Court Opinion

ID: 9468052
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 02:03:06.257441+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:40:39.369314
License: Public Domain

SWYGERT, Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
Edward Dennis Jacks has presented two grounds that necessitate the grant of his petition for a writ of habeas corpus. The use of State’s Instruction No. 5 is a particularly egregious error made by the state trial court, for it impermissibly shifted the burden of proof on an essential element of the crime. In addition, the admission into evidence of his request to speak to a lawyer conflicts with numerous opinions of the Supreme Court and of this circuit.
I
The majority’s holding that permits the use of State’s Instruction No. 5 creates a dangerous precedent that shatters the foundation of our criminal justice system: that every person is presumed innocent unless proven otherwise beyond a reasonable doubt. The trial judge instructed the jury that there is a “presumption of law, that every one is presumed to intend the natural and probable consequences of his voluntary acts, unless the circumstances are such as to indicate the absence of such intent.” The majority must concede that absent the final phrase, the instruction would be identical to the instruction that was condemned in Sandstrom v. Montana, 442 U.S. 510, 99 S.Ct. 2450, 61 L.Ed.2d 39 (1979).1 The majority relies on this final phrase and on other language in the instruction that the jury could look to surrounding circumstances and that any presumption of criminal intent may be rebutted by “justifying or excusing facts.” They hold the instruction valid because the qualifying phrases and the tenor of other instructions “nullified the mandatory flavor of the language condemned in Sandstrom.”
This holding ignores the nature of the two-part analysis in Sandstrom. The jury in that case might have interpreted the instruction given either as one creating an irrebutable presumption or as one shifting the burden of proof to the defendant.2 The Court held the instruction to violate the Due Process Clause under either interpretation. If the jury thought the presumption was mandatory, the instruction “‘would conflict with the overriding presumption of innocence with which the law endows the accused and which extends to every element of the crime.’ ” Id. at 521-523, 99 S.Ct. at 2458-2459, quoting Morissette v. United States, 342 U.S. 246, 275, 72 S.Ct. 240, 255, 96 L.Ed. 288 (1952).3 If the jury believed the presumption to be rebuttable, the instruction would still be invalid, for, as the Court explicitly held in In re Winship, 397 U.S. 358, 364, 90 S.Ct. 1068, 1072, 25 L.Ed.2d *492368 (1970), “the Due Process Clause protects the accused against conviction except upon proof beyond a reasonable doubt of every fact necessary to constitute the crime with which he is charged.” (emphasis added)4
The Court in Sandstrom followed several previous cases concerning instructions that had shifted the burden of proof to the defendant. In Mullaney v. Wilbur, 421 U.S. 684, 95 S.Ct. 1881, 44 L.Ed.2d 508 (1975), the Court held unconstitutional an instruction that permitted the inference of malice if the jury found the homicide in question was both intentional and unlawful, unless the defendant showed by a preponderance of the evidence that the crime had been committed in the heat of passion on sudden provocation. Under Maine law, malice was an essential element of the crime of murder. By requiring the defendant to prove he had acted in the heat of passion, the Maine rule shifted to the defendant the burden of proof on the question of malice, which was a “fact necessary to constitute the crime with which [defendant] was charged.”5 The Court held the Due Process Clause precluded any such shift on an essential element of the crime. If the defendant raised the heat of passion as a defense, the State would have to bear the burden of proving its absence.6
The Supreme Court has permitted a shift in the burden of proof only with respect to factors that did not constitute elements of the crime charged. In Patterson v. New York, 432 U.S. 197, 97 S.Ct. 2319, 53 L.Ed.2d 281 (1977), the Court held that New York did not violate the Due Process Clause by requiring a murder defendant to prove by a preponderance of evidence the affirmative defense of extreme emotional disturbance to reduce the crime to manslaughter. In New York, there were only two elements to the crime of second-degree murder: (1) “intent to cause the death of another person,” and (2) “causing] the death of such person or of a third person.”7 Malice aforethought was not an element of the crime. The statute provided that a defendant could reduce the charge to manslaughter if he proved that he had “acted under the influence of extreme emotional disturbance for which there was a reasonable explanation or excuse.”8 Because the State had proved the two necessary elements of second-degree murder in Patterson, the Court held that due process did not require it to prove the absence of the affirmative defense.
In so ruling, the Court relied on Leland v. Oregon, 343 U.S. 790, 72 S.Ct. 1002, 96 L.Ed. 1302 (1952), which had held that Oregon could shift the burden of proof on the insanity defense so long as the state had already proved beyond a reasonable doubt every element of the crime, including premeditation and deliberation.9 The Court succinctly stated the distinction between Patterson and Leland on the one hand and Mullaney and Sandstrom on the other. Under Patterson and Leland,
