Case Title: Bradley v. State

Citation: 214 So. 2d 815

Docket Number: 

State: mississippi

Court: Mississippi Supreme Court

Date: 1968-10-21T00:00:00Z

Document:
214 So. 2d 815 (1968) Alvin BRADLEY v. STATE of Mississippi. No. 44949. Supreme Court of Mississippi. October 21, 1968. Arrington & Arrington, Hazlehurst, for appellant. Joe T. Patterson, Atty. Gen., by Guy N. Rogers, Asst. Atty. Gen., and Laurence Y. Mellen, Sp. Asst. Atty. Gen., Jackson, for appellee. SMITH, Justice: On March 6, 1967 appellant, Alvin Bradley, having been convicted in the Circuit Court of Copiah County of the crime of burglary, was sentenced to serve a term of two years and six months in the penitentiary. On June 10, 1967, while serving his term, he filed in that Court a petition styled "Petition of Writ of Habeas Corpus and Leave to File Forma Pauperis," seeking to have his conviction and sentence vacated and to be discharged from custody. Attached to the petition was a letter written by one Sheffield, an alleged accomplice in the burglary and a fellow convict, upon whose testimony Bradley had been convicted, in which Sheffield sought to repudiate his testimony given at Bradley's trial. The trial court, purposely overlooking all informalities in the petition as filed, and treating it as an application for the post conviction remedy in the nature of a petition for a writ of error coram nobis, set the matter for trial upon its merits. On the date set, the Court heard the matter at length. Upon this hearing, Sheffield testified for the petitioner at considerable length, the substance of his testimony being that he had perjured himself at Bradley's trial and that actually Bradley had not participated *816 in the commission of the crime for which he had been convicted. When the hearing was concluded, the Court delivered an opinion in which it reviewed the circumstances of the case in detail. Among other things, the Court, in commenting upon Sheffield's effort to repudiate his former testimony, said: From the order denying the relief sought and dismissing the petition, Bradley has prosecuted this appeal. Appellant contends that the recantation of testimony by Sheffield constitutes "newly discovered evidence" and entitles him to a new trial, citing Lang v. State, 230 Miss. 147, 92 So. 2d 670 (1957). However, the question now presented has been before the Court on several former occasions and has been dealt with in a number of reported cases. In Gathings v. State, 46 So. 2d 800 (Miss. 1950) a new trial was ordered following repudiation of their testimony by three of Gathings alleged accomplices upon whose testimony he had been convicted. However, in Gathings the Court was careful to point out: And further in Gathings this Court said: It is also perhaps significant that in Gathings the Court referred to Cummins v. State, 144 Miss. 634, 110 So. 206 (1926) and Dolan v. State, 195 Miss. 154, 13 So. 2d 925 (1943), without overruling or modifying either. In each of those cases this Court affirmed denial of a new trial following recantation of testimony given by prosecution witnesses in the trial at which *817 the appellant had been convicted. The Court reached a similar conclusion in Carraway v. State, 167 Miss. 390, at 405, 148 So. 340 (1933). We think this case is controlled by Cummins, Carraway and Dolan, supra. In Dolan the Court said: The conclusion reached by the Court in those cases accords with the general rule as stated in 24 C.J.S. Criminal Law § 1454 k (1961): Also, in 39 Am.Jur. New Trial § 169 (1942) it is stated: There was no abuse of discretion on the part of the trial court in denying the relief sought in this case and his action in so doing is affirmed. Affirmed. GILLESPIE, P.J., and RODGERS, JONES and BRADY, JJ., concur.