Court Opinion

ID: 9850230
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 04:53:47.614142+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:20:33.456838
License: Public Domain

HENDERSON, Justice
(concurring specially).
In the trial court’s Instruction No. 4 to the jury, the trial court admonished the jury: “You must not consider as evidence *435any statement of counsel made during the trial.”
In the trial court’s Instruction No. 5 to the jury, the trial court advised the jury:
At the conclusion of the reading of these instructions, the attorneys for the respective parties will present to you their arguments of the case for your assistance in coming to a decision. The order of their appearance and the length of the time of their arguments is regulated by the Court. Statements, arguments, and remarks of counsel are intended to help you in understanding the evidence and applying the law as set forth in these instructions, but they are not evidence. You should disregard any such utterance that has no basis in the evidence. However, an admission of fact by an attorney for a party is binding on that party, (emphasis supplied)
These curative instructions sufficiently called the jury’s attention to the premise that the statements of defendant’s counsel were to be disregarded as evidence when the statements had no basis in the evidence.
In a civil action, plaintiff has opening and closing arguments. Before plaintiff’s final closing argument, plaintiff’s counsel made a motion for a mistrial based upon his adversary’s arguments. I would construe this to be timely. To my way of thinking, simply waiting until your adversary completes his argument, going into chambers and immediately making a motion is a timely objection. Immediately upon conclusion of defendant’s closing argument, plaintiff’s counsel made his motion for a mistrial before the court in chambers. I believe this was timely. I therefore cannot agree with the majority opinion’s language which would require counsel to immediately stand up and object.
In Peters v. Hoisington, 72 S.D. 542, 37 N.W.2d 410 (1949), no objection was made to wrongful arguments until the jury retired. This was deemed to be untimely. The facts in this case distinguish it from Peters v. Hoisington, supra.
State v. Husman, 66 S.D. 530, 287 N.W. 30 (1939), addresses the general issue of improper arguments and conduct of counsel. In that case, the defendant complained of certain alleged misconduct of the state’s attorney in presenting the case to the jury. With one exception, counsel made no objection at the time the alleged improper remarks were made. The court was not requested to caution the jury against the force of such remarks. No exception appears to have been taken. Bluntly, counsel in State v. Husman, supra, did not protect his record. I would hold in this case that the plaintiff’s counsel did protect his record. Before a 11 of the arguments were heard in this case, and before the case was submitted to the jury, plaintiff’s counsel objected to his adversary’s arguments and made a record in chambers of the court. He made a motion for a mistrial.
State v. Husman, supra, quoted the language used in State v. Christensen, 46 S.D. 61, 67, 190 N.W. 777, 779 (1922), with approval:
“We think it was the duty of the defendant, if he desired to save this exception for the appellate court, to challenge by a proper objection the statement made by the state’s attorney and obtain a ruling upon the objection thereto, and that the defendant should then request the trial court to give a proper instruction thereon; and, failing to do so, he cannot now be heard to complain. State v. Knudson, 21 N.D. 562, 132 N.W. 149, and authorities cited therein.” 66 S.D. at 534, 287 N.W. at 32.
Then, in State v. Husman, supra, this court expressed:
This court adhered to the same rule in the case of Behseleck v. Andrus, et al., 60 S.D. 204, 244 N.W. 268, 270, 88 A.L.R. 596, wherein it said, “For the purposes of review upon appeal, it is too late to take exceptions to argument of counsel to the jury after the jury had retired," and noted with approval the . . . case of Crumpton v. United States, [citation omitted] [which the majority cites herein]. 66 S.D. at 534, 287 N.W. at 32.
*436The point that I make is that counsel has not waived objection to improper argument if he makes his objection and record before the jury retires. See Graham v. Simplex Motor Rebuilders, Inc., 191 Neb. 320, 215 N.W.2d 641 (1974). There is still time for the attorney making the misstatement and the court to rectify the damage.
It was wrong for counsel to argue as he so argued. He conceded this before the Supreme Court in his oral argument. Counsel acknowledged that his remarks were error but insisted that they were not prejudicial and that his adversary’s objections were untimely.
I cannot agree that the objections of plaintiff’s counsel were untimely and I must therefore depart from the majority opinion in this regard. I do believe, however, that the curative instructions given by the trial judge in this case aptly put before the jury an admonition that such type of arguments were not evidence and should be disregarded. The instructions were not requested by plaintiff’s counsel; the court unilaterally gave them. In these situations, I would espouse that it is preferable to: (a) object to the misstatements in open court; (b) make a motion for mistrial in chambers; and (c) if the motion is denied, to specifically request an instruction.
Reviewing the arguments and the record as a whole, I could not reverse for misconduct of counsel unless I was convinced that the misconduct had a prevailing influence upon the jury to the detriment of the plaintiff. See 75 Am.Jur.2d § 315 (1974). In an agriculturally dominated county, the prevailing influence upon the jury was not the conduct of the lawyer in closing arguments; rather, it was the conduct of the farmer in feeding silage containing killing prussic acid to his cattle.