Williams v. United States, 8038.

• Decision Date: 12 October 1942
• Docket Number: No. 8038.,8038.
• Citation: 131 F.2d 21,76 US App. DC 299
• Parties: WILLIAMS v. UNITED STATES.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — District of Columbia Circuit

76 US App. DC 299, 131 F.2d 21 (1942)

WILLIAMS v. UNITED STATES.

No. 8038.

United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.

Decided October 12, 1942.

Mr. Saul G. Lichtenberg, of Washington, D. C., for appellant.

Mr. Bernard Margolius, Assistant United States Attorney, with whom Messrs. Edward M. Curran, United States Attorney, and Allen J. Krouse and Charles B. Murray, Assistant United States Attorneys, were on the brief, all of Washington, D. C., for appellee.

Before STEPHENS, VINSON, and EDGERTON, Associate Justices.

VINSON, Associate Justice.

Appellant (defendant) was indicted on two counts of assault with a dangerous weapon and one count of rape. He was found guilty of all three offenses and the jury added the death penalty to the rape verdict.

There was sufficient evidence, if believed, upon which the verdict, guilty of rape, could be based. Likewise, there was sufficient evidence, if believed, upon which it could be concluded that defendant did not commit the crime. The jury, not the court, is the trier of credibility. And if there were nothing more to the case than this, we should affirm. But in our view a different disposition of the case is required for reasons irrespective of the evidence. Thus there is no need to go into the evidence.

The defendant, in substance, makes three main points on this appeal, which concerns only the rape conviction. The first is that the indictment, by its use of words, charges that the girl raped herself rather than charging that defendant did. The defendant quotes a part of the indictment in support of his argument. There is one inaccuracy in his quotation. It is perhaps possible for one to obtain in some degree, from the excerpt quoted, the impression that the prosecuting witness raped herself. That is due, however, mainly to the inaccuracy in quotation and partly to the wholly uncalled for quasi-Chaucerian style of the indictment. A reading of the indictment as a whole shows that defendant's inference is entirely without merit. Defendant's second point is that the indictment is defective because it was signed by an Assistant District Attorney rather than by the United States Attorney. The case of Robinson v. United States,¹ in which the opinion was filed after the instant case was heard, answers this contention. Defendant's third point is in effect that the evidence did not afford a sufficient base upon which to place a death penalty. At times defendant stated there was not sufficient evidence to support the verdict of guilty. At other times in his brief and upon oral argument here, it was unequivocally stated that the evidence was sufficient to find defendant guilty, but defendant's counsel was at a loss to understand why upon this set of facts the jury returned the death penalty. Many persons probably would not have done so. This jury did. Congress has seen fit to give that power to the jury.² There is nothing a trial or appellate court can do to reverse its judgment in inflicting the death penalty when there is sufficient evidence to support a verdict of guilty.

Upon the issues presented by defendant, we would be constrained to affirm. It is our custom, however, in cases of serious criminal offenses, to check carefully the record for error prejudicial to defendant which he did not urge.³ In this case we have found such error. Several might be discussed, but since the Judge's charge to the jury was definitely erroneous and prejudicial, we will confine our discussion to the more important omissions therein which we think require a reversal of the judgment.

The trial judge was from another district brought here to help our overloaded district court. He probably was not familiar with all the legal requirements of this jurisdiction. The law in respect of charging a jury is a kind of law that will naturally develop many variations from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. We are concerned here, however, with more than favorite niceties of expression or words that have become words of art. This charge as a whole does not give the defendant the protection that the law requires.

A basic defect of the charge is the failure to discuss and define the offenses included within the indictment. Rape was not defined generally, much less broken down into its constituent elements; naturally, as a result, the elements were not discussed or defined. The jury was not told what assault with intent to rape is, nor how it is distinguished from rape. The Court at the conclusion of its charge was asked to instruct with regard to assault with...