United States v. Harper, 71-2975. Summary Calendar.
| Decision Date | 15 May 1972 |
| Docket Number | No. 71-2975. Summary Calendar.,71-2975. Summary Calendar. |
| Citation | 460 F.2d 705 |
| Parties | UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Wesley Leon HARPER, Defendant-Appellant. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit |
Morton O. Orbach (Court Appointed), Miami, Fla., for defendant-appellant.
Robert W. Rust, U. S. Atty., Kenneth G. Oertel, Asst. U. S. Atty., Miami, Fla., for plaintiff-appellee.
Before GEWIN, AINSWORTH and SIMPSON, Circuit Judges.
Wesley Leon Harper was found guilty after jury trial of violating Title 18, U. S.C., Section 2113(d), the federal bank robbery statute. He appeals from his judgment of conviction and sentence to ten years confinement. We affirm.
At the jury trial below, defense counsel stipulated to the truth of the factual allegations in the indictment. It was agreed that the sole issue to be determined by the jury was Harper's mental condition at the time he committed the robbery. He offered no other defense.
Included with the evidence offered at trial as to the appellant's mental condition, the government produced a psychiatrist, Dr. Moreau, who testified that, in his opinion, Harper was sane at the time of the robbery. Dr. Moreau had participated in a brief (one-half hour) examination of Harper while Harper was at the Medical Center at Springfield, Missouri.1 Dr. Moreau also had access to appellant's medical records and to the report prepared by a psychologist, Dr. Murney, who had examined and tested Harper extensively at Springfield. Dr. Murney was present at the trial and available to testify. The government represented that Dr. Murney would be called to testify after Dr. Moreau. At the completion of Dr. Moreau's testimony, however, the government rested its case and refused to call Dr. Murney as a prosecution witness. Defense counsel was told by the court that he was at liberty to call Dr. Murney. He did not do so.
Appellant's first contention on appeal is that the trial court committed reversible error in allowing Dr. Moreau to testify as to Harper's sanity since his opinion was in considerable part based on material not introduced in evidence. Harper maintains that an expert opinion cannot be based on opinions, conclusions, or inferences of others, and that Dr. Moreau's testimony should have been rejected for this reason. He also contends that the government had a duty to call Dr. Murney.
As to the latter point, it seems clear that a prosecutor has no duty to call all the witnesses he has subpoenaed, and may exercise his own judgment concerning the witnesses to be called and the testimony to be presented. See, e. g., United States v. Polisi, 2 Cir. 1969, 416 F.2d 573; Eberhart v. United States, 9 Cir. 1958, 262 F.2d 421; Curtis v. Rives, 1941, 75 U.S.App.D.C. 66, 123 F.2d 936; Jordon v. Bondy, 1940, 72 App.D.C. 360, 114 F.2d 599; Williams v. United States, 1927, 57 App.D. C. 253, 20 F.2d 269. Additionally, the admissibility of Dr. Moreau's testimony below was not conditioned by the trial court upon a requirement that the prosecution call Dr. Murney to the stand at a later time. The government's failure to call Dr. Murney did not in itself create reversible error.
Appellant contends, however, that without Dr. Murney's testimony there would be no evidence upon which Dr. Moreau could base his opinion. Sitting en banc, this Court has held that an expert's testimony is not required by either the confrontation clause or the hearsay rule to be based solely upon records which are themselves introduced in evidence as long as the sources of information are of a type reasonably relied upon by experts in forming their opinions or inferences upon the subject. United States v. Williams, 5 Cir. 1971, 447 F.2d 1285. Dr. Moreau's testimony falls within this category. In addition, we held in a closely analogous case, Birdsell v. United States, 5 Cir. 1965, 346 F.2d 775, cert. den. 382 U.S. 963, 86 S.Ct. 449, 15 L.Ed.2d 366 (1965), reh. den. 383 U.S. 923, 86 S.Ct. 900, 15 L. Ed.2d 680 (1966), that although it is preferable for the doctor who examined the defendant to testify, a psychiatrist who has reviewed all of the records and attended a staff conference with the examining doctor is qualified to give his opinion as to whether the defendant was sane at the time of the commission of the crime. Here, Dr. Moreau based his opinion upon a brief psychiatric staff examination of the appellant at which Dr. Moreau was present, medical reports which consisted of a psychological examination, routine laboratory tests and electroencephalogram, and a staff evaluation. We therefore find no reversible error occurred by allowing Dr. Moreau to testify, even though Dr. Murney was present and available to testify.
