Court Opinion

ID: 9778724
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 21:17:21.98801+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:33:12.785433
License: Public Domain

STEPHENS, Chief Justice,
dissenting.
Respectfully, I dissent.
In Tamme v. Commonwealth, Ky., 759 S.W.2d 51 (1988), this Court announced a simple rule, unconditionally stated, that could not have been more unambiguous: “Further-move, we hold that in capital cases in which the trial commences after the effective date of the finality of this opinion, the word ‘recommend’ may not be used with reference to a jury’s sentencing responsibilities in voir dire, instructions or closing arguments.” Id. at 53. (Emphasis added). ' By its treatment of the Tamme violation in this case as merely “technical,” the majority view obscures well-defined waters and encourages an impression that this Court does not mean what it says.
In pre-Tamme cases,1 the one thing certain was that there was no certain line. Hence, the Tamme mandate. The soundness of the Tamme prohibition lies in the total absence of any competing consideration that weighs in favor of use of the word, “recommend.” In fact the only possible value in using the word is to accomplish, in some measure, the forbidden effect. On the other side, the constitutional importance of foreclosing any possibility of diminution of a jury’s sense of sentencing responsibility in a capital case was carefully developed in Tamme and should be patently clear.
Reversal of a death sentence based on this issue should not turn on whether the word “fix” outnumbers the word “recommend” in the jury instructions. Nor is this a matter of simple semantics. The majority contends that appellant was not prejudiced by the “two isolated instances” where the jury instructions told the jury that it would “recommend” a sentence for the defendant. Yet, there was the word “recommend,” in black and white, on instructions that were actually carried into the jury room to assist the jury in deliberation. Without special insight, I cannot comfortably claim that no one juror was not influenced by the idea that the jury was only “recommending” the defendant be put to death. That was the point of the rule in Tamme. I respectfully dissent in its demise.
STUMBO, J., joins this dissenting opinion.

. Ice v. Commonwealth, Ky., 667 S.W.2d 671 (1984); Ward v. Commonwealth, Ky., 695 S.W.2d 404 (1985); Kordenbrock v. Commonwealth, Ky., 700 S.W.2d 384 (1985); Matthews v. Commonwealth, Ky., 709 S.W.2d 414 (1986); Sanborn v. Commonwealth, Ky., 754 S.W.2d 534 (1988) and Grooms v. Commonwealth, Ky., 756 S.W.2d 131 (1988).