once the facts constituting a crime are established beyond a reasonable doubt, based on all the evidence including the evidence of the defendant’s mental state, the State may refuse to sustain the affirmative defense of insanity [or extreme emotional disturbance] unless demonstrated by a preponderance of the evidence.
Patterson, supra, 432 U.S. p. 206, 97 S.Ct. p. 2324. The burden could not be reversed, however, on any of the facts constituting the crime.
These cases demonstrate that the majority’s analysis of Sandstrom is misplaced. *493Sandstrom did not overturn the instructions in that case because they created a conclusive rather than a rebuttable presumption. The Court held the instruction unconstitutional because it shifted the burden of proof on intent, an essential element of the crime charged.10 The instruction in this case suffers the same infirmity, for it reverses the burden of proof on intent. The instruction tells the jury that “one is presumed to intend the natural and probable consequences of his voluntary acts, unless the circumstances are such as to indicate the absence of such intent.” (emphasis added) As the majority notes in its opinion, supra, p. 485, “the jurors were told ... that any presumption of ‘a criminal intent from an unlawful act knowingly done' was rebut-table by ‘justifying or excusing facts.’ ” Because under Indiana law intent is one of the constituent elements of first-degree murder,11 the crime for which Jacks was convicted, the reversal of the burden of proof on that issue violated his Due Process rights. We cannot be sure that the text of the other instructions mitigated the effect of the improper language in Instruction No. 5. As Sandstrom points out, “even if a jury could have ignored the presumption and found defendant guilty because he acted knowingly, we cannot be certain that this is what they did do.” Id. 442 U.S. p. 526, 99 S.Ct. p. 2460 (emphasis in original). The petition for a writ of habeas corpus should therefore be granted.
II
I must also dissent from the majority’s holding that the admission into evidence of petitioner’s request for counsel was not prejudicial error. The majority’s attempted distinction of Doyle v. Ohio, 426 U.S. 610, 96 S.Ct. 2240, 49 L.Ed.2d 91 (1976), and United States v. Hale, 422 U.S. 171, 95 S.Ct. 2133, 45 L.Ed.2d 99 (1975), is faulty. The opinion states that the two cases are inapplicable because the prosecution, in introducing the tape-recorded conversation, was not attempting to use petitioner’s silence against him.12 If that statement were true, then there would not have been any reason to have played the recording for the jury. During the conversation, Jacks never told the police anything except basic information such as his name, age, address, and occupation. Any reading of the transcript in Appendix A would show that the only reason to introduce the tape into evidence was to inform the jury that Jacks had said he would not talk to the police until he had spoken to his lawyer. None of the rest of the conversation was at all useful to the jury-
A request for an attorney is extremely prejudicial in a case involving an insanity defense.13 The case is indistinguishable *494from United States v. Matos, 444 F.2d 1071 (7th Cir. 1971), in which this court held that the introduction of a postal inspector’s testimony that the defendant “indicated he did not want to make a statement” was plain error, and from the Doyle and Hale decisions.14 If Jacks had said no more than, “I would like to speak to a lawyer,” then there is no doubt that this statement would not be admissible.15 The mere fact that he had answered a few innocuous questions before he made that statement should not render his request for counsel admissible; nor should such trivial responses amount to a waiver of his constitutional right to remain silent. Similarly, the fact that Jacks testified freely at trial is irrelevant to his request for counsel at the time of his arrest. Miranda rights are too sacred and too fundamental as protection of the guarantee of a fair trial to rest upon so unstable a foundation.16
Ill
While I agree with the majority that Hussong v. Warden, 623 F.2d 1185 (7th Cir. 1980), controls our decision on the issue of admission into evidence of the illegally-recorded conversation between Jacks and his mother, I would like to add two comments regarding that portion of the opinion.
The trial judge’s instruction to the jury that it could consider the contents of the tape for the question of petitioner’s sanity, but not as to whether Jacks had committed the crime charged, is gross error. The only issue in the case was Jacks’ sanity. He admitted that he had committed the act that resulted in his wife’s death, but he only could have been guilty of the crime charged if he was in fact sane. The trial court’s instruction therefore permitted the jury to consider the contents of the tape on the ultimate issue in the case. As the majority notes, however, under Hussong, this error does not constitute grounds for granting the writ of habeas corpus.
Furthermore, United States v. Stewart, 443 F.2d 1129 (10th Cir. 1971), is not at all authority on this question. That case concerned the admissibility of lay testimony on the issue of sanity and also the sufficiency of evidence of mental capacity. The admissibility of the tape-recorded conversations was never in dispute in the case. The statement quoted by the majority, supra, p. 484, concerning the conversations’ probative effect is dictum and had little to do with the decision in the case.
I would grant the writ of habeas corpus for the reasons discussed in parts I and II of this dissent.

