Owen J. Roberts

“ The petitioners rely not on any one circumstance but insist that they were not afforded a fair and impartial jury free from influences extraneous to the proofs adduced at the trial; that they were deprived of an impartial and unbiased judge to preside at the trial and that the prosecutor resorted to unfair methods to influence the jury. ”

“ The petitioners insist that the rulings upon evidence and instructions to the jury, when taken in their totality, indicate that, whatever the intention of the trial judge, his rulings and attitude precluded a fair consideration of the case. ”

“ The Court of Appeals held that certain of the challenged rulings and instructions were erroneous but that the errors were not substantial in the sense that they affected the ability of the jury to render an impartial verdict, and that others of the alleged errors were not such under the law of New York. As already stated, the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment does not enable us to review errors of state law however material under that law. We are unable to find that the rulings and instructions under attack constituted more than errors as to state law. ”