Court Opinion

ID: 9456859
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 20:04:25.573284+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:35:07.518327
License: Public Domain

MOORE, Circuit Judge
(dissenting):
This obvious miscarriage of justice results from a misconception of the facts and from an ill-founded (and unintended — I hope) decision, the effect of which is to hold that a crime, no matter how overwhelmingly proved, can be justified if committed by a fifteen-year-old boy who admits to the use of narcotic drugs.
First, the facts. The jury was entitled to believe that the Government Postal Service agents observed the three mail robbers, including this defendant, during the span of their operations, i. e., the casing of the neighborhood, the parking of their stolen car near the mail truck, the removal of the mail sacks from the truck to their car and their attempted getaway.
Despite the trial court’s voir dire decision in holding the alleged involuntary confession to have been voluntary, the majority reappraise the facts in an endeavor to adjust them to facts of other cases which have little bearing upon the proper decision here. Thus, the impression is given that appellant was merely “laying on the back seat” whereas, in fact, he with his older brother had traveled by subway from his home to 37th Street, Manhattan, and proceeded to participate in the events just described. Because he had allegedly taken some form of narcotic drug prior to the robbery, at about 9:00 A.M., he was given an injection of methadone. The three defendants were brought to the United States Court House for arraignment and questioning about 10:00 A.M.
Binet himself took the stand. The jury had ample opportunity to assess his credibility in relation to that of the Government agents. He made no claim of abuse, threats or any other coercion. The very hyperbole in applicant’s brief, reflected in the majority opinion that the record does show “an effort to obtain the confession of a drugged, ‘sleepy,’ fifteen-year-old lad held for some éight hours without the presence of a lawyer or relative,” is not a distortion of fact— it is completely contrary to fact. There was no evidence that at the time of interrogation Binet was in a “drugged” condition. The methadone by his own admission caused him to feel better and his manner and responses during the questioning were alert. He was twice given Miranda warnings. There was no eight-hour holding.
This case, however, by no means stands upon Binet’s inculpatory statement; it was but a part of the testimony overwhelmingly pointing to guilt. Therefore, the error of the majority is to be found in their reliance on cases such as United States v. Glover, 372 F.2d 43 (2d Cir. 1967) and United States v. Middleton, 344 F.2d 78 (2d Cir. 1965).
*301Glover was decided less thaii a month before the Supreme Court handed down its decision in Chapman v. California, 386 U.S. 18, 87 S.Ct. 824, 17 L.Ed.2d 705 (1967) which greatly legitimatized the doctrine of “harmless error.” It is, therefore, most understandable that the Glover court did not seriously address itself to the question of harmless error. However, after Chapman came Harrington v. California, 395 U.S. 250, 89 S.Ct. 1726, 23 L.Ed.2d 284, decided on June 2, 1969. In that case, the Supreme Court signalled a definite departure from automatic reversal toward acceptance, if not encouragement, of broadened use of the harmless error rule in cases involving questions of fundamental constitutional dimension. The effect of that decision was pointed up by Mr. Justice Brennan, in his dissent, 395 U.S. at 255, 89 S.Ct. at 1729, in which he clearly recognized the meaning and manifold implications of the Court’s decision in Harrington; i. e., the Court did not intend to limit its narrowing of Chapman to the Bruton problems there presented when he said:
“The Court today overrules Chapman v. California, 386 U.S. 18, 87 S. Ct. 824, 17 L.Ed.2d 705 (1967), the very case it purports to apply. Far more fundamentally, it severely undermines many of the Court’s most significant decisions in the area of criminal procedure.
*****
“Chapman, then, meant no compromise with the proposition that a conviction cannot constitutionally be based to any extent on constitutional error. The Court today by shifting the inquiry from whether the constitutional error contributed to the conviction to whether the untainted evidence provided ‘overwhelming’ support for the conviction puts aside the firm resolve of Chapman and makes that compromise. As a result, the deterrent effect of such cases as Mapp v. Ohio, 367 U.S. 643, 81 S.Ct. 1684, 6 L. Ed.2d 1081 (1965); Griffin v. California, 380 U.S. 609, 85 S.Ct. 1229, 14 L.Ed.2d 106 (1965); Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966); United States v. Wade, 388 U.S. 218, 87 S.Ct. 1926, 18 L.Ed.2d 1149 (1967); and Bruton v. United States, 391 U.S. 123, 88 S.Ct. 1620, 20 L.Ed.2d 476 (1968), on the actions of both police and prosecutors, not to speak of.trial courts, will be significantly undermined.”
The majority today quotes heavily from Glover, 372 F.2d at 46-47, with particular emphasis on that portion of the opinion which seeks to establish for juveniles in custody minimum procedural safeguards greater than those guaranteed to all other similarly situated citizens by Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966). Even assuming arguendo that the Glover court was correct in making a finding of congressional purpose sufficient to justify conferral of the extremely protective rules of exclusion and automatic reversal under then-existing law, something which I seriously question, I find it anomalous indeed that this court today would treat matters relating to rights of fundamental constitutional importance with less favor than cases involving statutorily created rights intended to secure the same level of procedural protection for a special class of citizens deemed to be in special need of it. I cannot understand how the majority can distinguish the application of so neutral a concept as “harmless error” on the basis of age or on the basis of a “congressional purpose to protect juveniles against themselves.”
In my opinion the proper standard by which this court should be guided under the latest Supreme Court pronouncement on the subject is whether the evidence adduced at trial is “so overwhelming that unless we say that no violation of [18 U.S.C. § 5035] can constitute harmless error [as this court seems to say to-4ay], we must leave this [federal adjudication] undisturbed.” Harrington v. California, 395 U.S. at 254, 89 S.Ct. at 1729.
In summary, the evidence establishing Binet’s guilt clearly was “overwhelm*302ing.” A Postal Inspection Service Agent saw Binet, his brother and brother-in-law next to the mail trailer from which the stolen mail sacks were taken. Binet was arrested in a ear which he knew to be stolen, in the trunk of which the stolen mail sacks were discovered. Binet admitted at trial that he pushed one of the mail sacks into the car trunk, but offered the implausible story that he believed the mail sack belonged to his brother and not to the U.S. Government. This version of the facts, if disbelieved by the jury, constitutes affirmative proof in the Government’s case as part of Binet’s “guilty consciousness.” United States v. Fabric Garment Co., 262 F.2d 631, 639 (2d Cir. 1958), cert. denied, 359 U.S. 989, 79 S.Ct. 1117, 3 L.Ed.2d 978 (1959).
There can be little question but that the fruits of any alleged Government failure to comply with § 5035 were clearly harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.
I would affirm the judgment.