Isaac Williams v. United States

328 F.2d 178, 117 U.S. App. D.C. 206, 1963 U.S. App. LEXIS 3459
CourtCourt of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit
DecidedDecember 12, 1963
Docket17964
StatusPublished
Cited by39 cases

This text of 328 F.2d 178 (Isaac Williams v. United States) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Isaac Williams v. United States, 328 F.2d 178, 117 U.S. App. D.C. 206, 1963 U.S. App. LEXIS 3459 (D.C. Cir. 1963).

Opinion

FAHY, Circuit Judge:

Appellant was convicted of assault with a dangerous weapon. There was testimony and other evidence that he assaulted a man in a bar or grill with a bottle and bar stool. Appellant himself was shot by one Butler, the proprietor of the place who was tending the bar. Reversal is sought on grounds now to be mentioned and discussed with brevity.

It is said the court erroneously refused the request of defense counsel for an instruction on the lesser included offense of simple assault. We find no error in this respect. There was insufficient evidence of simple assault to have justified a verdict of guilty of that offense.

It is said cross-examination of Butler, designed to show his interest and bias, was erroneously restricted. We find no abuse of discretion in this regard, especially in light of the fact that the-circumstances of the shooting by Butler and the consequent relation of this witness to the situation as a whole were-sufficiently developed and argued to the jury.

It is said the court erred in refusing, on request, to order production of the transcript of the testimony of a key government witness given before-the grand jury. We find no error in this refusal, because the evidence as a whole-indicates no probable inconsistency.

It is said the court erred in instructing the jury that it was their duty to listen to each other with a view of being convinced by what their fellow jurors had to say so that the verdict would be unanimous and true. This was not objected to and occurred in the context of a full charge which precludes us from holding that the questioned part amounted to such plain error affecting substantial rights as to require reversal in the-exercise of our discretion under Rule-52(b), Fed.R.Crim.P.

Neither in the respects discussed nor-for other reasons do we find reversible-error.

There is, however, a problem under the Jencks Act, 18 U.S.C. § 3500 (1958), which requires a remand. Butler, the proprietor of tho grill, and Pauline Smith, a waitress at the grill,, testified for the prosecution. Each had testified before the grand jury and a short while before doing so each had given a statement to a clerk of the grand jury unit of the United States Attorney’s office. The clerk was an agent of the government. The statements were taken down and transcribed in writing by the-clerk. Counsel for appellant requested the production of both written statements. This was denied, the court ruling-that the written statements were not substantially verbatim accounts of what the-witnesses had said and were in no way *180 inconsistent with the witnesses’ testimony at the trial. 1 If, however, either .statement was a substantially verbatim recital of what the witness had said to the clerk it should have been made avail.able to defense counsel under the Jencks Act, which provides that after a witness called by the United States has testified ■on direct examination the court shall upon motion of the defendant order the United States to produce inter alia, a stenographic or other recording or transcription “which is a substantially verbatim recital of an oral statement made Ly said witness to an agent of the Government and recorded contemporaneously with the making of such oral statement.” 18 U.S.C. § 3500(e) (2) (1958).

As was pointed out by this court ■in Saunders v. United States, 114 U.S.App.D.C. 345, 348, 316 F.2d 346, 349 (1963), and reasserted in Hilliard v. United States, 115 U.S.App.D.C. 86, 317 F.2d 150, 151 (1963), these statutory provisions require that when a defendant .seeks the production of a statement, as ■defined in the Act, “the district court has .an affirmative duty to determine whether any such statement exists and is in the possession of the Government and, if so, •to order the production of the statement.” In Hilliard we further pointed out, “A trial judge is to conduct such inquiry as may be necessary to determine whether or not the conditions of the statute have been satisfied. His inquiry may involve .an interrogation of witnesses, or he may make an in camera examination of the statement,” or the circumstances may call for both such in camera examination and 'interrogation of witnesses. This is clear from the decisions of the Supreme Court in Campbell v. United States, 373 U.S. 487, 83 S.Ct. 1356, 10 L.Ed.2d 501 (1963), decided subsequent to the trial of this case, and in Palermo v. United States, 360 U.S. 343, 354-355, 79 S.Ct. 1217, 1226, 3 L.Ed.2d 1287 (1959). In the latter case the Court said:

“It is also the function of the trial judge to decide,, in light of the circumstances of each case, what, if any, evidence extrinsic to the statement itself may or must be offered to prove the nature of the statement. In most cases the answer will be plain from the statement itself. In others further information might be deemed relevant to assist the court’s determination.”

In the present case the trial judge examined the statements. They have also been made available to and have been examined by this court. It cannot be determined from the statements themselves that they are not substantially verbatim recitals of what the witnesses told the government agent. It is true each bears an introductory sentence reading, “The following is a summary of the witness conversation not read to or by the witness it is not intended to be a substantially verbatim account — ws.” 2 But, of course, the prosecution may not insulate itself from the requirements of the Jencks Act by such a pronouncement. Butler testified that the clerk took down what he said while he was speaking, and a portion of his statement is enclosed in quotation marks, which suggests that to some degree at least it incorporates his exact words.

The burden is not upon the defendant to prove that the statements re *181 quested are substantially verbatim recitals within the meaning of the Act. As we have indicated, the duty of examining all available evidence rests upon the trial judge himself, assisted by the parties. Campbell v. United States, 365 U.S. 85, 95, 81 S.Ct. 421, 5 L.Ed.2d 428 (1961); Saunders v. United States, supra; Hilliard v. United States, supra; and see United States v. Crosby, 294 F.2d 928, 950-951 (2d Cir. 1961), cert. denied sub nom. Mittelman v. United States, 368 U.S. 984, 82 S.Ct. 599, 7 L.Ed.2d 523 (1962); United States v. McKeever, 271 F.2d 669, 674 (2d Cir. 1959).

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Bluebook (online)
328 F.2d 178, 117 U.S. App. D.C. 206, 1963 U.S. App. LEXIS 3459, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/isaac-williams-v-united-states-cadc-1963.