Title: Fleener v. State

State: indiana

Issuer: Indiana Supreme Court

Document:

412 N.E.2d 778 (1980)
Timothy FLEENER, Appellant (Defendant below),
v.
STATE of Indiana, Appellee (Plaintiff below).
No. 1079S289.

Supreme Court of Indiana.
November 26, 1980.
Rehearing Denied January 27, 1981.
*779 Charles L. Berger, Evansville, for appellant.
Theodore L. Sendak, Atty. Gen., Kathleen G. Lucas, Deputy Atty. Gen., Indianapolis, for appellee.
PRENTICE, Justice.
Defendant (Appellant) was charged by indictment in two counts for murder and felony murder, Ind. Code § 35-13-4-1(a) (Burns 1975), for the 1977 stabbing of Harold Lewis in Evansville. After trial by jury he was convicted. The trial court imposed a sentence of life imprisonment on the felony murder count. The murder count was dismissed prior to trial. This direct appeal presents the following issues:
(1) Whether or not the trial court erred in admitting the defendant's confession.
(2) Whether or not the trial court erred in admitting statements attributable to the defendant without proof of the corpus delicti of the crime of felony murder.
(3) Whether or not the trial court erred in refusing Defendant's tendered instruction on lesser included offenses.
(4) Whether or not the trial court erred in refusing to grant the defendant's motion for a new trial based on newly discovered evidence.
(5) Whether or not the evidence was sufficient to support the verdict.
Over a pretrial suppression motion and timely objection, the defendant's confession was admitted at trial. The defendant contends he was induced to confess by promises from the interrogating officer that he would not be prosecuted.
*780 It is the State's burden to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant voluntarily and intelligently waived his rights, and that the defendant's confession was voluntarily given. Grey v. State, (1980) Ind., 404 N.E.2d 1348, 1351; Magley v. State, (1975) 263 Ind. 618, 626-27, 335 N.E.2d 811, 817.
Only the defendant and Detective Baggerly, the interrogating officer, testified.
The evidence in favor of the defendant is his own testimony that Baggerly represented to him that there would be no charges filed, if he cooperated, and that Baggerly told him that he did not need an attorney.
From the officer's version of the incident, there is nothing that a reasonable person of the apparent intellect of the defendant could have so construed.
The defendant signed a waiver of his rights and acknowledged his understanding thereof.
On this record we find that there was substantial evidence of probative value to support the trial court's ruling. See Baker v. State, (1980) Ind., 400 N.E.2d 137, 138; Richardson v. State, (1978) 268 Ind. 61, 64, 373 N.E.2d 874, 875.
The defendant contends that his confession and other statements attributed to him were admitted into evidence without independent proof of the corpus delicti, in this case the underlying felony of robbery.
The prosecutor chose color photographs to depict graphically in detail the location where the victim's body was found and the multiple stab wounds inflicted thereon. The evidence disclosed that the victim had been stabbed and then managed to walk a short distance before he died. We hold that this was sufficient evidence of corpus delicti to allow the confession and statements to come into evidence. Harrison v. State, (1978) 269 Ind. 677, 684, 382 N.E.2d 920, 925, cert. denied, (1979) 441 U.S. 912, 99 S. Ct. 2010, 60 L. Ed. 2d 384; Jones v. State, supra.
The defendant relies upon Porter v. State, (1979) Ind., 391 N.E.2d 801, where we said:
It has been stated that Porter and Harrison are apparently inconsistent, and that *781 Porter is a correct statement of the law. Udchitz v. State, (1979) Ind. App., 398 N.E.2d 688, 691 n. 4. But we note that in Porter there was ample evidence, independent of the confession, that established the commission of the underlying felony. Some language unfortunately crept into that opinion from which the defendant concluded that in proving the corpus delicti, pursuant to entering the confession to felony murder into evidence, it is necessary to prove the commission or attempt of the specific underlying crime charged. It was there said at 391 N.E.2d 809, "Thus to establish the corpus delicti, it was necessary to demonstrate that a robbery attempt had occurred." We also note that the case cited in support of that statement is not in point. It is apparent that another case by the same name, Jones v. State, (1969) 253 Ind. 235, 252 N.E.2d 572, was intended and its holding is in accord with the principles enunciated in Porter but diametrically opposed to the quoted passage taken literally. To the extent that Porter may be so read, it is disapproved; and Udchitz v. State, (1979) Ct. of App. Ind., 398 N.E.2d 688, which so construed it is overruled.
