Fontaine v. California, 854
| Decision Date | 08 April 1968 |
| Docket Number | M,No. 854,854 |
| Citation | 88 S.Ct. 1229,390 U.S. 593,20 L.Ed.2d 154 |
| Parties | Norman FONTAINE v. CALIFORNIA. isc |
| Court | U.S. Supreme Court |
See 391 U.S. 929, 88 S.Ct. 1813.
Thomas C. Lynch, Atty. Gen. of California, and Derald E. Granberg and Louise H. Renne, Deputy Attys. Gen., for respondent.
The petitioner allegedly made two sales of marihuana to an informer in June and July 1963. He was not indicted until mid-October 1963. According to the State, the delay was due to the State's desire to use the informer in other narcotics cases. By the time the case came to trial, the informer had disappeared. Evidence as to the alleged purchases from petitioner consisted of taped telephone conversations which petitioner claims are ambiguous, and the testimony of police officials. Some of the police observed the transactions between petitioner and the informer, but under circumstances which petitioner argues leave substantial doubt that the seller was in fact the petitioner.
The jury found petitioner guilty, but the trial judge ordered a new trial because of the State's delay which had made the informer unavailable. The California District Court of Appeal reversed the trial judge's ruling, 237 Cal.App.2d 320, 46 Cal.Rptr. 855 (1965). It held that the failure to produce the informer did not deny a fair trial.
At the trial, which took place before our decision in Griffin v. State of California, 380 U.S. 609, 85 S.Ct. 1229, 14 L.Ed.2d 106 (1965), the prosecutor had commented upon petitioner's failure to take the stand. His comment was as follows:
'His Honor will instruct you then on the effect that it may have, any conclusions or inferences you may draw from the fact that he wouldn't take the stand and testify * * *.
The Trial judge had instructed the jury that it could draw adverse inferences from petitioner's silence.* Griffin was decided between the time of trial and the appellate decision. The District Court of Appeal held that the prosecutor's argument and the judge's comment violated petitioner's privilege against self-incrimination under Griffin. However, the Court of Appeal found the constitutional error harmless under the California harmless-error rule prevailing at that time. The State Supreme Court declined to review the case.
Subsequently, we decided Chapman v. State of California, 386 U.S. 18, 87 S.Ct. 824, 17 L.Ed.2d 705 (1967), which disapproved of California's harmless-error rule as applied to federal constitutional errors. Thereafter, we granted a petition for a writ of certiorari in the instant case, vacated the judgment below, and remanded for further consideration in light of Chapman. 386 U.S. 263, 87 S.Ct. 1036, 18 L.Ed.2d 45 (1967). On remand, the District Court of Appeal reinstated its former opinion except that it rewrote the portion dealing with harmless error. This time it recited that the constitutional error in this case was harmless 'beyond a reasonable doubt'—the standard announced in Chapman. People v. Fontaine, 252...
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