Court Opinion

ID: 9464445
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 23:33:29.130882+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:38:37.939573
License: Public Domain

PELL, Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
Occasionally a judicial opinion affirming a criminal conviction will contain the observation that a defendant has no constitutional entitlement to a perfect trial but merely to a fair trial.1 The appellant in the case before us did not in my opinion have a fair trial in the constitutional sense and I therefore respectfully dissent.
In arriving at my firm belief that the appellant was deprived of a fair trial I need look no further than the first two issues discussed in the majority opinion, which when considered in tandem, although in reverse order from that in the majority opinion, demonstrate quite clearly, in my opinion, that the appellant was prevented from a meaningful presentation of what might well have been a successful defense of the criminal charge of murder.
Rooney was convicted in 1966 after a state court jury trial of murder. He was sentenced to a term of imprisonment of not less than 50 nor more than 99 years. There is no question that he intentionally fired the gun which caused the death of George “Stormy” Harvill and that on the occasion of the fatal shots he was aiming the gun at Harvill. Other than the defense of mental incompetency which he did not claim, Rooney’s only defense would appear to be that of self-defense, which he attempted to assert but unsuccessfully so because the trial judge had concluded “there was no evidence *527there was any assault to entitle him to use self-defense.”
In considering the present matter I agree that applicable state law is as propounded by the district court in its Memorandum and Order:
Under Illinois Law self-defense is an affirmative defense, and in order for the Defendant to present such a defense, he must present some evidence thereon. Ch. 38 Ill.Stats.Anno., § 3-2, § 7-14. Once some evidence of self-defense is offered by a defendant, the burden devolves upon the State to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Defendant’s activities were not justified by self-defense. People v. St. Pierre, 25 Ill.App.3rd 644, 324 N.E.2d 226 (1975). Self-defense (or defense of a third person) is defined in the Illinois Criminal Code as follows:
“A person is justified in the use of force against another when and to the extent that he reasonably believes that such conduct is necessary to defend himself or another against such other’s imminent use of unlawful force. However, he is justified in the use of force which is intended or likely to cause death or great bodily harm only if he reasonably believes that such force is necessary to prevent imminent death or great bodily harm to himself or another, or the commission of a forcible felony.” Ch. 38, Ill.Stats.Anno., § 7-1. Thus, the person asserting that he act-
ed in self-defense must show:
(1) That he was not the aggressor;
(2) That the danger of harm was a present one, not merely threatened at a future time, or without the present ability of carrying out the threat;
(3) That the force threatened was unlawful — either criminal or tortious;
(4) That he actually believed the danger existed, that his use of force was necessary to avert the danger, and that the kind and amount of force which he used was necessary; and
(5) That his belief, in each of the aspects described, was reasonable even if it was mistaken. The privilege extends to the protection not only of the person using the force, but of another individual unlawfully threatened with harm.
I now turn to the evidence in this case in the light of the above applicable law. Shortly after 2 a. m., Rooney and Anita Sarro approached in Rooney’s automobile a small duplex house in which Sarro resided with her two children, ages 9 and 12, children by a marriage prior to that with Harvill. She had been divorced from Harvill for approximately one month at the time. Rooney had never met Harvill but knew that Harvill had “beat up” his former wife during the preceding week and she was afraid of Harvill because of this and other occurrences. When Rooney started going out with Sarro they had gone to St. Louis rather than in the Illinois area to avoid encountering Harvill. Rooney knew from Sarro that Harvill sometimes carried a gun. Rooney had given a gun to Sarro which she carried in her purse so that she could scare Harvill in the event he attempted to bother her. On the evening in question shortly after their arrival at the Sarro residence, Harvill emerged out of the Sarro house yelling at them. Specifically, he yelled, “I’ll kill you, I’ll kill you, I’ll kill you both.”
Rooney and Sarro did not know whether Harvill had a gun with him at the time although after his death it was learned that he did not. Rooney was unable to see Harvill’s hands, and it probably does not need to be said that hindsight was not yet available to him at the time. Rooney did testify that he assumed that Harvill had a gun but this testimony was stricken upon objection. He was informed by his counsel that he could not say that he “assumed,” to which he responded that he would not have shot at him if he “didn’t think he did.” This also was stricken. Rooney told Sarro to go into the house and to call the police which, it must be observed, seems scarcely consistent with embarkation upon a planned homicide. He asked her for the gun which she gave to him. Rooney then emerged from the car with the gun in hand and Harvill retreated to a corner of the house. Rooney fired one shot at him upon which Harvill started run*528ning down the alley on one side of the house. As Harvill retreated, Rooney fired shots over his head. Rooney then started in the house with the purpose of removing Sarro and her children to safety. Before entering, however, he turned back to see if Harvill had returned to the area. When he went to the other side of the house he found Harvill crouching and coming around toward the front. It is difficult to conceive that a person who had several shots fired at him would promptly return to the area instead of continuing on his course away from the area, unless he had in mind some sort of confrontation.
