Title: Ex parte Laren Edward Laakkonen. PETITION FOR WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE COURT OF CRIMINAL APPEALS (In re: Laren Edward Laakkonen, alias v. State of Alabama)
Citation: N/A
Docket Number: 1080650
State: Alabama
Issuer: Alabama Supreme Court
Date: April 24, 2009

REL: 04/24/2009
Notice: This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in the advance
sheets of Southern Reporter.  Readers are requested to notify the Reporter of Decisions,
Alabama Appellate Courts, 300 Dexter Avenue, Montgomery, Alabama 36104-3741 ((334)
229-0649), of any typographical or other errors, in order that corrections may be made
before the opinion is printed in Southern Reporter.
SUPREME COURT OF ALABAMA
OCTOBER TERM, 2008-2009
_________________________
1080650
_________________________
Ex parte Laren Edward Laakkonen
PETITION FOR WRIT OF CERTIORARI
TO THE COURT OF CRIMINAL APPEALS
(In re:  Laren Edward Laakkonen
v.
State of Alabama)
(Madison Circuit Court, CC-04-5056;
Court of Criminal Appeals, CR-06-0981)
LYONS, Justice.
The petition for the writ of certiorari is denied.
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2
In denying the petition for the writ of certiorari, this
Court does not wish to be understood as approving all the
language, reasons, or statements of law in the Court of
Criminal Appeals' opinion.  Horsley v. Horsley, 291 Ala. 782,
280 So. 2d 155 (1973).
WRIT DENIED.
Cobb, C.J., and Stuart and Bolin, JJ., concur.
Murdock, J., concurs specially.
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3
MURDOCK, Justice (concurring specially).
I concur in the denial of the petition for a writ
certiorari.  I write separately to explain my reason for doing
so and my reasons for agreeing with the statement by the Court
today that our denial of certiorari should not be construed as
agreement with the rationale of the opinion of the Court of
Criminal Appeals in this case or, for that matter, the result
reached by the Court of Criminal Appeals.  
I do not agree with the result reached by the Court of
Criminal Appeals or with the rationale stated in Part I of
its opinion.  Instead, I agree in large measure with the views
expressed by Judge Welch in his dissenting opinion.
The Court of Criminal Appeals explains its decision as
follows: 
"[T]he State had failed to meet its burden of
proving Laakkonen's prior conviction ....  [A]n
error during the evidentiary portion of a trial
should be objected to as soon as the error becomes
apparent."
Laakkonen v. State, [Ms. CR-06-0981, Oct. 31, 2008] ___ So. 3d
___, ___ (Ala. Crim. App. 2008) (emphasis added).  As a
threshold matter, I note that this explanation confuses the
concept of a party's failing to adequately or properly prove
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4
some element of its case with an "error."  Parties do not
commit error; trial courts commit errors.  
Moreover, the fact that one party attempts to impeach
another during cross-examination, but fails in this effort
because it does not receive affirmative answers to its cross-
examination questions, does not obligate the other party's
counsel to object to those questions.  It is true that "in
attempting to impeach a hostile witness by questioning the
witness about a prior conviction, a prosecutor must be
prepared to rebut a negative answer with proper proof of the
prior conviction."  Covington v. State, 620 So. 2d 122, 126
(Ala. Crim. App. 1993), summarizing holding in Ex parte
Peagler, 516 So. 2d 1369, 1371 (Ala. 1987).  (Such proper
proof includes the original court record of the prior
conviction or a certified or sworn copy of the same.)  It is
also true, as Judge Welch explains in his dissent to the Court
of Criminal Appeals' opinion, that "'"'[l]aying prejudicial
allegations before the jury "by dint of cross-examination
without being prepared to prove them is generally regarded as
reversible error."  United States v. Brown, 519 F. 2d 1368,
1370 (6th Cir. 1975).'"'" ___ So. 3d at ___ (Welch, J.,
1080650
Indeed, "'for the state's attorney to ask a question
1
which implies the existence of a factual predicate which the
examiner knows he [or she] cannot support by the evidence is
unprofessional conduct.'" Covington, 620 So. 2d at 126
(quoting Daniel v. State, 534 So. 2d 1122, 1126 (Ala. Crim.
App. 1988)).
5
dissenting, quoting Covington v. State, 620 So. 2d at 126).1
Nonetheless, Laakkonen's counsel was under no obligation at
the time the questions were being put to his client on  cross-
examination to object to those questions.  For all defense
counsel knew at the time, the State would eventually follow up
those questions with proper evidence of the prior convictions.
Only at such time as it became apparent that the State would
not or could not do so did the objectionable nature of the
State's earlier cross-examination questions become known.
Even then, Laakkonen's counsel had no obligation to object to
the questions themselves.  
Specifically, if defense counsel was willing -- for
strategic or other reasons -- to live with whatever negative
suggestions those questions had left in the minds of the
jurors, he might decide to refrain from interposing any
objection to the questions themselves, knowing that he
eventually could object to any effort to charge the jury as to
the import of a prior conviction because, quite simply, no
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prior conviction had been proven.  Strategic reasons for not
objecting to the cross-examination questions themselves could
include a desire not to bring more attention to the issue or
a desire not to educate the State, before it rested, as to the
proper manner of proving a prior conviction.  Accordingly, it
was perfectly within defense counsel's prerogative to make a
strategic decision not to object to the cross-examination
questions in their own right, but to object only if and when
an effort was made to give a prior-conviction charge to the
jury and then to object to the charge itself as being without
a proper factual predicate.
Thus, it appears to me that the Court of Criminal Appeals
was incorrect to base its decision on the fact, as that court
put it, that "Laakkonen failed to object to the State's
attempt to impeach him while he was on the witness stand."
___ So. 3d at ___. There was nothing at that juncture to which
defense counsel was obligated to object.  The State was
attempting to impeach his client; the attempt was failing.
Defense counsel certainly was under no obligation to object to
that.  
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Notwithstanding the foregoing concerns regarding the
opinion of the Court of Criminal Appeals and the result it
reaches, I have concurred to deny certiorari review because
the defendant has failed to address the two supposed
procedural defaults upon which the Court of Criminal Appeals
bases its opinion.  These are the supposed insufficiency of
Laakkonen's principal brief in that court and Laakkonen's
supposed failure to preserve error in the trial court by not
objecting to the cross-examination questions regarding his
prior convictions.  Obviously, for the reasons discussed
above, I disagree with the Court of Criminal Appeals as to
whether there was any procedural default in the latter regard.
Also, I agree with Judge Welch that the majority of the Court
of Criminal Appeals is incorrect to view Laakkonen's brief as
insufficient. ___ So. 3d at ___ (Welch, J., dissenting). In
his petition to this Court, however, Laakkonen addresses only
the substantive merits of the impropriety of the jury charge
as to prior convictions.  As such, the petition provides this
Court with no proper basis under Rule 39, Ala. R. App. P., for
granting certiorari review of the decision rendered by the
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Court of Criminal Appeals in this case. See generally
Rule 39(a)(1)(D) and Rule 39(d)(3).