The rule in this state upon the quantum of evidence of the corpus delicti required to render a confession admissible and upon the utilization of the confession, thereafter, to prove all requisite elements of the crime was determined and well stated in the earlier Jones case,
The defendant contends that the trial court erred in refusing his tendered instruction on lesser included offenses-second degree murder, voluntary manslaughter, involuntary manslaughter, robbery, theft, assault and battery with intent to commit a *782 felony, and assault and battery-to felony murder.
There are no lesser included homicides of felony murder. Rodriguez v. State, (1979) Ind., 388 N.E.2d 493, 496; Dull v. State, (1962) 242 Ind. 633, 636-37, 180 N.E.2d 523, 524-25, cert. denied, (1962) 371 U.S. 902, 83 S. Ct. 206, 9 L. Ed. 2d 164; Hawkins v. State, (1941) 219 Ind. 116, 125-26, 37 N.E.2d 79, 83 (cases cited therein); Swain v. State, (1938) 214 Ind. 412, 414-15, 15 N.E.2d 381, 383, cert. denied, (1939) 306 U.S. 660, 59 S. Ct. 791, 83 L. Ed. 1057. We recognize that under appropriate circumstances a defendant charged with felony murder could be acquitted of felony murder but found guilty of the underlying felony. Whitten v. State, (1975) 263 Ind. 407, 414, 333 N.E.2d 86, 91; Hester v. State, (1974) 262 Ind. 284, 289, 315 N.E.2d 351, 354. However, to warrant such an instruction, the evidence would have to be such as would support a guilty verdict as to the underlying felony without also supporting a finding that the murder was incidental to that felony. See Cade v. State, (1976) 264 Ind. 569, 579, 348 N.E.2d 394, 401.
The evidence in this case clearly shows that the decedent was killed in the perpetration of a robbery. The only question the jury had to determine was whether or not the defendant was an accessory to the crime. There was no evidence from which it could have been reasonably found that the defendant was guilty of the robbery but not of the murder; hence the tendered instruction simply was not applicable to the evidence. See Rogers v. State, (1979) Ind., 396 N.E.2d 348, 354; Richardson v. State, (1979) Ind., 388 N.E.2d 488, 492; Pruitt v. State, (1978) 269 Ind. 559, 563-64, 382 N.E.2d 150, 153; Sharp v. State, (1977) 267 Ind. 198, 200, 369 N.E.2d 408, 410.
The defendant contends that he should have received a new trial by reason of newly discovered evidence. The claim of new evidence is supported by a deposition of Defendant's former cellmate, Alvin Hunley, which relates that the defendant told Hunley that his confession to Detective Baggerly was false and was given out of revenge for the purpose of implicating his co-defendant.
Although the deposition of Hunley was taken after the trial, the information therein upon which the defendant seeks to rely, i.e., the purpose of his confession, was not a new discovery. The defendant did not testify at his trial, and neither did Hunley.
We find no error. See Vacendak v. State, (1976) 264 Ind. 101, 109, 340 N.E.2d 352, 357, cert. denied, (1976) 429 U.S. 851, 97 S. Ct. 141, 50 L. Ed. 2d 125; DeShone v. State, (1934) 207 Ind. 380, 386, 193 N.E. 223, 225.
The defendant's challenge to the sufficiency of the evidence assumes the correctness of his position upon the issues of the admissibility of his confession and the extent to which it could be utilized by the jury. We have determined those issues to the contrary, and there is no other basis for the challenge presented.
We find no error. The judgment of the trial court is affirmed.
GIVAN, C.J., and HUNTER and PIVARNIK, JJ., concur.
DeBRULER, J., concurs in result.