Court Opinion

ID: 9758803
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 23:46:59.645289+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:28:56.085038
License: Public Domain

Moore, J,

dissenting:

In my view, reversible error was committed by the trial court in permitting testimony by the informer, Stephen Brown, that he and the appellant “use [sic] to work together selling narcotics.” At oral argument the State claimed the *261answer was “a surprise” and candidly characterized the response of the informer as a “blockbuster.”
This is not adverted to by the majority and the State’s concessions of probable prejudice to appellant and that the “propriety of the trial court’s ruling on the question may be debatable,” are also ignored.
In my judgment, the question which the informer was permitted to answer was as objectionable as the two prior questions as to which appellant’s objections had been sustained. We have here a truly “dragnet” type inquiry relating to any contacts between the informer and the accused ranging over a period of fifteen years. Such a question is clearly so broad as to be improper. The elementary law here applicable is stated in 58 Am. Jur., Witnesses, § 565 as follows:
“As a general proposition the questions asked a witness should be definite and specific; questions which are so indefinite that they fail to put the adverse party on notice of the testimony sought to be elicited, or which leave it almost entirely to the discretion of the witness as to what matters he shall elucidate, are improper, and if a timely objection is made the trial court should not allow the witness to answer.” (Emphasis added.)
Defense counsel made a timely objection. The State contended in its brief that any question of error based upon the prejudicial effect of the answer had not been preserved for review because appellant made no objection to the answer nor a motion to strike or for a mistrial. The State’s reliance in this respect upon Maryland Rule 522 d 2 is altogether misplaced. This is not a situation where a question is competent, an objection is properly overruled but the answer constitutes inadmissible or unresponsive matter. In such instance, an objection to the answer is reasonable and its form is a motion to strike. See Wigmore on Evidence, 3d. Ed., Vol. 1, § 18 p. 344, where the author states:
“Moreover, where a question is objected to, and *262the objection is properly overruled, but the answer which follows contains improper evidence, the objection to the question is of no avail; a new objection must be made specifically to the answer; because the answer contains new matter. . . . Here the form of the objection is a motion to strike out.”
Again, a motion to strike an answer is the proper technique in situations where objection before answer is not feasible. McCormick on Evidence, 2d Ed., § 52 cites, for example, the case of the “forward witness” who answers before counsel has a chance to object, or where, after the evidence is received, a ground of objection is disclosed for the first time later in the trial. The author states (p.113):
“In all these cases, an ‘after-objection’ may be stated as soon as the ground appears. The proper technique, for such an objection is to phrase a motion to strike out the objectionable evidence, and to request an instruction to the jury to disregard the evidence.”
In the instant case, appellant’s counsel made timely objection, not once but three successive times, to the State’s Attorney’s question seeking to elicit from the informer evidence relating to his relationship with the appellant ranging over a period of 15 years, i.e., from 1958 to February 6, 1973, the date of the alleged crimes. The question even as rephrased was clearly improper and the third objection should also have been sustained on, at least, the stated ground of irrelevancy.
The reasons assigned for the. objection, at the request of the court and in the presence of the jury, can reasonably be understood only as an expression of counsel’s legitimate apprehension that the question would elicit prejudicial matter bearing upon appellant’s criminal character or propensity. Under the circumstances, the particularization of the objection was reasonably specific and sufficient. See Williams v. State, 229 Md. 606 (1962).
As previously noted, the court overruled the objection on *263the third occasion because of the conspiracy charges “and events prior to that may be relevant.” 1 To overrule the objection on the rationale of the alleged conspiracy and for the stated reason that “events prior to that [ie., February 6, 1973] may be relevant,” was erroneous. Prior criminal activity between co-conspirators has been held by the Court of Appeals to be admissible under certain circumstances and conditions. Greenwald v. State, 221 Md. 245, 249 (1960); Irvin v. State, 23 Md. App. 457. Here, however, the question posed by the State did not relate to such prior activity between the co-conspirators but to “what, if any, contact” the informer had with the appellant since 1958. It was wrong to allow, on the rationale suggested by the trial court, a question so broad as clearly to involve the potential for prejudice which, in fact, occurred.2 Compare, United States v. Barcenas, 498 F. 2d 1110 (5th Cir. 1974).
Where, as here, there is an improper question, a timely objection to which is erroneously overruled, a motion to strike is not essential to preserve the objection for appellate review. A contrary holding, as suggested by the State, would be illogical and would construct a requirement which is plainly absent from Rule 522. It is implicit in prior decisions, that a timely objection to the question will suffice to preserve the prejudicial answer for judicial review. See Wethington v. State, 3 Md. App. 237 (1968); State v. Babb, 258 Md. 547 (1970), reversing (on grounds of harmless error) Babb v. State, 7 Md. App. 116 (1969). The same conclusion is explicit in appellate interpretations of Rule 46 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, the content of which is substantially the same as sections a, ( “Formal Exceptions Unnecessary” ), b, ( “Action Desired or Objection” ) and c, ( “Lack of Opportunity to Object — No Prejudice” ) of Maryland Rule 522. See Rice v. Louisville & Nashville *264Railroad Co., 309 F. 2d 930 (6th Cir. 1962) where the Court stated:
