New trial

“ Daniel, itself distinctly recognizes, as one of the grounds for awarding new trial at law out of chancery-'the discovery of new evidence, relevant to a point not put in issue, for want of proof to sustain it.' The true meaning of 'putting in issue,' was either mistaken by the court, or the true ground of decision is misstated. ”

“ And as the trial drags its course, with each new link in the evidence seeming to forge a chain that is gradually drawing closer around the wretched being who stands before you in the dock, the intensity of the situation becomes so great and so strained that one is almost tempted to believe that the whole world is awaiting that one word from the lips of the jury which shall set him free once more or send him to his doom. ”

“ Although we conclude that respondent's demand for a jury trial was rightly denied, there must be a new trial because of the prejudicial restriction, by the trial judge, of cross-examination by respondent. The testimony of five prosecution witnesses was the sole evidence of the acts of respondent relied on to establish the doing of business without a license. ”

“ The evidence before the jury, on the question of prior use, may have been so overwhelming as to satisfy the court below that no new trial ought to be granted, but that the verdict should stand, whatever might be said as to the technical points raised by the bills of exceptions. That evidence is not before us. ”

“ This, however, overlooks the fact that as a preliminary to a new trial it must first be determined whether any of Mazzei's collateral testimony, now drawn in question, so reflects upon the truthfulness or credibility of his trial testimony as to warrant submission of the case to a new jury. That preliminary determination has always been recognized as the function of the trial court. ”

“ Every man sees that the jury is but a troublesome delay, great charge, and of no use in determining right and wrong, and therefore the trials by them may be better abolished than continued; which were a strange new-found conclusion, after a trial so celebrated for many hundreds of years. ”

“ The trial judge's bare question 'Did you want to say something?' follows immediately upon a lengthy statement covering three printed pages by the counsel for a codefendant arguing that his motion for a new trial should be granted because of the weakness of the evidence, inconsistencies in testimony, and lack of credibility of a government witness. The colloquy in the four pages preceding that likewise does not touch upon the question of sentencing. ”

“ Undoubtedly, in ordinary cases, a new trial cannot be granted by the court below, except for good cause, and in the exercise of its sound judgment, and it is not within its power, in entering the judgment of the supreme court, to award a new trial ”

“ Excluding probative evidence years after trial, when a new trial may be a practical impossibility, will often result in the release of an admittedly guilty individual who may pose a continuing threat to society. ”

“ That court, in a death case, is empowered by statute to order a new trial for errors of law, or if the conviction is found to be 'against the weight of evidence', or if the court is satisfied for any reason whatever 'that justice requires a new trial'. ”

“ The jury are bound to consider it in that light, unless they are invested with authority to disregard the rules of evidence, by which the liberty and estate of every citizen are guarded and supported. No judge would hesitate to set aside their verdict and grant a new trial, if, under such circumstances, without any rebutting evidence, they disregard it. ”

“ Discovery by the judge during the trial that 'one or more members of a jury might be biased against the Government or the defendant' has been held to warrant discharge of the jury and direction of a new trial. ”

“ The record of both the original trial and the proceedings on the motions for a new trial shows clearly that the trial judge gave the numerous elements of the controversy careful and honest consideration. We think that even a casual perusal of this record should have revealed to the Circuit Court of Appeals that here nothing more was involved than an effort to upset a trial court's findings of fact.
Determination of guilt or innocence as a result of a fair trial, and prompt enforcement of sentences in the event of conviction, are objectives of criminal law. ”

“ Courts are not inclined to grant a new trial merely on account of ambiguity in the charge of the court to the jury, where it appears that the complaining party made no effort at the trial to have the point explained. ”

“ Perhaps we should rather say that our remarks would take the form of a speculation about the origin and growth of trial by jury; for of the early history of this method of deciding disputed questions of fact, very little is known accurately. In our research, we soon get into the far-back ages of fog and mist, where history gropes her way with faltering and uncertain step. There is, in fact, no means of discovering when trial by jury began in England. ”

“ It is quite different where the purpose of the new constitutional standard proscribing the use of certain evidence or a particular mode of trial is not to minimize or avoid arbitrary or unreliable results but to serve other ends. In these situations the new doctrine raises no question about the guilt of defendants convicted in prior trials. ”

“ Even where it finds that the jury could 'reasonably credit the denial of the police', if it considers that the prosecution had failed to produce all reasonably available evidence to clear charges of coercion, it will order 'a new trial, where there can be a more adequate search for the truth.' People v. ”

“ If we rid ourselves of the assumption that we can measure the moral culpability of the accused, the whole process of a criminal trial consists in the assemblage of facts, the discussion, and the decision upon the evidence. For the classical school, on the other hand, such a trial has been regarded as a succession of guarantees for the individual against society, and, by a sort of reaction against the methods of legal proof, has been made to turn upon the private conviction, not to say the intuition, of the judge and counsel. ”

“ For example, diagrams must be prepared, photographs taken of the place of the crime, witnesses compensated for their time and their expenses paid, and, most important of all, competent experts must be engaged. This leads us to an interesting aspect of the modern jury trial.
When no other defence to homicide is possible the claim of insanity is frequently interposed. Nothing is more confusing to the ordinary juryman than trying to determine the probative value of evidence touching unsoundness of mind, and the application thereto of the legal test of criminal responsibility. ”

“ This conviction must influence his conduct of the case. “Quel homme est assez Dieu pour rendre la Justice” under these conditions? Many Frenchmen have been of the opinion for a long time that the procedure of a French criminal trial needs reformation. Many consider that the judge’s preliminary interrogatory of the prisoner and of the witnesses should be entirely suppressed, and should give place to examination and cross-examination by prosecuting counsel and the counsel for the defence. ”