It was after Harvill took a couple of steps towards Rooney that he started shooting at him again and hit him. Three shots were fired upon which Harvill fell to the ground and apparently shortly thereafter died.
In considering the tests it had outlined, as set out above, the district court stated it was uncontroverted that the deceased was not the aggressor and was in retreat at the time he was shot by the petitioner. I cannot find that this is supported by the record unless “aggressor” refers only to the immediate situation at the time the fatal shots were fired and, of course, if this is the narrow scope of that term then the person engaged in self-defense could never establish that defense because it only comes about when it has been exercised with dire results to the person against whom the defense was being launched. Harvill was not in retreat at the time he was shot by Rooney but indeed had come around the house and was again approaching Rooney. It takes no distorted reasoning to believe that being aware that Harvill sometimes carried a gun, that he had just previously visited violence upon his ex-wife, that he had immediately upon Rooney’s arrival at the scene threatened three times to kill both occupants of the automobile and that he did not continue to retreat away from the scene after having shots fired at him and over his head, Rooney was in real fear for his life. There was certainly ample reason for Rooney to believe that the danger of harm to himself or to Sarro was a present one and that it was necessary to use the force which he did. As the district court pointed out, if the belief is reasonable it may be nevertheless mistaken as it may have been in this case.
Nevertheless, the jury found Rooney guilty and it is at this point that the first two issues discussed in the majority opinion become important. The first of these is that the defense was not permitted to show the reputation of Harvill for violent and dangerous disposition. The Appellate Court of Illinois in its abstract opinion on the direct appeal of petitioner’s conviction stated, as set forth in the majority opinion, the applicable law as follows:
Evidence of reputation of deceased for violent and dangerous disposition is not admissible until evidence is adduced from which it may be inferred that use of unlawful force was imminent, or that defendant reasonably believed that his use of force was necessary to prevent imminent death or great bodily harm to himself or another.
While Rooney was permitted to testify that he had learned about the violent nature of Harvill as related to him by Sarro, this testimony was of a potentially suspect character under the circumstances because it came from a divorced wife upon whom Harvill had visited considerable difficulty and from a vitally interested party to the particular litigation who was on trial on a murder charge. As a matter of fact, Rooney was not permitted to testify that he was familiar with the reputation of decedent as being a violent, dangerous, quarrelsome man, or that he knew Harvill usually went about carrying a gun and had been arrested and pleaded guilty on a charge of carrying a gun and had been arrested and pleaded guilty on a charge of carrying a concealed gun and had been interrogated as a suspect in one murder case and had been charged with murder in another case.
More to the point for the present purpose, however, is that the chief investigator of the Sheriff’s Office, Joseph Rodriguez, was called as a witness and was asked whether he was aware of the reputation of Harvill *529for being a violent, dangerous, and quarrelsome man. Objection was sustained, upon which the offer of proof was that the witness would have answered in the affirmative which would have been based upon the number of times Harvill had been arrested for carrying concealed weapons, upon his being a suspect in murder cases and upon other charges against him. Objection was made on a foundation ground but the court’s ruling was that there was no evidence in the record indicating the decedent committed any act of aggression other than words and for that reason any evidence as to the reputation of the decedent for violence or quarrelsomeness was not admissible.2 The defense counsel was told that the same ruling would apply to any other witnesses that might be presented on this matter. The defense then made the following offer of proof:
The following witnesses would testify that they are familiar with the general reputation of the decedent for being a dangerous, violent and quarrelsome person in the area in which he resided and that that reputation was bad, that he was a dangerous, violent and quarrelsome person: Walter Moehle, head of the local department of the Federal Bureau of Investigation; Chief — Sergeant Jack Gray of the East St. Louis Police Department and chief investigator for the State’s Attorney’s Office; and Charles Stewart, news editor of the Metro-East Journal.
It is granted, of course, that John J. Rooney and not George Harvill was on trial but on the other hand this testimony if admitted would have reflected directly upon the reasonableness of Rooney’s belief that in this small hour of the morning in the surrounding darkness when the person fired at had returned to the scene he was actually in danger of being killed himself. Evidence from these disinterested sources of the dangerous, violent, and quarrelsome nature of Harvill could not have other than supported the reasonableness of the belief and would not have left the matter merely to the credibility of the two witnesses, Sarro and Rooney, as to what type of an individual was confronting them at this time of the morning.
The deficiency in the defense resulting in the court’s ruling was compounded by the triple reference to the fact that Rooney did not say anything to the police when they arrived at the scene.
The transcript reflects the following:
Q While you were there did you have conversation of any sort with the defendant?
A I talked to him.
Q What did he say to you, if anything, and what did you say to him?
A I don’t remember what I said to him, but he did not answer any of my questions.
Q Did you ask him what had happened?
