Opinion ID: 1695166
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: claim 1. the indictment is void because it fails to set forth the essential elements of the underlying offense of burglary.

Text: Lockett alleges his indictment for capital murder is defective because it failed, without uncertainty or ambiguity, to identify the essential elements of the underlying felony offense of burglary. The indictment charged that Lockett, with malice aforethought, murdered John Earl Calhoun while he was engaged in the commission of the crime of burglary ... in that he had forcibly, burglariously, unlawfully, wilfully and feloniously broken and entered into the dwelling house of the said John Earl Calhoun and Geraldine Calhoun with the intent to, once inside, steal the personal property situated therein and to unlawfully do violence to the persons situated therein ... According to Lockett, a mere allegation of an intent to ... steal is insufficient to charge the burglarious intent to commit larceny, the intended crime. Lockett alleges the indictment should have contained additional allegations focusing upon ownership and asportation of the personal property as well as a specific intent to permanently deprive another of the personal property. The argument is doubly barred. This concern about the indictment was not expressed at any time during Lockett's trial. Nor was it one of the sixteen (16) issues raised on direct appeal to this Court. Finally, it was not among the fifteen (15) individual grounds cited in support of the relief requested in Lockett's first application for post-conviction relief. Accordingly, Lockett is barred by virtue of the time bar found in § 99-39-5(2) and the successive writ bar contained in § 99-39-27(9) from raising the matter at this late hour. Lockett, however, argues that a time bar and a procedural bar have no applicability here because matters of jurisdiction may be raised for the first time on appeal, the error is both plain and fundamental constitutional error, and the failure of Lockett's previous counsel to raise and pursue the issue either at trial or on direct appeal constitutes ineffective assistance of counsel. We are not persuaded. Three (3) sets of attorneys have failed to raise this issue which is both time barred and successive writ barred.