Court Opinion

ID: 9690243
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 18:58:57.944451+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:18:54.566582
License: Public Domain

JOHNSON, Judge
(dissenting)'.
After reconsideration, I most respectfully dissent from the order overruling the application for rehearing in this cause and render the following opinion which would affirm the proceedings and judgment by the Circuit Court of Tuscaloosa County, Alabama.
I accept as correct the basic facts constituting this crime as stated by this court in the opinion issued on June 29, 1962. The testimony is, without contradiction, that the witness, Richard H. Harris, otherwise referred to in the record as “Reverend”, who was the victim' of the robbery, was seventy years of age and for forty-seven years had resided in the same community which was four miles from Tuscaloosa, Alabama, and had for thirty years been a minister of the gospel in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. The reputation of this prosecuting witness for truth and veracity was not assailed, and it was not only the right, but the duty, of the Circuit Solicitor to argue this testimony, or his reasonable inference therefrom, to the trial jury.
In analyzing the solicitor’s statement in argument 'upon which the reversal is bottomed, to-wit, “I know this man of God' told *672you the truth, he is on God’s side, gentlemen, and God is on his”, I find no violation of the rule in Alabama, which is hereafter set out, controlling the propriety of solicitors’ arguments. The statement was the voiced expression of a reasonable and authorised inference from the evidence made by the prosecuting official at the crescendo of his forensic zeal.
Mr. Justice Simpson, in speaking for our Supreme Court in the unanimous affirmation of the case of Johnson v. State, 272 Ala. 633, 133 So.2d 53, restated with approval the rule governing permissible argument in Alabama.
“It is sometimes difficult to draw the line between allowable argument and improper statements in argument. The rule is that an attorney cannot be allowed to state anything as a fact as to which there is no evidence. Olden v. State, 176 Ala. 6, 11, 58 So. 307. But the solicitor may properly comment upon the evil generally of the crime which the law he is seeking to enforce intends to prevent. Dollar v. State, 99 Ala. 236, 13 So. 575. It is only when the statement is of a substantive, outside fact— stated as a fact- — and which manifestly bears on a material inquiry before the jury, that the court can interfere and arrest discussion. Cross v. State, 68 Ala. 476, 484; Sanders v. State, 260 Ala. 323, 70 So.2d 802.”
For the solicitor’s argument to be in error, it must transgress the triune aspects of the rule, to-wit:
1. It must be the statement of a substantive outside fact.
2. It must be stated as a fact.
3. It must bear on a material inquiry before the jury.
■ I have analyzed that portion of the remark of the solicitor, “I know this man of God told you the truth”, in the light of the three requirements of the rule. The trial jury, which was, as required by law, composed of men of sound judgment, heard and weighed all of the evidence presented at this trial as to how, when, and where the crime occurred, and therefrom they quickly and properly reached the conclusion that the Circuit Solicitor was not present at any time at the scene of such crime, saw no part thereof, and could not possibly have personal knowledge of the testimony of the prosecuting witness, Richard H. Harris. The trial jury, possessed of its common sense and good reasoning, could and did properly conclude that the remarks of the solicitor in argument were nothing more than his reasonable and warranted inference from the evidence as to the divine calling or vocation of Reverend Richard H. Harris.
That portion of the remarks of the solicitor, “He is on God’s side, gentlemen, and God is on his”, could not, in my opinion, under any human conception, be construed as a proven fact or evidence to which the solicitor or other mortal man could testify. I submit, in all reverence and humility, that these remarks are of theological significance and the actual factual truth thereof is known only to the Deity and it is beyond the power of man, or a man-made court, possessed with human frailties and limitations, to make any definite or proven conclusion of who’s on God’s side, or whose side God is on. In this field of philosophy, man has opinion, faith and hope but it is reiterated that such remarks are impossible of proof and could not possibly be remarks that the jury could or would accept as a stated fact, or evidence known by and coming to them from the solicitor.
It is my opinion that the trial judge did not consider the remark of the solicitor as testimony of a fact. I reach this conclusion because of his action in overruling an objection made thereto by counsel for the appellant. The manner in which a remark is made in argument conveys the intendment of the speaker. The learned trial judge heard the argument and observed the entire situation when the solicitor made the statement to the court and jury. He observed the demeanor of the solicitor, heard *673his tenor, and heard the vocal emphasis, or lack thereof, used by him as he spoke, and it is my conclusion that the trial judge, who was then and there safeguarding the rights of the defendant, did not regard such remarks as statements of fact or testimony, or made as such by the solicitor to the jury.
The voice of the prosecuting official is the vocal medium by which the rights of a concerned and aggrieved society is heard. I concur with Mr. Justice Harwood, former Presiding Judge of this Court, when he spoke for this Court in unanimity in the affirmative of the case, Ash v. State, 33 Ala. App. 456, 34 So.2d 700, affirmed 250 Ala. 417, 34 So.2d 704, affirming a conviction of manslaughter in the first degree as follows:
“As we have stated before, society has a valid and strong interest in enforcement of criminal laws, not only in seeing that punishment is imposed on the guilty, but that criminal acts on the part of others are discouraged by the example of such punishment. It is the duty of the Solicitor to exercise his full powers toivard these ends. In exhorting a jury to do its dzity he should not be so fettered by niceties as to destroy his effectiveness. The adversary setting of a law trial partakes of combat, and not of a social tea. * * * ”
(Emphasis ours).
While our constitutional guarantee of a fair and public trial, must remain inviolate, yet in securing this right unto our people, we should not dim the voice of our public prosecutors, in their official efforts to protect individuals and their property from the crimes of violence.
In conclusion, it is my opinion that failure to dissent from the majority opinion would be a violation of the admonition set out by Mr. Justice Plarwood in the Ash case to the effect that a law' trial partakes of combat rather than a social tea. I feel that for the verdict of the jury and judgment of the lower court to be disturbed would be the equivalent of a social tea for the appellant who perpetrated this crime, according to. the evidence, in a pink Cadillac. It is my minority and dissenting opinion that the verdict and judgment of the lower court should not be disturbed.