Court Opinion

ID: 9442587
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-03 18:52:25.826718+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:29:08.730869
License: Public Domain

MAGRUDER, Chief Judge
(concurring).
I concur in the judgment and in general in the opinion of the Court.
With reference to the question which the prosecutor asked of a defense character witness, “Did you also hear that the defendant was convicted for violation of the labor laws in — ”: This type of question may be permissible in the discretion of the trial judge, provided the proper factual basis for it exists. Malatkofski v. United States, 1 Cir., 1950, 179 F.2d 905, 913, 914; Michelson v. United States, 1948, 335 U.S. 469, 69 S.Ct. 213, 93 L.Ed. 168. Here the judge excluded the question at the outset and directed the jury to disregard it. Counsel for the defendant did not ask for a mistrial at that point. After the jury brought in its verdict, the defendant moved for a new trial for the reason, among others, that he had been substantially prejudiced and deprived of a fair trial as a result of the action of the prosecutor in asking the character witness the foregoing question. The reasons given by the judge for denying a new trial on that score seem to me to be adequate. Defendant was not entitled to a new trial as a matter of law, and it seems to me obvious that the trial court cannot be said to have committed an abuse of discretion in-denying the motion. See Sears v. United States, 1 Cir., 1920, 264 F. 257, 264.
The effect of what we do is that the defendant will have to serve concurrent sentences of 18 months and pay aggregate fines of $4,000. I think the conviction on count 5 is clearly invulnerable, for the reasons indicated in the Court’s opinion. Therefore, though I agree that the convictions on counts 2 and 3 should also be affirmed, it may be worth while to point out that even if we had concluded that the defendant had been improperly convicted on those two counts, all we would have done would have been to set aside the judgment of conviction and the sentences as applied to counts 2 *294and 3, leaving standing the judgment of conviction on count 5 with the sentence thereon of 18 months’ imprisonment and a fine of $2,000. See Jarvis v. United States, 1 Cir., 1937, 90 F.2d 243, 246-247. Giugni v. United States, 1 Cir., 1942, 127 F.2d 786, 792.