Ferguson v. United States

Court: Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit
Date filed: 1964-04-02
Citations: 329 F.2d 923
Copy Citations
1 Citing Case
Lead Opinion
PER CURIAM.

Appellants were tried jointly but were represented by individual counsel. The trial court’s ruling that prosecution witnesses could be cross-examined by but one counsel constitutes plain error within the compulsion of Rule 52(b) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure. Each defendant had the right to have non-repetitious cross-examination conducted on his behalf by his individual counsel and could not be required to have questions pertaining to his particular interests channeled through his co-defendant’s counsel.

The opinion of the court heretofore filed, 307 F.2d 787, is withdrawn and the judgments are severally reversed with directions to grant new trials.