Court Opinion

ID: 9672343
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 03:53:06.738337+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:16:15.487588
License: Public Domain

R. M. Maher, J.
(dissenting). GCR 1963, 512 provides in pertinent part:
".2 The jury agreeing on a verdict shall return into court and announce their verdict. A party may require a poll which shall be by the clerk asking each juror if it is his verdict. If any juror expresses disagreement on such poll and the number of those agreeing is less than required by law, the jury shall be sent out for further deliberation; otherwise the verdict is complete and the jury shall be discharged.
".3 The court may discharge a jury from the case because of any accident or calamity requiring it, or by consent of all the parties, or when a continuance or mistrial is declared, or when they have deliberated until it appears that they cannot agree. The court may order another jury to be drawn, and the same proceedings may be had before such new jury as might have been had before the jury so discharged.” (Emphasis supplied.)
Not only did the trial judge, in the present case, fail to follow the court rule’s mandate to send the jury out for further deliberation but he could not, as the majority holds, have properly declared a mistrial. There would be no "manifest necessity for the act” since there is no showing that the jury was unable to reach a verdict. See United States v Perez, 22 US 579, 580; 6 L Ed 165 (1824). The jury in this case was not allowed sufficient opportunity to properly reach a verdict or reach an impasse.
"Once a defendant has been placed in jeopardy, he has a right to have his guilt weighed finally by that tribunal. If the jury is discharged without legal justification or defendant’s consent before his guilt or innocence has been determined, the discharge 'is equivalent to an acquittal and bars retrial’.” People v Gardner, 37 Mich *412App 520, 526; 195 NW2d 62 (1972), lv den, 387 Mich 771 (1972). (Citations omitted.)
I would reverse the trial court and order defendant released.