Court Opinion

ID: 9759981
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 00:36:50.694677+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:29:07.106859
License: Public Domain

*55Clifford, J.
(dissenting). As presented to the jury this case was a close one on its facts. The assistant prosecutor who argued before us candidly acknowledged as much. Our law attaches great significance to this feature of the case. The closeness affects the prosecutor’s obligation, the general nature of which I recently had occasion to review in my dissenting opinion in State v. DiPaglia, 64 N. J. 288, 298 (1974), raising his duty to a level requiring particular circumspection scrupulously to avoid improper conduct resulting in the unjust conviction of a defendant. See Berger v. United States, 295 U. S. 78, 88, 55 S. Ct. 629, 633, 79 L. Ed. 1314, 1321 (1935); United States v. Arendale, 444 F. 2d 1260, 1269 (5 Cir. 1971); State v. Bogen, 13 N. J. 137, 141, cert. den., Lieberman v. State, 346 U. S. 825, 74 S. Ct. 44, 98 L. Ed. 350 (1953); People v. Evans, 39 Cal. 2d 242, 246 P. 2d 636, 642 (Sup. Ct. in Bank 1952); People v. Freedman, 4 Ill. 2d 414, 123 N. E. 2d 317, 321 (Sup. Ct. 1954); Vess, “Walking a Tightrope: A Survey of Limitations on the Prosecutor’s Closing Argument,” 64 J. Crim. L. & C. 22, 54 (1973). See also Note, “The Nature and Consequences of Eorensie Misconduct in the Prosecution of a Criminal Case,” 54 Colum. L. Rev. 946, 970 (1954). This is especially true in a case where the testimony is in sharp conflict and the result ultimately turns on questions of credibility, as in this trial. See United States v. Antonelli Fireworks Co., 155 F. 2d 631, 654 (2 Cir.) (Frank, J. dissenting), cert. den., 329 U. S. 742, 67 S. Ct. 49, 91 L. Ed. 640 (1946); State v. D’Ippolito, 19 N. J. 540, 547 (1955); State v. Welsch, 29 N. J. 152, 158 (1959); People v. Jackson, 40 A. D. 2d 1006, 338 N. Y. S. 2d 760 (App. Div. 1972). Por the second time this term I am emboldened to disagree with the majority’s opinion of the prosecutor’s remarks in summation and their effect on the result.
Defendant was a police officer of the City of Newark. He was charged with attempted extortion from one Willie Lee Jones in violation of N. J. S. A. 2A:105-1 and N. J. S. A. 2A:85-5. The prosecutor’s summation included the remarks *56quoted in full in the majority opinion. In defense thereof the State says it was simply answering defense counsel’s summation wherein the complaining witness, Jones, was characterized as a convicted criminal bearing a grudge against the man who arrested him and whose sworn testimony was unworthy of belief against that of an officer of the law. The State’s brief asserts that “the prosecutor simply argued to the jury that if they believed Jones’ story and the rest of the State’s case sufficient to prove Perry’s guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, they should not fail to convict on the basis that a convicted criminal like Jones was disentitled to the protection of the laws which govern society.”
If that were all there were to it, I would not be troubled by the excerpts from summation quoted by the majority. But I perceive those remarks as going much farther and expanding the issues for which defendant was on trial beyond those included in the indictment. Now the jury was called upon to confront the larger issue of police corruption in general and, by its verdict, to redress the injustices visited by society upon the disadvantaged. This entreaty was wrong, and plainly so.
