Court Opinion

ID: 9732526
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 16:24:05.961679+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:26:28.826283
License: Public Domain

SABERS, Justice
(dissenting).
I believe it is wholly improper to base a conviction upon the privileged communications between a defendant and his wife, and I would reverse.
The majority contends that this Court cannot even address the merits of the trial court’s effective denial of the defendant’s pretrial motion to suppress his wife’s testimony because no written order on the motion appears in the settled record and the defendant failed to object further at trial. As the majority knows, however, SDCL 19-9-6 and 23A-44-131 permit this Court to consider on appeal errors which are so substantial and obvious that they rise to the level of “plain error,” even though technically they have not been preserved for appeal.
The breach of the spousal privilege at trial is such a substantial and obvious error. The privilege is secured under South Dakota law by the clear language of SDCL 19-13-13: “An accused in a criminal proceeding has a privilege to prevent his spouse from testifying as to any confidential communication2 between the accused and the spouse.”
In this case, it is undisputed that the challenged testimony falls outside the handful of limited exceptions to the privilege at SDCL 19-13-15 and the “joint participation” exception created in State v. Witchey, 388 N.W.2d 893 (S.D.1986). Here the defendant, in his motion to suppress, formally asserted the privilege, as permitted by SDCL 19-13-13 and as required by State v. Damm, 62 S.D. 123, 252 N.W. 7 (1933). Under these circumstances, the error of the trial court in admitting the testimony was obvious.
It was also substantial. The pedigree of the spousal privilege asserted by the defendant is ancient and its public policy justification is urgent and preemptive.
The purpose of the marital communication privilege is many: the protection of the marital relationship; to protect marital privacy; and to insure the ability of one spouse to communicate privately with the other_ It can even be ar-
gued that the rule is a logical extension to the constitutional prohibition against self-incrimination.
State v. Witchey, 388 N.W.2d at 897 (Sabers, J., dissenting).
Any weakening of the spousal privilege has implications which are broader and *745deeper than its effect on particular marriages and particular cases. As the Federal District Court for Colorado stated in United States v. Neal, 532 F.Supp. 942 (D.Colo.1982),
Over at least the last decade, the circle of privacy surrounding each of us has drawn smaller with each new governmental incursion and each new technological advance. Courts have sought to preserve inviolable some small island of privacy as a refuge for the human spirit where government may not intrude. Here the question is whether one such sanctuary, protected by the common law for centuries, shall be breached, rendering the secrets told to wives by husbands fair game for government investigators.
The issue is whether in our free society the government may, by making a deal with one’s spouse, invade the confidences of marriage to turn those nearest and dearest into informers ... [T]he police could obtain much information of great value in combatting crime. The only question is whether the price would be too high.
Id., at 946.
Not only may this Court reach the merits under the plain error rule, its decision on the merits ought to be equally plain. The use by the State of a wife’s testimony against her husband concerning the intimate details of their sexual relationship is so self-evidently prejudicial to the husband in his capacity as a defendant in a rape trial that we should not hesitate to reverse a conviction resting on such testimony. Certainly the State has not shown beyond a reasonable doubt that such error was harmless, which makes it reversible error. State v. Michaelek, 407 N.W.2d 815, 819 (S.D.1987).
I respectfully dissent.

. SDCL 23A-44-13 provides in part: "(Rule 51) Exceptions not required to preserve objection ... it is sufficient that a party, at the time the ruling or order of the court is made or sought, makes known to the court the action which he desires the court to take or his objection to the action of the court and the grounds therefor...."

. SDCL 19-13-12 provides: "A communication is confidential if it is made privately by any person to his or her spouse during their marriage and is not intended for disclosure to any other person.”
These communications, though nonverbal, were "made privately," "during their marriage,” and were "not intended for disclosure to any other person."