Case Title: Langley v. State

Citation: 232 N.E.2d 611, 250 Ind. 29

Docket Number: 30,893

State: indiana

Court: Indiana Supreme Court

Date: 1968-01-09T00:00:00Z

Document:
250 Ind. 29 (1968)
232 N.E.2d 611
LANGLEY
v.
STATE OF INDIANA.
No. 30,893.

Supreme Court of Indiana.
Filed January 9, 1968.
Rehearing denied March 15, 1968.
*31 William C. Erbecker, of Indianapolis, for appellant.
John J. Dillon, Attorney General, and Murray West, Deputy Attorney General, for appellee.
LEWIS, C.J.
The appellant was convicted of the crime of robbery in the Criminal Court of Marion County, Indiana, Division 1. Appellant was sentenced to a term of not less than ten (10) years nor more than twenty five (25) years in the Indiana State Penitentiary.
The trial was before a jury. Thereafter, a motion for new trial was filed claiming the following errors:
The motion for new trial was overruled and appellant filed a motion for the appointment of appellant counsel. The Motion for Appointment of Counsel reads as follows:
Thereafter, the Court entered the following Order:
All until further order of the Court.
Dated at Indianapolis, Indiana, this 28th day of Aug., 1964."
The record fails to indicate that Mr. Ward was ever notified of his appointment as appellate counsel and, consequently, Mr. Ward did not file an appearance or take any steps to perfect an appeal.
Thereafter, on July 9, 1965, the attorney for appellant was privately employed by appellant and filed a petition for permission to file a belated motion for new trial. The petition for belated motion for new trial, in substance, alleged that the motion for new trial previously filed was inadequate; that the appellant was not adequately represented in his trial in the Criminal Court of Marion County; and that the appellant *33 had been diligent in attempting to determine his Constitutional Rights, but that he was without sufficient technical knowledge, pro se, to make an adequate judgment concerning his rights.
The appellant further alleges that the provision in Rule 2-40 and 2-40A of this Court (Supreme Court Rules, 1964), which require due diligence in asserting and taking advantage of the post-conviction remedies contained therein, is unconstitutional. The Trial Court denied appellant's petition for permission to file his belated motion for new trial and appellant now assigns as errors:
The evidence most favorable to the State is as follows: A filling-station attendant testified that on the 27th day of December, 1961, he was held up while he was at work; that he was put in fear by one of the holdup men putting a gun in his back and demanding money. One of the other individuals engaged in the holdup took the money from the drawer and then the filling-station attendant was bound and gagged and placed in a backroom.
The statute on robbery, Burns' Indiana Statutes, Anno., § 10-4101, (1956 Repl.), reads, in part, as follows:
The appellant was one of three men involved in the filling-station holdup. The appellant was the driver of a car and the other two men actually committed the physical acts of pulling the gun and taking the money. The police officers testified that shortly after the robbery they stopped the appellant driving the motor vehicle which had been used as the "getaway" car and the appellant was driving. A search of the car revealed weapons and friction tape. Friction tape had been used to bind the filling-station operator. The appellant admitted to the police officers that he had driven the car at the time of the robbery and gave as his only excuse that he had been drinking with the other two men and appellant's wife and that they had run out of money and liquor and had decided to go get some more money. Later he claimed that when his two "friends" entered the filling station he didn't know that they were going in for the purpose of robbing the station.
The only essential difference between the States theory of the commission of this crime and the appellant's theory is the State's contention that all of the appellant's actions before, during and after the actual robbery indicate and prove the substantial evidence that appellant was a participant. The appellant contends that he did not have advance knowledge of the robbery and that he was the innocent victim of the impetuous act of his two companions. Suffice it to say that appellant testified before the jury and gave his whole version of the commission of the happenings on the night in question. The jury chose to adopt the State's arguments concerning the evidence on the happenings at the time of the participating of the appellant in the robbery.