Reference to the social setting of a trial has not infrequently given rise to a finding of prejudicial error. Singer, “Forensic Misconduct by Federal Prosecutors — and How it Grew,” 20 Ala L. Rev. 227, 256 (1968). See, e. g., Viereck v. United States, 318 U. S. 236, 63 S. Ct. 561, 87 L. Ed. 734 (1943) (references to the war and those who would destroy us); Greenberg v. United States, 280 F. 2d 472 (1 Cir. 1960) (charge of unpatriotism in a tax evasion case); Brown v. United States, 125 U. S. App. D. C. 220, 370 F. 2d 242 (D. C. Cir. 1966) (acquittal would leave police powerless short of martial law); United States v. Fullmer, 457 F. 2d 447 (7 Cir. 1972) (references to gun control and fight against crime and violence); State v. Perry, 274 Minn. 1, 142 N. W. 2d 573 (Sup. Ct. 1966) (references to monetary cost to taxpayers and safety in community); People v. *57Moore, 26 A. D. 2d 902, 274 N. Y. S. 2d 518 (App. Div. 1966) (acquit defendant if you want to live in a community where crime runs rampant); Seely v. State, 471 P. 2d 931 (Okl. Cr. 1970) (reference to great number of deaths on highway in a drunk driving case). See also Vess, supra, 64 J. Crim. L. & C. at 50. Given the extremely close case presented to the jury here, reference to the broader issue could only be prejudicial to defendant.1
The ABA Prosecution Eunetion Standards explicitly proscribe the comments of the prosecutor in this case. According to Standard § 5.8 (d) :
“The prosecutor should refrain from argument which would divert the jury from its duty to decide the case on the evidence, by injecting issues broader than the guilt or innocence of the accused under controlling law, or by making predictions of the consequences of the jury’s verdict.”
ABA Project on Minimum Standards for Criminal Justice, Standards Relating to the Prosecution Function (Approved Draft, 1971).
The majority takes the position that at Perry’s trial “[t]he issue of police corruption and its potential in dealing with the general class of law breaker such as Willie Lee Jones was squarely before the Court * * *•.” If so, I suggest it should not have been, and it was intruded there precisely *58because of the prosecutor’s excessive zeal. What should have been before the trial court was the issue of whether Andrew Perry committed the attempted extortion with which he was charged — no less, certainly, but just as certainly no more. Police corruption was not properly on trial, and all the Willie Lee Joneses of the world were not properly on trial. Only Andrew Perry was on trial — or should have been — for the offense set forth in the indictment. See State v. Kenny, 128 N. J. Super. 94 (App. Div. 1974) (alternative holding).
Justification for broadening the issues to include police corruption and “a fair shake” for the world’s downtrodden is found by the majority in the necessity for the prosecutor to respond to defense counsel’s attempts at impeachment of the credibility of the State’s chief witness. If this is to be the rule, the door to expanding the issues beyond guilt or innocence is wide open to prosecutors in every trial, since the credibility of the prosecution’s witness is invariably at issue in a criminal case.
. The Court relies on State v. Knight, 63 N. J. 187, 193-194 (1973) to support the position that “[w]ithin reasonable limitations, the prosecutor should be permitted to observe the serious social consequences of the crime charged as long as the jury, as in this case, is clearly instructed that its verdict must be based on the evidence.” At the outset I differ with the suggestion that the repeated infractions in this case fall within “reasonable limitations” required by the opinion in Knight. Moreover, I disagree with the conclusion that the customary instruction that the jury should render a verdict “on the evidence” given in every trial is sufficient to cure the prejudice to the defendant. Rote especially the clear and explicit instructions in State v. Smith, 27 N. J. 433, 461 (1958), cert. den., 361 U. S. 861, 80 S. Ct. 120, 4 L. Ed. 2d 103 (1959); State v. Ordog, 45 N. J. 347, 366 (1965), cert. den., 384 U. S. 1022, 86 S. Ct. 1942, 16 L. Ed. 2d 1025 (1966).
*59I too am troubled, along with the majority, by defense counsel’s failure to object to the serious transgressions recited above (although I do not attach much significance to his perfectly understandable request for a recess after conclusion of summations; I venture to say that a recess at this point in the trial, for a variety of obvious reasons, is almost routine). But I fail to see how this supports the Court’s discovery of an inference that within the context of this trial any error was of no moment.
