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North Carolina v. McKoy9/7/1988
Supreme Court of North Carolina -- it is necessary. If any error is made in this court, that Court will say."
{PA}
Page 10} White, 286 N.C. at 402, 211 S.E.2d at 449. The trial court sustained defendant's objection and instructed the jury: " on't consider what he said about the Supreme Court." Later, as it began its charge, the court gave the following instruction:
"I want to go back to the argument that was objected to in the argument of counsel that the Supreme Court has a right to send this case back on mistakes. The reason I sustained that objection, I want you all to understand is that the Supreme Court will review this case. That they would only send the case back if I make a mistake on a legal question. They will not review the decisions of the facts by the jury. The jury is the sole trier of the facts of this lawsuit."
Id. at 402-03, 211 S.E.2d at 449. We explained that an argument suggesting that the jury can "depend upon either judicial or executive review to correct any errors in their verdict, and to share their responsibility for it, is an abuse of privilege and prejudicial to the defendant." Id. at 403, 211 S.E.2d at 450. The prosecutor's argument, we said, "was clearly intended to overcome the jurors' natural reluctance to render a verdict of guilty of murder in the first degree by diluting their responsibility for its consequences." Id. at 404, 211 S.E.2d at 450. While the court accurately stated that this Court will only review questions of law, the instructions were nonetheless held inadequate to cure the impropriety because they "did not fully enlighten the jury as to the nature of the Supreme Court's review of a case on appeal and as to the difference between 'triers of the facts' and judges of the law." Id. Moreover, we said, the jury probably understood the statement that "the Supreme Court will review this case" to mean that the trial court assumed that there would be a guilty verdict. Id. at 404, 211 S.E.2d at 450-51. For these reasons, we granted the defendant a new trial. Id. at 404, 211 S.E.2d at 451.
In Jones, the prosecutor argued: " f you do err in this case he [defendant] has the right of appeal." Jones, 296 N.C. at 497, 251 S.E.2d at 427. Because an appellate court will not review the factfinder's verdict in the guilt phase, we observed that the prosecutor had made an inaccurate statement. Moreover, the argument's "overriding vice" was that it "effectively told the jurors that they could rely upon the Supreme Court to correct their verdict if it were wrongful or improper . . . ." Id. at 500, 251 S.E.2d
at 428. We held that the argument could have caused the jury to believe that this Court would share its burden of reaching a verdict, and we thus granted defendant's request for a new trial. Id.
In Caldwell, the prosecutor argued to the jury: " our decision is not the final decision. . . . Your job is reviewable." Caldwell, 472 U.S. at 325, 86 L. Ed. 2d at 237. In addition, the trial court stated that the jury's decision would be "reviewable automatically as the death penalty commands." Id. The United States Supreme Court vacated defendant's death sentence, stating that "it is constitutionally impermissible to rest a death sentence on a determination made by a sentencer who has been led to believe that the responsibility for determining the appropriateness of the defendant's death rests elsewhere." Id. at 328-29, 86 L. Ed. 2d at 239.
These cases stand for the proposition that statements by the
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