Larry Moulder. Photo courtesy of the Kentucky Online Offender Lookup.
By MICHAEL CRIMMINS
Glasgow News 1
The Kentucky Supreme Court, in an opinion issued on Oct. 26, reversed the conviction and sentence of Larry Moulder, stating that there had been “juror rehabilitation” by the trial court when one juror expressed doubts about her impartiality.
Moulder, 57, of Cave City, was found guilty on multiple sex offenses including first degree rape (victim under 12 years of age), first degree sexual abuse, first degree sodomy (victim under 12 years of age) and incest (victim under 12 years of age) and was given a life sentence in 2021.According to the Kentucky Online Offender Lookup, Moulder is serving his sentence in the Luther Luckett Correctional Complex.
Originally, according to KOOL, Moulder would have been eligible for parole in 2040, but the Kentucky Supreme Court has sent the case back to the Barren County Circuit Court after it determined by a 5-2 opinion that one juror — the opinion names her as Juror A.R. — should have been removed due to questions of her impartiality.
“It is unfortunate that the victim in this case may yet again have to endure the vicissitudes of a trial,” the opinion states. “It is not our duty, however, to save convictions when they cannot be saved, but to uphold the law…. Humans are ill-equipped as it is to judge the truth in another person’s heart; when there is a reasonable ground to doubt the impartiality of a juror, the doubt must control.”
According to the opinion, Juror A.R. made “physical indications” that she would be uncomfortable with pornography. Because of this she was asked to come to the bench alongside the commonwealth attorney and defense counsel. At the bench an “approximately ten minute” informal conversation between the trial court and A.R. occurred where she expressed her uncertainty.
“I have no history, I just feel very uncomfortable about . . . about it all, . . . I understand it’s our duty as a citizen and I want to do that, but I just don’t know so . . . I don’t know if that’s a normal feeling or if I cannot give you . . . or be a good juror,” the quoted conversation states.
After the the trial court asked if she would be able to fulfill the oath to be “fair and listen to the evidence” to which A.R. responded “I believe so.” However, she did say it would be hard to sit on a jury for a case involving a child because she “leans towards the children.”
After roughly five minutes of “equivocal” conversation between A.R. and the trial court, the juror said she could render an impartial verdict in Moulder’s case. A.R.’s affirmative answer only came after the trial court searched for the “magic words” in an attempt to “rehabilitate” her impartiality, the opinion states.
“We have several times declared that rehabilitation of a juror who has given a reasonable ground to doubt their impartiality is not merely inappropriate, but impossible. Only after the trial court told her what she needed to say before she could be seated on the jury did Juror A.R. affirmatively say she could be fair and impartial. After a full review of the colloquy, the trial court’s failure to strike Juror A.R. for cause was an abuse of discretion. Its decision was based on the affirmative declarations at the end of an otherwise, equivocal ten-minute colloquy. However true such declarations may have been, they were not enough to dispel the reasonable ground to believe she would be partial.”
Justice Christopher Nickell wrote the dissenting opinion that appeared at the end of the document stating that [Judge] John Alexander “carefully and conscientiously determined there was no reasonable basis to doubt Juror A.R.’s ability to render a fair and impartial verdict” and thus he would “affirm the judgment in all respects.”
“Unlike the majority, I do not perceive that Juror A.R.’s equivocal responses placed her into the impermissible gray area,” he wrote. “Thus, I cannot conclude the trial court obviously abused its discretion.”
For the court’s full opinion click here.
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