Court Opinion

ID: 9535359
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 04:48:21.564381+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:33:13.728326
License: Public Domain

GODFREY, Justice,
with whom POMER-OY and NICHOLS, Justices, concur, dissenting.
I cannot agree with the majority’s characterization of the presiding justice’s comments and must respectfully dissent.
The state’s witness, Cauley Connell, who testified in exchange for a recommendation of probation by the State, admitted burglarizing Napoli’s Pizza and named appellant as his accomplice. Appellant testified that he did not accompany Connell to Napo-li’s Pizza on the morning in question and did not take part in the burglary. Appellant’s testimony was corroborated by three other defense witnesses, including his sister, *762Cindy, and her friend, Sonya Gordon, whose credibility was thus of crucial importance to the defense.
Cindy and Sonya testified that on the morning of appellant’s arrest, while they were clearing out their apartment in preparation for vacating it later in the day, they found in a trash container outside the apartment building eight or ten cases of beer which they carried up to their apartment on the top floor. The presiding justice interrupted the direct examination of Cindy to interrogate her as follows:
“THE COURT: When were you planning to move out that day?
THE WITNESS: Oh, in between probably eight and two, whenever we got out, early morning.
“THE COURT: But you brought eight or nine or ten cases up to the top floor of the building of the apartment you were going to move out of?
THE WITNESS: Uh-hum.”
That intervention by the trial justice cannot be justified as “clarifying a confused evi-dentiary situation” or “bringing forward overlooked essential facts.” State v. Annis, Me., 341 A.2d 11 (1975). The majority cannot see how the jury could interpret the justice’s questioning “as an expression of opinion by the Court respecting Cindy’s believability.” I do not see how the justice’s second question could be interpreted by the jury to signify anything other than disbelief or doubt.
The Maine Legislature has made it clear that during the trial, the presiding justice shall not express an opinion on issues of fact arising in the case. 14 M.R.S.A. § 1105 (1978 — 79 Supp.). Such an expression of opinion is sufficient cause for a new trial in a criminal case if the defendant thereby aggrieved desires it. The appellant asserts that he was aggrieved by the presiding justice’s questioning, which manifested disbelief in the testimony of a key witness for the defense. I am satisfied that his claim is well founded and would set aside the conviction and order a new trial.
I am authorized to state that Justices Pomeroy and Nichols join in this dissent.