Anyone familiar with courtroom procedures is sensitive to many considerations, tactical and otherwise, on account of which an attorney may knowingly refrain from objecting to improper comments by the prosecutor. The most apparent reason is that to do so frequently serves only to impress the prejudice of the comment more deeply into the jurors’ minds by again drawing attention to it. Garris v. United States, 129 U. S. App. D. C. 96, 390 F. 2d 862, 865 (D. C. Cir. 1968); United States v. Grunberger, 431 F. 2d 1062, 1068-1069 (2 Cir. 1970). See also Judge Jerome Frank’s observation in United States v. Grayson, 166 F. 2d 863, 871 (2 Cir. 1948) (concurring) :
[A]s experienced trial lawyers have often observed, merely to raise an objection to such testimony — and more, to have the judge tell the jury to ignore it — often serves but to rub it in. I believe that a prosecutor ought not deliberately and repeatedly, as here, put defendant’s lawyer in such an awkward dilemma — where his client will suffer if the lawyer does not object or if he does. If, without attaching any practical consequences to such tactics of the prosecutor, we simply express disapproval of them, we do nothing to prevent their repetition * * *.
I hasten to add that the defense attorney who fails to object and give the court an opportunity to correct the error quite properly incurs the burden of establishing “plain error” on appellate review under R. 2:10-2. However, I question both the fairness and reasonableness of applying in this case any rule by which counsel is further penalized for failure to object, whether for tactical or other reasons, by the imposi*60tion of an additional inference that that failure implies a lack of moment in the error.
The potential for prejudice is at least as apparent here as it is in State v. Spano, 64 N. J. 566 (1974), decided this day by a unanimous court. There the prosecutor’s improper and gratuitious observation that defendant could have testified before the grand jury is held to be sufficient, standing alone, to warrant a reversal of the conviction. Not only was there no objection in that case, there was wthat amounted to a concession by defense counsel that the prosecutor’s flagrant misstatement of the law was in fact correct. And there was absolutely no interference or attempted curative instruction by the trial judge. I am unable to perceive how the comment in Spano, nowhere characterized as a close case, can be looked upon as “prejudicial,” “obvious error,” “unfair [ness],” “excessive,” “simply inexcusable,” and “definitely of * * * constitutional dimension,” while the statements here are viewed as “inconsequential.”
Judge Prank, to whose splendid dissenting opinion in United States v. Antonelli Fireworks Co., supra, I had occasion to refer in my dissenting opinion in DiPaglia, there takes notice of the ancient observation, “If you want to excite prejudice you must do so at the close, so that the jurors may more easily remember what you said.” Id. 155 F. 2d at 642, quoting Aristotle, Rhetoric, Book III, Chap. 14. I submit that there has been demonstrated the possibility of prejudice to the defendant in this tenuous ease being excited by the prosecutor’s reference in summation to issues outside the indictment. I would therefore reverse the Appellate Division’s affirmance of the judgment of conviction and remand for a new trial.
For affirmance — Chief Justice Hughes and Justices Jacobs, Mountain, Sullivan and Pashman — 5.
For reversal and remandment — Justice Clifford — 1.

With respect to whatever comfort my colleagues derive from United States v. Antonelli Fireworks Co., 155 F. 2d 631 (2 Cir.), cert. den., 329 U. S. 742, 67 S. Ct. 49, 91 L. Ed. 640 (1946), I can only express the expectation (and this with no sense of diminished respect for the distinguished judges who there comprised the majority) that were a case with similar facts to appear before this Court today, some twenty-eight years after AntonelU, we would reach a contrary result. But apart from that fond hope, note particularly that the decision in Antonelli rests in part on the conclusion of the majority of that court that the trial judge had applied extensive corrective measures and had given a swift and sure rebuke, deflating immediately the very words of the prosecutor which the majority opinion herein recites. It is for this reason, in some considerable measure, that Judge Clark deemed the Antonelli prosecutor’s concluding sentence in summation, which he termed “ill advised and overzealous,” 155 F. 2d at 638, not prejudicial in the context of that trial.