. The instruction in Sandstrom v. Montana, 442 U.S. 510, 99 S.Ct. 2450, 61 L.Ed.2d 39 (1979) reads: “[T]he law presumes that a person intends the ordinary consequences of his voluntary acts.”

. Id., p. 517, 99 S.Ct., at p. 2455.

. See also United States v. United States Gypsum Co., 438 U.S. 422, 98 S.Ct. 2864, 57 L.Ed.2d 854 (1978).

. Sandstrom, supra, 442 U.S. p. 524, 99 S.Ct. p. 2459.

. In re Winship, 397 U.S. 358, 364, 90 S.Ct. 1068, 1072, 25 L.Ed.2d 368 (1970).

. See also Hankerson v. North Carolina, 432 U.S. 233, 97 S.Ct. 2339, 53 L.Ed.2d 306 (1977) (instruction reversing burden of proof on issue of self-defense invalid under Mullaney).

. N.Y. Penal Law § 125.25 (McKinney 1975).

. Id.

. See also Rivera v. Delaware, 429 U.S. 877, 97 S.Ct. 226, 50 L.Ed.2d 160 (1976) (appeal claiming that the Winship and Mullaney decisions had overruled Leland dismissed as not presenting a substantial federal question).

. The Montana statute under which Sand-strom was prosecuted reads in relevant part:
(1) [Cjriminal homicide constitutes deliberate homicide if:
(a) it is committed purposely or knowingly; or
(b) it is committed while the offender is engaged in or is an accomplice in the commission of, an attempt to commit, or flight after committing or attempting to commit robbery, sexual intercourse without consent, arson, burglary, kidnapping, felonious escape, or any other felony which involves the use or threat of physical force or violence against any individual....
R.C.M. § 94-5-102 (1977).

. The Indiana murder statute reads,
A person who:
(1) Knowingly or intentionally kills another human being; or
(2) Kills another human being while committing or attempting to commit arson, burglary, child molesting, criminal deviate conduct, kidnapping, rape, or robbery; commits murder, a felony.
I.S.A., Crimes, § 35-42-1-1 (Burns 1979).

. Majority opinion, supra, p. 483.

. The majority states, supra, n. 1, that any error in the admission of this statement would be harmless. The footnote does not cite any opinion that so holds. Before a federal constitutional error can be held harmless, the court must be able to declare a belief that it was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. Chapman v. California, 386 U.S. 18, 87 S.Ct. 824, 17 L.Ed.2d 705 (1967). Considering the sanctity of Miranda rights (see n. 16 below) and the prejudice to the defendant in this case, I believe *494this error necessitates that the petition for a writ of habeas corpus be granted. United States v. Matos, 444 F.2d 1071, 1073-74 (7th Cir. 1971).

. See also United States v. Nielsen, 392 F.2d 849 (7th Cir. 1968).

. Doyle v. Ohio, 426 U.S. 610, 96 S.Ct. 2240, 49 L.Ed.2d 91 (1976); United States v. Hale, 422 U.S. 171, 95 S.Ct. 2133, 45 L.Ed.2d 99 (1975); Baker v. United States, 357 F.2d 11 (5th Cir. 1966).

. The sanctity of Miranda rights was recently reaffirmed by the Supreme Court in Edwards v. Arizona, - U.S. -, 101 S.Ct. 1880, 68 L.Ed.2d 378 (1981) (Once a defendant has invoked his right to counsel, police may not initiate further interrogation in counsel’s absence.), and in Estelle v. Smith,-U.S.-, 101 S.Ct. 1866, 68 L.Ed.2d 359 (1981). The majority’s attempted distinction of Edwards suffers the *495same infirmities as the faulty distinctions of the Doyle and Hale cases.