Court Opinion

ID: 9710945
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 04:21:07.092475+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:23:01.235250
License: Public Domain

VOGEL, Justice,
dissenting.
The majority opinion admits that error of constitutional dimensions occurred when the prosecuting attorney inquired of the defendant as to whether he had testified at the preliminary hearing and why he had not done so, but says the error is harmless. I dissent.
Under the rule of Chapman v. California, 386 U.S. 18, 24, 87 S.Ct. 824, 828, 17 L.Ed.2d 705, 710-711 (1967),
“. . . before a federal constitutional error can be held harmless, the court must be able to declare a belief that it was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.”
We have specifically approved this rule for North Dakota. State v. Hilling, 219 N.W.2d 164 (N.D.1974). We have gone farther: We have held that we are committed to fair trials, even where the evidence is ample for conviction. State v. Jensen, 251 N.W.2d 182 (N.D.1977); State v. Haakenson, 213 N.W.2d 394 (N.D.1974); State v. Ghylin, 222 N.W.2d 864 (N.D.1973); State v. Schlittenhardt, 147 N.W.2d 118 (N.D.1966).
*422In North Dakota we have a statute which specifically forbids prosecutors from doing what was done in this case. Section 29-21-11, N.D.C.C., says:
“In the trial of a criminal action or proceeding before any court or magistrate of this state, whether prosecuted by information, indictment, complaint, or otherwise, the defendant, at his own request and not otherwise, shall be deemed a competent witness, but his neglect or refusal to testify shall not create or raise any presumption of guilt against him. Nor shall such neglect or refusal be referred to by any attorney prosecuting the case, or considered by the court or jury before whom the trial takes place.”
The majority opinion holds, in the face of all of this decisional, constitutional, and statutory law, that it was harmless error to allow the prosecuting attorney, over objection, to interrogate the defendant as to his failure to testify at the preliminary hearing. In order to do so, the majority has to find beyond a reasonable doubt that the error was harmless. Chapman v. California, supra.
It is my feeling, beyond a reasonable doubt, that the error was harmful. Anyone with any experience in prosecuting or defending criminal cases must know that the sort of inference created by the prosecutor’s questions, leading the jury to believe that the defendant had a duty to tell his story at the earliest opportunity, will be nothing but devastating to any defense he may interpose. The defendant was asked whether he took part in the preliminary hearing, whether he took the witness stand, and whether he knew that if someone else was driving there would be no further case against him. His attorney objected, pointing out that it' was the attorney’s decision to not allow the defendant to testify at the preliminary hearing, that whether or not he testified had nothing to do with the trial, and that it was improper cross-examination. The attorney pointed out that the State needed “little more than nothing to bind a defendant to this Court, and I think to imply that if he had gone up and testified that day that he was not driving, to imply that if he had done that we wouldn’t be here today, I think that is highly irregular and it is not proper questioning, your Hon- or.” All of the objections were overruled. The effect could only be devastating, and it is simply preposterous to hold that the error was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.
In State v. Bragg, 221 N.W.2d 793 (N.D.1974), we held that it was plain error to permit the State witness to testify to the effect that the defendant had remained silent after being arrested for a crime, even though the evidence was brought out without any objection whatever on the part of the defendant.
The majority opinion apparently attempts to escape this holding by attempting to distinguish Bragg on two grounds: (1) that Bragg did not take the witness stand at the trial, and (2) that somehow he lost his right to refuse to testify at the preliminary hearing by testifying at the trial.
The right to remain silent is absolute and is not dependent upon when it is invoked. Furthermore, in Bragg we cited two Michigan cases, People v. Bobo, 390 Mich. 355, 212 N.W.2d 190 (1973), and People v. Severance, 43 Mich.App. 394, 204 N.W.2d 357 (1972). In both of those cases the defendant did take the witness stand at the trial, and in both of them it was held that the prosecution may not use at the trial the fact that a defendant exercised his privilege of silence in the face of accusation. The reason was that the defendant would thereby be penalized for exercising the privilege. The same is true here, whether the defendant testified at the preliminary hearing or not.
