People v. Hammer

California Court of Appeal Sep 3, 1925 No. Docket No. 1214.Published

Before: Works

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Holding. The trial court erred by instructing the jury that an alibi defense is easily fabricated and subject to suspicion, as such an instruction constitutes an improper charge on the weight of evidence and shifts the burden of proof. However, the conviction was affirmed because the court determined, under the state constitution, that the error did not result in a miscarriage of justice given the overwhelming evidence of guilt.

Issues

Whether the trial court's instruction regarding the defense of alibi constituted reversible error.
Whether the error in the jury instruction resulted in a miscarriage of justice requiring reversal.

Disposition. affirmed

Quotations verified verbatim against the opinion

“The instruction not only casts an unwarranted burden upon the defendant, but casts suspicion upon his defense and the evidence produced in support thereof. It is essentially an argument against the defendant”

“The trial court here erred in reading the questioned instruction to the jury.”

“After the examination we have concluded that justice has not miscarried and that, therefore, the error of the court does not require a reversal.”

[346]

WORKS, J.

Defendant was charged with having committed rape upon the person of a girl under the age of eighteen years, the alleged victim having been of the age of sixteen at the time of the alleged offense. The jury rendered a verdict of guilty and defendant appeals from the judgment of conviction and from an order of the trial court denying his motion for a new trial.

The testimony of appellant, and of three other witnesses who corroborated him, established a perfect alibi, if the jury had elected to believe the evidence put forward by the defense upon that issue. The trial judge instructed the jury:

“The defendant could not have been in these two places at the same time; and in this contradiction of witnesses the jury have to determine for themselves where lies the truth. In so judging they will take into consideration the appearance and apparent candor and fairness of the respective witnesses; the probability of their statements; its coincidence with other facts or features of the case which they may deem established; and generally those rules of ordinary experience and general observation by which intelligent men decide as to controverted propositions of fact.

“The effect of an alibi when established, is like that of any other conclusive fact presented in a case. Showing, as it does, that the party asserting it could not have been present at the time of the commission of the crime alleged in the indictment, and therefore did ont participate in it, is, when credited, a defense of the most conclusive and satisfactory character. That is a question to be decided 'by the Jury the same as any other question. .

“The fact, however, which experience has shown, that an alibi as a defense is capable of being and has been occasionally successfully fabricated; that even when wholly false its detection may be matter of very great difficulty;- and that the temptation to resort to this as a spurious defense may be very great; especially in eases of importance.”

It is contended that the giving of this instruction was error, and the third and last paragraph is pointed at particularly in presenting the contention. Instructions of a character like unto this, in several instances practically identical with it, have been before the courts of review of the state many times. In the earlier cases the charge as a whole

People v. Hammer

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WORKS, J.

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