“ At the conclusion of the complainant's case, if it appear reasonably certain that the magistrate will "hold" the prisoner for the action of a superior court, the lawyer will then "waive further examination," or, in other words, put in no defence, preferring the certainty of having to face a jury trial to affording in prosecution an opportunity to discover exactly what defence will be put in and to secure evidence in advance of the trial to rebut it. ”

“ All the conditions of intense excitement meet in a murder trial. The awful issue at stake gives significance to the lightest word or look. How the quick eyes of the spectators rove from the stolid jury to the keen lawyers, the impassive judge, the anxious prisoner. Nothing is lost of the sharp wrangle of the counsel on points of law, the measured decision's of the bench; the duels between the attorneys and the witnesses. The crowd sways with the rise and fall of the shifting, testimony, in sympathetic interest, and hangs upon the dicta of the judge in breathless silence. ”

“ The crime is highly technical and the evidence almost entirely a matter of chemical analysis and expert opinion. The battle goes on for weeks or even months. A jury would have become hopelessly confused and the issue successfully obscured, but the three judges are expert jurymen, and in due course, if he be guilty, the defendant is inevitably convicted. Such a trial may cost the parties tens of thousands of dollars for expert testimony alone, while the sentence of the defendant will very likely be not more than a two-hundred-and-fifty-dollar fine. ”

“ The session of October 11th was ended, and Gilles led back to prison.
On Wednesday the judges met, not in the great audience chamber, but in the hall below, aula bassa. It was, and is, the custom in the prosecution of criminal cases to have the investigation of the witnesses before either the court or some high officer of justice prior to the public or official trial. In this investigation the procedure corresponds in some degree to that of our grand jury, or more properly before the prosecuting attorney as well as the presiding judge. ”

“ In a prosecution such as this, conducted against one of its citizens by a government, what should be the course of that government, and what is due to the jury and to the prisoner? Whatever there is that can throw light upon the alleged crime should be let into the jury box. All evidence that could go before the human mind calculated to impress it with conviction, or modify its opinions, should be allowed to come before you. What has been the case with regard to this trial? ”

“ Let the "yellow" newspapers confine themselves simply to an accurate report of the evidence at the trial, with a reiterated insistence that the law must take its course. Let them stop pandering to those morbid tastes which they have themselves created. Let the "Sympathy Sisters," the photographer, and the special artist be excluded from the court-room. When these things are done, we shall have the same high standard of efficiency upon the part of the jury in great murder trials that we have in other cases.
CHAPTER IV. Why Do Men Kill? ”

“ As most of the Jurors were unlearned men, not accustomed to intricate questions, it became necessary for the presiding judge, a man of nicer culture, to prepare rules of evidence which should prevent the matter from becoming too complicated for the rustic judgment. Thence came the curious and strange "rules of evidence" which prevail in all countries where trial by Jury is established, but are unknown in lands where the trial is conducted solely by experts, educated men. But as the mass of the people, as in America, become well informed, the old rules appear ridiculous, and will perish. ”

“ Judge Sprague, in the district court of the United States for the district of Massachusetts, said: 'The constitution secures a trial by jury, without defining what that trial is. We are left to the common law to learn what it is that is secured. Now, the trial by jury was, when the constitution was adopted, and for generations before that time had been, here and in England, a trial of an issue of fact by twelve men, under the direction and superintendence of the court. ”

“ All evidence offered by the defense was accepted by the trial court. The prosecution had competent evidence that petitioner was capable of understanding the nature and quality of his acts. Instructions in the usual form were given by the court submitting to the jury the issues of insanity, irresistible impulse, malice, deliberation and premeditation. Under these instructions, set out below, the jury could have determined from the evidence that the homicide was not the result of premeditation and deliberation. ”

“ But if it is important that the accused should be convicted and sentenced and that, perhaps with a view to further developments, the testimony as it appears should be kept from some conspirators still at large, it is of vastly greater importance that the trial should be absolutely fair, not only in spirit but also in appearance. ”

“ The alternate path which we take today leads to trial of separate essential parts of criminal prosecutions by commissions, by executive agencies, by legislative committees. Farming out pieces of trials to investigative agencies is fragmentizing the kind of trial the Constitution authorizes. It prejudices the ultimate trial itself ”

“ The specifics of trial procedure, which in every mature legal system will vary greatly in detail, are within the sole competence of the States. I do not see how it can be said that a trial becomes unfair simply because a State determines that evidence may be considered by the trier of fact, regardless of how it was obtained, if it is relevant to the one issue with which the trial is concerned, the guilt or innocence of the accused. ”

“ I have decided to take this method of procedure instead of a jury trial, because as a rule in trials by jury the case resolves itself into a battle of medical experts, and in my experience I have never witnessed a case where the testimony of the experts on one side was not directly contradicted by the testimony of as many or more experts on the other side. Where men especially trained in mental and nervous diseases disagree, how can it be expected that a jury of twelve laymen should agree? ”

“ An important trial has all the high interest of a most exciting narrative, whose catastrophe is yet to come, and where so many influential agencies are in operation to mould it. The proofs themselves, the veracity of witnesses, their self-possession and courage under the racking torture of cross-examination, the ability and skill of the advocate, the temper of the judge, his character of rashness or patience, of doubt or decisiveness ”

“ I venture to say that rarely in the annals of criminal trials has the life of an accused been assailed by such an array of false testimony as is exhibited in the evidence of these nine witnesses - and rarely has it been the good fortune of an innocent man, arraigned and on trial for his life, to so confute and overwhelm his accusers. ”