“Counsel for the defendant raise the question that plaintiffs counsel made no request for any admonition by the court concerning this evidence [a prior conviction for drunkenness]. Counsel for plaintiff objected to the introduction of the testimony at every point when it was offered. An objection is all that is necessary under Rule 46 F.R.Civ.P.”
The majority opinion concludes that the question “was simply not objectionable for either of the reasons assigned by appellant” when the trial court requested an assignment of grounds as authorized by Rule 522 d.l. While the question may not have been leading, one of the grounds stated by counsel, the alternative ground of irrelevancy was certainly not saved, as the majority suggests, by the mere fact that the question included “the crucial date of the alleged offense.” Robinson v. United States, 366 F. 2d 575 (10th Cir. 1966), upon which the majority relies, cites the familiar rule that evidence of another and independent crime is not admissible but that a recognized exception to the rule is that such evidence may be admissible if it tends to establish absence of mistake or accident, a common scheme, system, plan or design on the part of the accused “where it is so related to the crime charged, that it may serve to establish the crime charged or to establish an intent or a motive in the mind of the accused to commit the crime charged.”
In this case the objectionable question did not relate to any activity between the informer and the accused on the day of the alleged conspiracy but, for all that appears, some illicit narcotics-related activity at a remote period of time; and there was no proffer by the State that the evidence sought to be elicited related to any of the recognized exceptions to the general rule above stated.
Nor can it be maintained that in the circumstances of this case, the court’s error was harmless. There was here no *265curative instruction when the prejudicial response was elicited nor was there an appropriate instruction in the court’s general charge to the jury. Cf. Dixon v. United States, 287 A. 2d 89, 99 (D.C. App. 1972). That the jury was free to consider the prior selling of drugs, testified to by the informer, as substantive proof of appellant’s guilt on the presently charged offense, distribution of heroin, is abundantly clear. This was at complete variance with the rationale for the exclusionary rule that evidence which simply indicates a disposition or propensity on the part of the accused to commit a crime and does not tend to establish any of the elements just numerated is irrelevant and untrustworthy; it deflects the mind of the trier of facts from the single issue of guilt or innocence of the specific crime with which the accused is charged. Wharton, Criminal Evidence, Vol. 1, § 240; Gilchrist v. State, 2 Md. App. 635 (1967). In the words of Dean Wigmore: “It is objectionable, not because it has no appreciable probative value but because it has too much.” 1 Wigmore on Evidence, (3d Ed. 1960), § 194, p.646.3
Strikingly apposite is the statement of Judge Morton for this Court in Gilchrist v. State, supra:
“This was a jury trial and we have no way of assessing the influence this testimony may have had upon their judgment. Doubts in this regard must be resolved in favor of the Appellant. Fahy v. Connecticut, 375 U.S. 85; Barnes and Burgess v. State, 1 Md. App. 123; Goodman v. State, 2. Md. App. 473.” (Emphasis added.)
In evaluating error as harmless vel non, the opinion of the *266Court of Appeals in Babb, supra, by Judge Finan noted a significant difference between a bench trial and a jury trial (258 Md. at pp. 550-1):
“As we have previously stated, we think that the admission of the evidence pertaining to the prior conviction for drunkenness; if error at all, was harmless error. We are fortified in this belief by the fact that this was a nomjury case. The assumed proposition that judges are men of discernment, learned and experienced in the law and capable of evaluating the materiality of evidence, lies at the very core of our judicial system. Such an assumption would be completely unwarranted with regard to a jury of laymen and the impact which evidence may have upon their deliberative powers. And, if this case had been tried before a jury, our conclusion may well have been different than that presently reached.” (Emphasis added.)
In the instant appeal, it is significant that the State’s case depended in sizable measure on the testimony of the paid informer and the jury manifested some uncertainty about the guilty verdict rendered against appellant when it inquired of the court as to whether or not that verdict might be reconsidered.
It is my conclusion that the court below committed reversible error in overruling appellant’s objection and that a new trial should be granted,

. The second indictment against appellant charged that he and Marable “did unlawfully conspire with each other,” on February 6, 1973, to violate the narcotics laws.

. The trial court under these circumstances should have required a proffer by the State, out of the hearing of the jury, of the evidence sought to be elicited.

. It is, of course, elementary that when the accused takes the stand in his own behalf, he is subject to the rules of impeachment of witnesses. Prior convictions of crimes affecting his credibility may be shown, Linkins v. State, 202 Md. 212 (1953), subject to the provisions of Code (1974) Courts Art., § 10-905 (not admissible if appeal pending, time to appeal not expired or conviction reversed) and Courts Art., § 3-834 (proceedings in Juvenile Court not admissible, unless the charge is perjury); and subject to the principle of Burgett v. Texas, 389 U. S. 109, 88 Sup. Ct. 258 (1967) that the conviction occurred when the accused was represented by counsel or there was a valid waiver of his right to counsel.