Com. v. Brownell
| Decision Date | 23 November 1887 |
| Parties | COMMONWEALTH v. BROWNELL. |
| Court | United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court |
J. Brown, for defendant.
A.J Waterman, Atty. Gen., for the Commonwealth.
It was proper for the counsel for the defendant to impress upon the jury their duty to acquit the defendant if his guilt was not proved by the evidence in the case, and to remind them that whenever they should have a proper occasion to give a reason for acquitting the defendant, it would be sufficient to say that his guilt was not proved. The counsel had a right to present this thought in a logical, or in a rhetorical, form he was at liberty to dramatize it in imaginary dialogue, and to illustrate and enforce it by imaginary occasions. The counsel in his argument suggested an occasion in which the jury might be asked the reason why they acquitted the defendant, and the answer which they would give. The language put into the mouth of the jurors is entirely proper and unobjectionable; the impropriety, if any, must have been in the supposed occasion of uttering it. The supposed occasion was the inquiry, by friends and neighbors of the jury, why they acquitted the defendant, and the supposed impropriety must have consisted, either in the implied suggestion that the jury might have in mind the opinions of their friends and neighbors, or in the suggestion that the jury might, at some future time, state to their friends and neighbors the grounds of their verdict. Any attempt to influence a verdict by outside opinion and sentiment is improper; but an appeal to the jury not to be influenced by such opinions and sentiments is proper; and such appeal involves a recognition of the fact that the thought of such opinions may be in the mind of the jury. It is not an assertion of a fact, but the recognition of a possibility. There was no other suggestion of outside influences in the case at bar than was involved in warning the jury against them. We see no impropriety in the other suggestion involved, that, if the defendant was acquitted for want of proof, the jury were at liberty to say, in answer to questions of their friends and neighbors, that the proof was not sufficient. No question of disclosing the secrets of the jury room, or of calling a juror to account for his verdict, is involved. The suggestion is that the juror may voluntarily, and on his own account, make a statement of the...
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