Court Opinion

ID: 9505886
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-06 20:27:53.368124+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:02:32.821484
License: Public Domain

PREGERSON, Circuit Judge,
concurring:
The United States Attorney is the representative not of an ordinary party to a controversy, but of a sovereignty whose obligation to govern impartially is as compelling as its obligation to govern at all; and whose interest, therefore, in a criminal prosecution is not that it shall win a case, but that justice shall be done. As such, he is in a peculiar and very definite sense the servant of the law, the twofold aim of which is that guilt shall not escape or innocence suffer. He may prosecute with earnestness and vigor — indeed, he should do so. But, while he may strike hard blows, he is not at liberty to strike foul ones. It is as much his duty to refrain from improper methods calculated to produce a wrongful conviction as it is to use every legitimate means to bring about a just one.
Berger v. United States, 295 U.S. 78, 88, 55 S.Ct. 629, 79 L.Ed. 1314 (1935) (Sutherland, J.).
I reluctantly join the majority’s opinion, but write separately to express my views on how this case was conducted. There was no reason for the prosecutor to push the envelope and ignore Justice Sutherland’s warning that a prosecutor “may strike hard blows,” but not “foul ones.” Id. The prosecutor struck foul blows by repeatedly telling the jury that they could acquit Ruiz only if they found that both Officer Peck and Officer Ludikhuize were liars. The prosecutor emphasized his improper statements with PowerPoint slides that stated: “Only Way Not Guilty: Officer Peck lied to you” and “Only way not guilty: Officer Ludikhuize lied to you.”
The prosecutor’s argument relies upon specious reasoning. The jury could have concluded that the officers were telling the truth, but still have determined that the evidence put forth by the government was not sufficient to find the defendant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. The prosecutor instead told the jury that to find the defendant not guilty, it first must find that the two officers lied. This distorts the burden of proof and misstates the law, but sadly is condoned by the incantation: “harmless error review.”