Court Opinion

ID: 9678808
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 06:33:02.984605+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:17:08.053213
License: Public Domain

WOLLMAN, Justice
(concurring specialty)-
As the majority opinion points out, SDCL 19-14-7, as adopted by this court in 1978, was taken from Rule 606(b) of the Federal Rules of Evidence. The original draft of Rule 606(b) as prepared by the Advisory Committee, contained a very narrow exclusionary rule. As revised by the Advisory Committee, however, and as submitted to Congress by the United States Supreme Court, Rule 606(b) contained a significantly broader prohibition against juror impeachment of verdicts. Efforts were made in the House of Representatives to narrow the exclusion, but the Senate Judiciary Committee restored the broader exclusion proposed by the Advisory Committee and the Supreme Court, and it was this broadened version that was finally adopted by Congress. See Mueller, “Jurors’ Impeachment of Verdicts and Indictments in Federal Court Under Rule 606(b),” 57 Neb.L.Rev. 920, 928-30 (1978); 3 J. Weinstein & M. Berger, Evidence, 606-2 — 606-9 (1982).
Rule 606(b) as finally adopted thus reflected a conscious, deliberate choice on the part of the Advisory Committee, the Supreme Court, and Congress to limit the scope of post-trial attacks upon verdicts.
What constitutes extraneous prejudicial information or improper outside influence can range from the straightforward, relatively simple case, e.g., newspaper accounts of a defendant’s activities, United States v. McKinney, 429 F.2d 1019 (5th Cir.1970), cert. denied, 401 U.S. 922, 91 S.Ct. 910, 27 L.Ed.2d 825 (1971), to the difficult question presented by the instant case. I say difficult, because since prejudice is so abhorrent to the judicial process there is a temptation to speak in magniloquent terms in expressing our condemnation of it and in fashioning remedies to counteract it.
Read literally, SDCL 19-14-7 would bar the consideration of the proffered affidavit of juror Stabnow (quoted in full in Justice Henderson’s dissent, infra).
But what should be done in terms of Rule 606(b) if a juror has stated that he does not trust convicts, after evidence of a conviction is used to impeach pursuant to Rule 609, or has commented adversely on the religion of a witness, or has referred in an uncomplimentary manner to the length of the defendant’s hair, and proof of these statements if offered on a motion for a new trial? Can proof of these statements or some of these statements be separated from proof of the effect these statements had on the minds of the jurors, or are the two so inextricably interwoven that the entire testimony should be rejected under the Rule? The line may be very difficult to draw. Generally, it seems better to draw it in favor of juror privacy; in .the heat of juror debate all kinds of statements may be made which have little effect on outcome, though taken out of context they seem damning and absurd. The amendments to the 1971 draft discussed in ¶ 606[1], supra, support this interpretation.
3 J. Weinstein & M. Berger, supra, ¶ 606[4], 606-33 — 606-34 (footnotes omitted).
The Supreme Court of Wisconsin has responded to the broad exclusionary bar of Rule 606(b) by recognizing the competing interests of juror privacy and fairness to litigants.
While the rule against impeachment of a jury verdict is strong and necessary, it is not written in stone nor is it a door incapable of being opened. It competes with the desire and duty of the judicial system to avoid injustice and to redress the grievances of private litigants.
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*171The concern for fairness to the parties and monitoring the integrity of the judicial system leads us to conclude that a trial court may, in appropriate circumstances, consider allegations that extraneous prejudicial remarks were made to jurors which were not a part of the judicially guarded evidence they received.
After Hour Welding v. Laneil Management Co., 108 Wis.2d 734,737-39,324 N.W.2d 686, 689-90 (1982) (footnote omitted).**
Prejudice can take many forms. After Hour Welding, supra, 108 Wis.2d at 739, 324 N.W.2d at 690. Although one is loath to chart a hierarchy of prejudices, most would agree that racial prejudice is especially repugnant to the impartiality that is a criminal defendant’s constitutional due.
Notwithstanding the broad sweep of SDCL 19-14-7, then, there may be cases, whether because of inadequate voir dire or otherwise, where evidence of the manifestation of racial prejudice during jury deliberations is so clear cut as to warrant a relaxation of the exclusionary aspects of SDCL 19-14-7. See Smith v. Brewer, 444 F.Supp. 482 (D.S.D.Iowa 1978), aff’d, 577 F.2d 466 (8th Cir.1978), cert. denied, 439 U.S. 967, 99 S.Ct. 457,58 L.Ed.2d 426 (1978). As Professor Mueller has written:
Serious and sensitive problems may arise if it can be made to appear that a verdict was the product of egregious racial or ethnic prejudice. If proof to this end depends upon the testimony or statements of one or more jurors after the verdict, Rule 606(b) stands as a potential bar, since such proof arguably goes to the “effect” of something upon the minds of such jurors, or the “mental processes” of these jurors. On the other hand, it is again at least arguable that such considerations amount to “outside influence” as to which impeaching evidence should be allowed.
... Clearly the counsel of the rule, however, is to be conservative in the approach to such problems and to err upon the side of exclusion rather than receipt of evidence in close cases.
57 Neb.L.Rev. at 942-43 (footnotes omitted).
Pace the dissenting opinion, it draws more inferences from juror Stabnow’s affidavit than that document will properly yield. The force of affidavit is largely vitiated by the fact that juror Stabnow was attempting to recant her vote. Under the broadest possible reading of SDCL 19-14U7, she would not be permitted to do so. As Judge Hanson said in his thoughtful, thorough opinion in Smith v. Brewer, supra:
Mrs. Elliott’s statements relative to the pressures put upon her to change her vote are similarly barred from consideration. Though Mrs. Elliott claims to have been subjected to strong pressure from other jurors, that fact constitutes neither extraneous information nor improper influence to which she could testify. Furthermore, it is too late in the day to assert that Mrs. Elliott was intimidated into joining in the guilty verdict against her will. After the jury returned its verdict, Mrs. Elliott and the other jurors were asked by the trial judge whether the verdict was the decision of each member of the jury. Mrs. Elliott remained silent and thereby assented to the verdict. Under these circumstances, the opportunity for Mrs. Elliott to renounce the verdict has passed.
444 F.Supp. 482, 488 (citations omitted). So also, juror Stabnow will not now be belatedly heard to deny the vote she affirmed when the jury was polled.
Excising the self-serving portions of the affidavit, then, we are left with juror Stab-now’s bald statement that extreme racial prejudice was expressed throughout the deliberations and that the jury did not look at the facts in the case. The only specific reference to any racial comments by the members of the jury are her allegations *172that she had been accused by her fellow jurors of being racially prejudiced in such a manner as to not want to convict defendant. If in fact the other jurors made this statement, was it anything more than a part of the normal give and take of jury deliberations? Indeed, was it anything more than an appeal to juror Stabnow to decide the case on the basis of the evidence and not on the basis of her racial affinity with the defendant? I would answer no to both questions.
In the light of the legislative history of Rule 606(b) and in the light of the strong policy considerations in favor of maintaining the privacy of jury deliberations, I conclude that juror Stabnow’s affidavit does not warrant a relaxation of the exclusionary provisions of SDCL 19-14-7, and I therefore join in affirming the judgment of conviction.

 My reference to this case does not necessarily signal my agreement with all that the Wisconsin court said and held therein. I am not so sure that I would relax the bar of SDCL 19-14-7 in civil cases, nor do I necessarily agree with the procedure prescribed to be followed by the trial court.