Court Opinion

ID: 9693259
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 16:33:15.516786+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:19:43.384568
License: Public Domain

STEIN, J.,
concurring in part and dissenting in part.
I am fully in accord with the Court’s ruling that a jury poll, pursuant to Rule 1:8-10, requires each juror to state whether he or she agrees with the verdict. The Court correctly observes that a jury poll “ensures that each juror express concurrence or disagreement with the verdict, allows jurors to dissent from the announced verdict, and protects against coercive deliberations.” Ante at 279, 575 A.2d at 9.
I cannot agree, however, that the trial court’s failure to poll the jury correctly is harmless error. Although the Court notes that “not every misapplication of the Rules of procedure should amount to reversible error,” ante at 284, 575 A.2d at 12, my view is that a misapplication of Rule 1:8-10 cannot be harmless. As acknowledged, the purpose of polling the jury after a nonunanimous verdict is to “ascertain with certainty that * * * no juror has been coerced or induced to agree to a verdict to which he has not fully assented.” United States v. Grosso, 358 F.2d 154, 160 (3d Cir.1966), rev’d on other grounds, 390 U.S. 62, 88 S.Ct. 709, 19 L.Ed.2d 906 (1968) (quoting Miranda v. United States, 255 F.2d 9, 16-17 (1st Cir.1958)). When the poll is defective, the objective of the Rule has not been fulfilled. We cannot assume that a juror who may have been coerced to concur inside the jury room would be emboldened to speak out and protest in open court. I would hold that the error in polling the jury was reversible per se. Cf. Virgin Islands v. Hercules, 875 F.2d 414, 419 (3d Cir.1989) (court reversed criminal conviction where trial court failed properly to poll jury, noting that “[wjhile reversal may be a harsh result, nothing short of *286reversal suffices to remedy this {JFed.R.Crim.P. 81(d)] violation.”).
STEIN, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part.
For reversal — Chief Justice WILENTZ, and Justices CLIFFORD, HANDLER, POLLOCK, O’HERN and GARIBALDI — 6.