Appellant also urges that the trial court erred in instructing the jury that the factual issues were admitted and that the sole issue remaining for their determination was whether Harper was guilty or not guilty by reason of insanity at the time of the robbery.2 The appellant alleges that the trial court in effect directed a verdict of guilty, similar to the situation that arose in United States v. Skinner, 5 Cir. 1971, 437 F.2d 164.
In Skinner, this Court held that it was harmful error for the trial judge to charge a jury that they must return a verdict of guilty unless they found that the defendant lacked the mental capacity to commit the offenses charged. We believe Skinner is clearly distinguishable from the case at bar, however, for Skinner involved a comment by the trial judge on an admission of the defendant. Here, defense counsel stipulated in open court that the allegations contained in the indictment were true. Thus the sole disputed issue for the jury's determination was the appellant's mental condition at the time of the robbery. We hold that the quoted (footnote 2) instruction to the jury was not improper in this situation. See, e. g., United States v. Brown, 1970, 138 U.S.App.D.C. 398, 428 F.2d 1100.3
Appellant's final point on appeal is that the court's refusal of a motion for mistrial because of certain remarks by the prosecutor during closing argument using the term "irresistible impulse" was prejudicial error. The point was raised by motions for a corrective instruction and for mistrial.4
The insanity test employed in this Circuit was defined in Blake v. United States, 5 Cir. 1969, en banc, 407 F.2d 908. Blake rejected the "irresistible impulse" theory, and adopted the standard of Section 4.01, of the A.L.I. Model Penal Code, for use in determining insanity where the defense of insanity is "in issue":
Appellant maintains that the prosecutor's references to the "irresistible impulse" definition confused the jury as to the proper legal test of insanity they were to apply, and this misconception caused the guilty verdict. We disagree. The use of the term by the prosecutor described it as "the irresistible impulse test as far as layman's terms go", and the Court in responding to defense counsel's objection that the prosecutor's comments were an incorrect statement of the law observed (in the jury's presence):
"I don\'t necessarily think it is incorrect; that is to say, if you want to characterize the rule as an irresistible impulse test, that might be a label that one would put on it like you would a label or a shortcut—it doesn\'t state the whole of the law, nor in fact are those words used in the test that we will give you, but it might be something that would be a little...
To continue reading
Request your trial
- Beadle v. Allison
-
U.S. v. Cohen
...underlying acts that constituted a federal crime and offered in defense only the plea of insanity, see, e.g., United States v. Harper, 460 F.2d 705, 706, 707 n. 2 (5th Cir.1972), a general verdict of not guilty could be used by a state to automatically commit the defendant to a local mental......
-
United States v. McCracken
...a verdict against the defendant, we held that the trial judge should have included the "not guilty" alternative. United States v. Harper, 5 Cir. 1972, 460 F.2d 705, was a Skinner-based challenge to the trial court's instruction that the only issue remaining for the jury was whether the defe......
-
Harrison v. State, 57898
...not require that all witnesses to a crime be called by the prosecution. U.S. v. Heck, 499 F.2d 778, 789 (9th Cir.1974); U.S. v. Harper, 460 F.2d 705,706 (5th Cir.1972). Admittedly there are cases where the prosecution, as a matter of due process, will be required to call a witness who the S......