Court Opinion

ID: 9742594
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 21:16:36.02869+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:24:34.004765
License: Public Domain

Levin, J.
(concurring in affirmance). We agree *293with Justice Swainson’s analysis and conclusion that neither a defendant’s lawyer nor a prosecutor may during argument to the jury properly advert to the disposition of the defendant should he be acquitted by reason of insanity.
However, since the assumption underlying the Cole  instruction is that a jury will be wondering about the actual disposition of the defendant (and, accordingly under Cole, the judge should cover the subject when instructing the jury), this case differs from the Robinson  and Humphreys  cases where but for the prosecutor’s argument the pejorative information would not have been before the jury at all.
Since the disposition of a defendant acquitted by reason of insanity is, by hypothesis, in the minds of the jurors, an incorrect statement by a prosecutor in making even an impermissible argument regarding disposition should in most cases be rectifiable by a curative instruction.
Impermissible argument of this kind will continue to occur in future cases as many lawyers and judges will not become aware of, or will forget, or perhaps ignore the rule of this case prohibiting lawyer comment on disposition. A requirement of per se reversal would enable a reckless defense lawyer to entice an unwitting prosecutor into creating a record (which an unknowing judge would not protect) requiring automatic reversal.
Unless the matter deteriorates seriously, as in Suave v Carling Brewing Co, 374 Mich 487; 132 NW2d 655 (1965), erroneous argument of both counsel ordinarily should not require a new trial.
*294Here the prosecutor was restricted shortly after he began to make an argument regarding the defendant’s disposition. Had the defendant’s lawyer requested a curative instruction, the judge could have taken any sting out of the prosecutor’s argument by stating that in truth the defendant might remain in the custody of the department for years, longer than he might serve if he was convicted, perhaps for the rest of his life—to secure his release more would be required than filling out a piece of paper.
T. G. Kavanagh, J., concurred with Levin, J.