It is no answer to the constitutional error to say that a defendant can be cross-examined like any other witness. Of course he can, but he does not lose his constitutional rights by taking the witness stand. One of those rights is that he has a right to remain silent, at trial as well as before trial. This is a right that other witnesses do not have, unless they claim their Fifth Amendment privilege and sustain it. When the majority opinion admits that
*423. . whatever remaining vitality Raff el retained appears to have been substantially diminished by Doyle v. Ohio,
the majority admits that there remains no persuasive authority whatever for the proposition that a defendant’s refusal to testify can be commented upon by the prosecution.
In Chapman, supra, the question before the court was whether questions and comments of a prosecutor referring to the defendant’s failure to testify could ever be harmless error. The United States Supreme Court held that they could be harmless error, but were not in that case. The whole burden of Chapman v. California is that error of constitutional dimensions is presumed reversible error, that the existence of constitutional error puts a burden on the beneficiary of the error to prove that there was no injury, and that before such error can be held harmless the court must be able to declare a belief that it was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. Under that rule, I submit that the error in the present case is flagrantly reversible. The exact language of the United States Supreme Court is:
“Certainly error, constitutional error, in illegally admitting highly prejudicial evidence or comments, casts on someone other than the person prejudiced by it a burden to show that it was harmless. It is for that reason that the original common-law harmless-error rule put the burden on the beneficiary of the error either to prove that there was no injury or to suffer a reversal of his erroneously obtained judgment. There is little, if any, difference between our statement in Fahy v. Connecticut [375 U.S. 85, 84 S.Ct. 229, 11 L.Ed.2d 171] about ‘whether there is a reasonable possibility that the evidence complained of might have contributed to the conviction’ and requiring the beneficiary of a constitutional error to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the error complained of did not contribute to the verdict obtained.” Chapman v. California, supra, 386 U.S. at 24, 87 S.Ct. at 828, 17 L.Ed.2d at 710.
Most of the cases on the right of the defendant to remain silent relate to situations such as that in Bragg, supra, where the defendant does not immediately assert his innocence to the police. Even in such cases, comment on his silence is almost always reversible error. See Doyle v. Ohio, 426 U.S. 610, 96 S.Ct. 2240, 49 L.Ed.2d 91 (1976); State v. Bragg, supra. The reason is well stated in United States v. Hale, 422 U.S. 171, 180, 95 S.Ct. 2133, 2138, 45 L.Ed.2d 99, 107 (1975):
“Not only is evidence of silence at the time of arrest generally not very probative of a defendant’s credibility, but it also has a significant potential for prejudice. The danger is that the jury is likely to assign much more weight to the defendant’s previous silence than is warranted. And permitting the defendant to explain the reasons for his silence is unlikely to overcome the strong negative inference that the jury is likely to draw from the fact that the defendant remained silent at the time of his arrest.
“As we have stated before: ‘When the risk of confusion is so great as to upset the balance of advantage, the evidence goes out.’ Shepard v. United States, 290 U.S. 96, 104, 54 S.Ct. 22, 26, 78 L.Ed. 196 (1930). We now conclude that the respondent’s silence during police interrogation lacked significant probative value and that any reference to his silence under such circumstances carried with it an intolerably prejudicial impact.”
Comments on failure to testify are even more flagrantly prejudicial when the comment relates to failure to testify at a preliminary hearing. This is admitted by the minority justices of the United States Supreme Court in Doyle v. Ohio, supra, where they say:
. . a more difficult question is presented by their objection to the questioning about their failure to testify at the preliminary hearing and their failure generally to mention the ‘frame’ before trial. Unlike the failure to make the kind of spontaneous comment that discovery of a ‘frame’ would be expected to *424prompt, there is no significant inconsistency between petitioners’ trial testimony and their adherence to counsel’s advice not to take the stand at the preliminary hearing; moreover, the decision not to divulge their defense prior to trial is probably attributable to counsel rather than to petitioners.” 426 U.S. at 630-632, 96 S.Ct. at 2250, 49 L.Ed.2d at 104.
