Figge and Bayer told him Grooms was not with them the day of the robbery, but had been before that day. Strat-*1314ton’s first impression was that the identification of Grooms as the Plymouth driver was mistaken, although later investigation changed that impression. Nor is there any good reason shown why, in the three mile drive between the two roadblocks, Bayer, who was armed, permitted Grooms to get out of the Plymouth and escape, instead of escaping himself. Normally one does not expect such altruism among thieves.
It is clear that at best this was a thin case1 for the government. The weak link was in the government’s proof of the strange chain of events in which Grooms was identified by the two policemen as driver of the Plymouth, then disappeared as into thin air during the three mile drive to the second roadblock at 90 miles an hour. The police officer’s weak identification is the only testimony adduced to connect Grooms to the alleged crime. This weak link was firmed up by the prosecutor’s argument to the jury.
It was in the evidentiary context discussed above that the prosecutor, in my view, made prejudicial argument to the jury. As a prelude to the discussion of the argument it should be pointed out that in cross-examination of agent Stratton, Grooms’ counsel asked, “What did you do?” The answer, “Well, I asked Mr. Figge and Mr. Bayer if he was on the robbery with them.” He then volunteered, “They said ‘No.’ I sajd, ‘Did he know about it?’ They said ‘Yes. He was supposed to go with us but this morning when we left for the robbery we didn’t go pick him up. He was in on the planning all the way. He agreed to go on it.’ ” The volunteered testimony given in answer to the question was stricken on motion of Grooms’ counsel and the jury was instructed to disregard what Figge and Bayer had told Stratton.
Later the prosecutor stated to the jury:
A. “I believe that he drove that change car.”
B. “We have a confession from this man that he planned the bank robbery, he went over the getaway route.” Grooms’ counsel objected that there was no confession nor evidence that Grooms had planned any getaway. He stated that agent Stratton used the word “discussion.” The district court said “It is an admission.” The prosecutor then stated, “All right ... he admitted that he planned it.” The argument went on:
C. “I leave to you . . . whether or not this man is guilty whom I believe to be guilty. ...”
A.
The argument that the prosecutor believed Grooms drove the Plymouth was highly improper. I need not go as far as the court in Greenberg v. United States, 280 F.2d 472 (1st Cir. 1960), and hold that the naked statement is reversible error. It is enough that I think that the prosecutor’s belief may have been the basis upon which the jury inferred that although the testimony as to Grooms’ participation was weak, the prosecutor had some knowledge that the jury did not have that Grooms was the driver of the Plymouth and had thus participated in the robbery as an aider and abettor. This possibility is strengthened by the unexplained change of Stratton’s original impression that officers Dummet and Hess were mistaken in their identity of Grooms. There is no evidence of what was discovered in a later investigation testified to by Strat-ton as to what changed his original impression to coincide with the views of Dummet and Hess.
*1315B.
Agent Stratton testified that Grooms told him that he had “several conversations [with Figge and Bayer] about the robbery but denied that he had at any time agreed to go on the robbery;” and that Grooms admitted “that he had several discussions with them” about the robbery. Agent Vornberger testified that Grooms told him that he had discussed this “robbery with Bayer and Figge” and also said “But I wasn’t there.” Neither agent said Grooms had used the word “planned” or admitted he had planned the robbery. The first use of the word “planned” was in a leading question the prosecutor put to Stratton on rebuttal, “Did Mr. Grooms admit to you . . . that he had discussed and planned the bank robbery with Figge?” Objection to the word “planned” was overruled. Then Stratton, in answering the question, for the first time said “planned.” Again an objection failed. Stratton then said, “I asked him whether ... he had gone over the planned getaway . and he admitted that he had with Figge.” Twenty-six pages later in the transcript the prosecutor capped the insinuations by asserting, “He [Grooms] admitted planning the robbery.” This progressive expansion of what Grooms said to Stratton and Vorn-berger was unfair, and suggests — in view of the prelude mentioned at the beginning of this discussion of arguments — an anxiety to insinuate that Grooms aided and abetted the robbery by use of the word “planning” in voluntary answers of government witnesses as well as in argument. The volunteered answer was stricken, but seems to have achieved its purpose.
C.
Shortly after that capping statement —mentioned above — the prosecutor told the jury his belief that Grooms was guilty. This is improper argument. See Greenberg v. United States, supra,, 280 F.2d at 475, n. 3. The personal opinion of the prosecutor is not an issue for the jury. United States v. Handman, 447 F.2d 853, 856 (7th Cir. 1971).
I express no view upon the guilt or innocence of Grooms. It is my opinion that he was denied a fair trial because the government presented a weak evi-dentiary case which was buttressed with what has appearances of deliberate use of a prejudicial vapor created by insinuation, exaggeration and argument.' I would reverse the conviction and order a new trial.

. I recognize, however, that even though the identification of Grooms as the Plymouth’s driver is weak in itself, it is not inherently improbable or physically impossible. But the identification testimony is weakened further when considered in the framework of other circumstances at the trial which I shall now discuss.