Case Title: Ex Parte Coulter

Citation: 438 So. 2d 352

Docket Number: 

State: alabama

Court: Alabama Supreme Court

Date: 1983-08-05T00:00:00Z

Document:
438 So. 2d 352 (1983)
Ex parte David Leroy COULTER.
(Re David Leroy COULTER
v.
STATE of Alabama.)
82-453.

Supreme Court of Alabama.
August 5, 1983.
Rehearing Denied September 16, 1983.
Carl Stolsworth and William J. Underwood, Tuscumbia, for petitioner.
Charles A. Graddick, Atty. Gen., and Ed Carnes, Asst. Atty. Gen., for respondent.
PER CURIAM.
David Leroy Coulter was sentenced to die for the intentional killing of one George Morris during the course of a robbery. Code 1975, § 13-11-2(a)(2). On appeal to the Court of Criminal Appeals, Coulter raised several issues which he claimed entitled him to either a new trial or to a new sentence hearing. The Court of Criminal Appeals, in a lengthy opinion, discussed each of Coulter's arguments, found no reversible error, and after independently determining that the sentence of death was appropriate for Coulter, affirmed his conviction and sentence.
Coulter filed a petition for this Court to review that decision, and in his petition, he raises the same issues he had previously presented to the Court of Criminal Appeals. In brief, he lists these issues:
The Court of Criminal Appeals addressed each of these issues in great detail in its opinion, Coulter v. State, 438 So. 2d 336 (Ala.Cr.App.1982), and cited ample authority in support of its resolution of those issues, and we see no need to address those same issues, because we think the Court of Criminal Appeals correctly decided them.
We do expand on that court's opinion regarding the petitioner's claim that a conviction of crimes which occurred after the capital offense was committed could not be used as proof of an aggravating circumstance. We cannot accept petitioner's argument. We agree with the Court of Criminal Appeals' determination that "the previously convicted language [in § 13-11-6(2)] must refer to convictions received prior to the sentencing hearing."
In Zant v. Stephens, ___ U.S. ___, 103 S. Ct. 2733, 77 L. Ed. 2d 235 (1983), the Supreme Court of the United States noted in footnote 6:
The Model Penal Code suggests that a defendant's past behavior can be an aggravating circumstance.
In the comment to § 210.6, A.L.I., Model Penal Code and Commentaries, 1980, at page 136, it is stated:
The Model Penal Code does not define "prior conviction," but the comment is contained in a section dealing with the sentence hearing. In view of that fact, and in view of the fact that individualization of sentence is the desired goal, the words "previously convicted" used in the Model Penal Code draft of aggravating circumstances must refer to a time prior to sentence instead of prior to the date of the commission of the capital offense.
Having considered the petition, the briefs, and the opinion of the Court of Criminal Appeals, we are of the opinion that the judgment of the Court of Criminal Appeals which upheld Coulter's conviction and sentence of death is due to be, and it hereby is, affirmed.
AFFIRMED.
TORBERT, C.J., and MADDOX, FAULKNER, JONES, ALMON, SHORES, EMBRY, BEATTY and ADAMS, JJ., concur.