Also pertinent is footnote 10 of the dissent:
“Under Ohio law, the preliminary hearing determines only whether the defendant should be held for trial. The prosecution need establish, at most, that a crime has been committed and that there is ‘probable and reasonable cause’ to hold the defendant for trial and the court need only find ‘substantial credible evidence’ of the charge against the defendant. . Defense counsel thus will have no incentive to divulge the defendant’s case at the preliminary hearing if the prosecution has presented substantial evidence of guilt. Since that was the case here, no significant impeaching inference may be drawn from petitioners’ silence at that proceeding.” 426 U.S. at 632, 96 S.Ct. at 2251, 49 L.Ed.2d at 105.
All of these things may properly be said of the case before us. Indeed, the objections by defense counsel quoted above show that the failure of the defendant to testify at the preliminary hearing was due entirely to the advice of the attorney. Therefore, “no significant impeaching inference may be drawn” from the defendant’s silence at the preliminary hearing.
Since the United States Supreme Court has held, in Doyle, that it is constitutional error requiring reversal to refer to the silence of the defendant when accused by the police, and since even the four dissenting justices in the same case concede that silence at a preliminary hearing raises “a more difficult question” and that silence upon recommendation of the defense attorney means that “no significant impeaching inference may be drawn from” the silence, it seems to me simply irrefutable that reference to silence at the preliminary hearing is reversible constitutional error.
Let us now examine the evidence which the majority relies upon to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the constitutional error was harmless.
The statements by the defendant which the majority considers as incriminating are disputed. Several peace officers testified that the defendant, his brother, and the surviving passenger refused to say who was driving, and that later, after the other passenger died, the defendant admitted being the driver. The defendant denied this, and so did his brother. The surviving passenger, when called as a defense witness, appeared to be too intoxicated to testify. The defendant said that he was arrested, handcuffed, and then questioned as to whether he was the driver. Somewhat indignantly, he asked the officers why he was arrested if they didn’t know who was driving and, when his brother was arrested, apparently for having a gun, why they were arresting him if the defendant was the driver, and he admitted making a statement such as, “. . .it looks like they are going to try to hold me for driving.”
As for the statement that he knew he would lose his license for refusing to take a blood test, which the majority construes to be an admission that he was driving, there is not one iota of evidence that the defendant knew that only drivers could be compelled to take the test or that only drivers could lose licenses for being under the influence of liquor. In fact, the evidence is that the Assistant State’s Attorney told him that “by refusing he would lose his driver’s license,” from which the defendant could fairly conclude that anyone who refuses to take the test will lose his license whether he was driving or not.
To me, it is nowhere near proved beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant was guilty. There was enough evidence to go to a jury, but the jury found the defendant guilty of a lesser crime than that charged. The jury may very well have been influenced by evidence totally inadmissible and totally improper — evidence that the defend*425ant had exercised, under the advice of his attorney, the right to remain silent at a preliminary hearing. That right is being destroyed by court decisions such as that of the majority.
Even if it is conceded that there was a preponderance of the evidence in favor of conviction, and even if we assume [although United States v. Harp, 536 F.2d 601 (5th Cir. 1976), says otherwise] that it still is possible to find harmless error in prosecuto-rial comments on post-Miranda silence, it would be necessary to find that not one juror could have had a reasonable doubt of guilt in order to hold the error harmless [Minor v. Black, 527 F.2d 1 (6th Cir. 1975)]. I can’t do it.
The effect of opinions such as the majority opinion in this case is to allow prosecuting attorneys to commit error of constitutional dimensions with impunity. If they have a strong case, they may violate the Constitution in the secure knowledge that the appellate court will hold that the evidence of guilt was so strong that the error was “harmless.” If they have a weak case, they may violate the constitutional rights of the defendant in the hope that the error will be overlooked, or in the belief that they have nothing to lose since the case will be lost, anyway.
I would adhere to our rulings listed in the second paragraph of this dissent, and in State v. Bragg, supra, and I would follow the United States courts in their rulings in United States v. Hale, supra, Doyle v. Ohio, supra, and United States v. Harp, supra, and would therefore reverse.