A Yes.
Q What did he tell you?
Mr. Godfrey: Object, if the Court please.
Mr. Juen: What is the basis?
By the Court: He may tell what was said.
Witness: The best of my knowledge, he did not answer any of the questions that I directed to him.
Mr. Juen: So that I understand this right, you asked him questions and he refused to answer, is that right?
A That is right.
Mr. Godfrey: Objection, and ask it be stricken. He had a right to remain silent, that was his right.
Mr. Juen: We are not quarreling with that, we just want to find out what happened.
By the Court: Overruled. You may cross-examine him on that.
The courts who have reviewed the Rooney case, including both the district court and the majority opinion in this court, have *530agreed upon the impropriety of the witness, over objection and without any cautionary instruction, stating three times that Rooney did not answer any of the sheriff’s questions. Nevertheless, despite the admitted impropriety, the reviewing courts heretofore, including the majority opinion in this court, have attempted to bury this severe prejudicial violation of Fifth Amendment rights in the “harmless error” doctrine.
This court has on two occasions in comparable situations found that this error is so prejudicial as not to permit the application of the “harmless error” theory.
In United States v. Kroslack, 426 F.2d 1129 (7th Cir. 1970), an FBI agent after giving a Miranda warning testified that the defendant said he did not have anything to say. In Kroslack, the trial court struck the testimony from the record, informing the jury that the fact that the person refused to discuss a matter with a government agent was no evidence of anything. As contrasted with Kroslack, in the case under consideration the trial court appeared to think that this type of testimony was entirely proper and could be countered on cross-examination. This, of course, would completely subvert the Fifth Amendment rights, particularly if the defendant had not answered any questions because obviously his counsel would not then go into cross-examination on the matter. In Kroslack, the matter was returned to again upon which the agent answered that he was basically giving the same answer that was stricken from the record. A second motion for a mistrial was denied but no cautionary instruction was given to the jury and this court rev'ersed. It is true in Kroslack that the court observed that the evidence against the defendant was thin on the record.
The evidence was not thin, however, in United States v. Matos, 444 F.2d 1071 (7th Cir. 1971). In that case Matos, a postal employee, on request emptied his pockets which produced a stolen watch. He was arrested and was given the Miranda warnings. The Government attorney asked, “Now, after this, did you tell the defendant anything?” The postal inspector unresponsively answered that Matos “indicated he did not desire to make a statement.”
The Matos case is substantially parallel to the case at bar in that Matos testified at the trial that he did not intend to steal the watch and had accidentally stepped on a box which contained it, put it in his pocket with the intention of returning it to the platform office but had been brought to the inspector’s office before he could turn the watch in. The underlying rationale in the Matos opinion is that because his credibility as a witness was involved in his explanation of why he had the watch in his possession, this credibility was weakened by the jury knowing that he had not offered this explanation at the time he was confronted by the postal inspectors. Likewise in the case at bar Rooney’s testimony supporting his claim of self-defense was subject to the same weakening effect if the jury thought that he did not tell the investigating police officer that he was defending himself and Sarro. Putting it another way, if a person was engaged in defending himself and during the course thereof killed somebody it would be natural that he would proclaim this fact vigorously and quickly to the investigating police officers. At least, the jury could so reason. But here the jury was told three times, apparently with the court’s blessing, that he said nothing to the sheriff.
In Matos this court held that the harmless error doctrine was not sufficient to obviate the prejudicial violation of the Fifth Amendment rights.
While it is true in the present case that the prosecution did not advert to the fact of this particular testimony in final argument, I find as a final matter some considerable significance in the closing argument made by the state prosecuting attorney. After hearing the closing argument by the defense counsel the prosecuting attorney began his argument as follows:
I am somewhat perplexed and a little saddened by the turn of the argument in this case. If I understand the defendant’s defense that you good people are asked to accept here, it is to the effect *531that the defendant, Rooney, had the right to take the life of Harvill in order to free Mrs. Sarro of whatever burden she had with Harvill.
This twisting of the defense theory into one of just freeing the life of a girlfriend from the unpleasantness of an ex-husband is far removed from a defense of self-defense which was rendered considerably less effective than it should have been by the rulings of the trial court.
Further, the prosecutorial characterization of Rooney’s motivation became more likely of acceptance by the jury which was not permitted to have on their balancing scales the full information as to Harvill’s dangerous character.
I would therefore grant the writ.

. As a matter of record, such a statement was made by the Appellate Court of Illinois in its opinion denying Rooney postconviction relief. People v. Rooney, 16 Ill.App.3d 901, 307 N.E.2d 216, 221 (1974), cert. denied, 419 U.S. 1025, 95 S.Ct. 503, 42 L.Ed.2d 300.

. Insofar as technical grounds of objection are concerned, these, of course, can be obviated by rephrasing. Here, however, the objection was sustained upon grounds which were not susceptible of being overcome.