When the question of the sufficiency of the evidence is raised, this Court will consider only that evidence which is *35 more favorable to the State. Wagner v. State (1963), 243 Ind. 570, 188 N.E.2d 914. We have said on a number of occasions that this Court cannot weigh the evidence but will consider only the evidence most favorable to the State, and the reasonable inferences that may be drawn therefrom, to determine whether the jury was warranted in returning a verdict of guilty. Gilmore v. State (1951), 229 Ind. 359, 98 N.E.2d 677. Flowers v. State (1956), 236 Ind. 151, 139 N.E.2d 185.
The uncontradicted evidence shows that appellant was the driver of the car that took the active participants in the holdup to the filling station; that appellant waited for the participants until the holdup was consummated and then drove them away. The evidence indicated appellant was without funds prior to the holdup and that after the holdup the officers found some $8.00 on appellant which was approximately one-third of the proceeds of the robbery. It is quite evident that the jury did not believe appellant when he testified that he did not know that his companions entered the filling station for the purpose of robbery. There was substantial evidence to prove each and every material allegation of the affidavit against appellant and there was sufficient evidence of each and every material allegation to sustain the conviction.
We conclude that the Trial Court did not commit error in refusing permission for appellant to file a belated motion for new trial.
Rule 2-40 provides as a condition precedent to granting permission to file a belated motion, the following:
A review of the petition and the attempted showing by the appellant of diligence causes us to conclude that the Trial Court did not commit error in refusing permission to file the *36 belated motion for new trial. The rule in this regard is set out succinctly in Barrett v. State (1952), 230 Ind. 533, 105 N.E.2d 508, as follows:
The question of incompetency of trial counsel is not before this court because of the ruling of the Trial Court in refusing to grant permission to file a belated motion for new trial. The competency or incompetency of trial counsel was not presented in the original motion for new trial. However, in the interest of putting this matter at rest, we have reviewed the record in an effort to determine whether or not appellant's Constitutional Rights were denied by the Court failing to provide appellant with competent trial counsel.
The second guessing of the trial counsel by appellant's present counsel amounts to "Monday morning quarterbacking." The transcript including the bill of exceptions indicates to this Court that appellant's trial counsel did his work creditably under difficult circumstances. Appellant now contends that his trial counsel failed to object to certain questions and failed to cross-examine on certain questions. A difference in strategy between attorneys does not make one competent and the other incompetent. The attorney who occupies the counsel table before the jury is in the best position to make a determination concerning the proper examination and the proper time for objections. An *37 attorney's errors, if honest errors in judgment, are not proof of incompetency. Haley v. State (1956), 235 Ind. 333, 133 N.E.2d 565; Hendrickson v. State (1954), 233 Ind. 341, 118 N.E.2d 493.
In Schmittler v. State (1950), 228 Ind. 450, 93 N.E.2d 184, this Court stated that:
Our review of appellant's trial leads us to conclude that appellant totally lacks strong and convincing proof to overcome the foregoing presumption; in fact, there is an absence of any proof.
Appellant further complains because the Trial Court failed to rule on his motion for new trial for a long period of time, to-wit: 14 months, that he was denied a "speedy trial" by reason of this failure of the Trial Court. The attorney general urges that the trial had been concluded and that, therefore, rulings on the motion for new trial do not come within the Constitutional provision of "speedy trial." We find it unnecessary to make a determination on this point. Suffice it to say that appellant did have the remedy under Rule 1-13 of this Court which reads as follows:
Appellant did not assert this remedy; in fact, appellant did not at any time take any overt action to call this delay to the attention of the Trial Court and did not, thereby, give the Trial Court an opportunity to correct any claimed error. Errors not raised in the Trial Court are not subject to review before this Court. Martin v. State (1963), 245 Ind. 224, 194 N.E.2d 721.
The errors alleged in appellant's motion for new trial are without merit. The Trial Court did not commit error in refusing to permit appellant to file his belated motion for new trial and as we have discussed in this opinion, even if the belated motion for new trial had been filed, same was without merit.
The judgment is affirmed.
Arterburn, Hunter and Mote, JJ., concur.
Jackson, J., concurs in result.
NOTE.  Reported in 232 N.E.2d 611.