Opinion ID: 1917788
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Claimed Violations of Constitutional Rights

Text: (1) The trial court was justified in refusing to grant a new trial upon the grounds of newly discovered evidence consisting of certain statements made by the county attorney in open court on June 8, 1960, when the indictment against Alex DeGoode was dismissed, which statements included these comments: This matter presently before the Court was a companion matter to the Lupino case which has already been tried, and the Azzone case which has already been tried. These cases arose after conviction of Azzone and Lupino in a federal trial for unlawful flight, and after sentence of this defendant who had pled guilty to the same charge. Now, in the federal trial this defendant had pled guilty, and after he had been sentenced I asked if he was willing to waive his constitutional rights and testify before a Ramsey County District Grand Jury. He indicated he would. After his testimony and other evidence the Grand Jury indicted this defendant, together with Lupino and Azzone, for Kidnapping.          [But] in this court Mr. DeGoode pled not guilty.       Separating the trials, as each of these defendants has chosen to do, leaves me with a completely different picture. I'm now faced with the trial of DeGoode alone, not in concert with Lupino and not in concert with Azzone,    the State is unaware of a single [witness] who will testify that this defendant was even in the State of Minnesota, to say nothing of having taken part in the crime for which he is charged.    we are unable to prove that the crime of kidnapping occurred and that this defendant participated in it. The Court: You mean by that without his own testimony. Mr. Randall: Without his own testimony and with his testimony we are unable to establish corroboration as to his participation in it, because we have no witnesses who identify Mr. DeGoode as being anywhere in Minnesota at that time. Now, immediately following the completion of the Azzone trial, which was the second of the two, I talked to the attorney for Lupino and I talked to the attorney for Azzone. They talked to their clients. Thereafter, I talked personally to Lupino and I talked personally to Azzone. I pointed out to them in as clear words as I could use that we needed additional evidence in order to corroborate the confession and the sworn testimony which DeGoode had given. Neither Lupino or Azzone were able to give me the names of a single witness; nor were they willing to indicate their willingness to appear as a witness themselves. Defendant contends that these statements by the county attorney made with respect to the state's case against DeGoode constitute judicial admissions which establish as a fact that DeGoode was not in Minnesota on September 29, 1953, and this being so, convictions based on his testimony should not be permitted to stand. The argument reflects a misunderstanding of the differences between problems of proof occurring under Minn.St. 634.03, which provides: A confession of the defendant shall not be sufficient to warrant his conviction without evidence that the offense charged has been committed; nor can it be given in evidence against him whether made in the course of judicial proceedings or to a private person, when made under the influence of fear produced by threats, and those occurring under § 634.04, which provides: A conviction cannot be had upon the testimony of an accomplice, unless it is corroborated by such other evidence as tends to convict the defendant of the commission of the offense, and the corroboration is not sufficient if it merely shows the commission of the offense or the circumstances thereof. One object of § 634.03 is to discourage invasions of the constitutional rights of accused persons to be free from undue pressure to confess exerted by law enforcement authorities. [2] The importance of this right and the measure of judicial concern for its protection is illustrated by the recent decision of the United States Supreme Court in Jackson v. Denno, 378 U.S. 368, 84 S.Ct. 1774, 12 L.Ed.2d 908, where it was held that criminal procedures followed in the State of New York which made possible jury reliance upon a credible but nonvoluntary confession deprived the defendant of his liberty without due process of law. The object of § 634.04 is to provide a check upon the credibility of testimony of a person who, having been admittedly involved in criminal conduct, might be disposed to shift or diffuse responsibility in order to curry the favor of law enforcement officials. The confession to which reference is made in § 634.03, as a practical matter, is one obtained extrajudicially. There is no opportunity for the jury to observe firsthand the process which produces it. On the other hand, the testimony of an accomplice is given in open court and is subject to cross-examination by the defendant's attorney. Verity is thus safeguarded in a measure. These different reasons for §§ 634.03 and 634.04 in themselves suggest that the quantum of proof required to constitute evidence that the offense charged has been committed within the meaning of § 634.03 [3] is different than that required to constitute such other evidence as tends to convict the defendant of the commission of the offense within the meaning of § 634.04. [4] In evaluating the comments made by the county attorney, the question is not whether DeGoode's written confession made out of court coupled with the recitation of events given by him in open court during the Lupino and Azzone trials would have supported a conviction. The significant thing is that in the opinion of the county attorney at the time these statements were made the written confession of DeGoode could not be buttressed by his testimony in the Lupino and Azzone trials in order to meet the requirements of § 634.03. Whether that judgment was correct is not the issue before us. The problem now is whether the statement of the county attorney as applied to the problems of proof as against DeGoode represents an official acknowledgment that there was inadequate corroborating evidence of DeGoode's testimony in the cases against Lupino and Azzone. The problems of proof were entirely different in the Azzone and Lupino trials than they would be in the DeGoode case. The evidence needed to prove that the offense charged had in fact been committed was provided in each of the separately tried cases by DeGoode. He acknowledged participation and testified in detail concerning the acts of Azzone and Lupino which constituted the crime. The convictions in the Lupino and Azzone cases did not rest upon confessions at all. Each plead not guilty. Lupino, taking the witness stand, claimed that he was at home throughout the night when the crime allegedly occurred. Azzone at his trial asserted his constitutional right to remain silent. In the absence of a confession, [5] other corroborating evidence was needed to meet the requirements of § 634.04, and in the Lupino decision we found the corroboration adequate as to him. The problem in the case against DeGoode was quite different. Although he had given a written confession to the crime and had testified with respect to the details of it in the cases against Lupino and Azzone, he pleaded not guilty as to himself and refused to repeat the confession where his own liberty was at stake. The state was left with no testimony to be corroborated (except for the confession made previously), [6] and this because the men who, according to DeGoode, participated with him in the crime were either unable or unwilling to testify that a kidnapping had in fact been committed by anyone. To contend that an acknowledgment of these facts by the county attorney represents a judicial admission that the crime was not committed is to confuse the existence of a fact with the proof needed to establish it in a specific case. (2) Defendant was not denied his constitutional right to appellate review of the proceedings resulting in his conviction (Douglas v. People of State of California, 372 U.S. 353, 83 S.Ct. 814, 9 L.Ed. 2d 811), by the fact that the trial court considered his motion for a new trial to be untimely. [7] Where claims of constitutional infringement are involved, this court (accommodating to such recent United States Supreme Court decisions as Fay v. Noia, 372 U.S. 391, 83 S.Ct. 822, 9 L.Ed.2d 837; Townsend v. Sain, 372 U.S. 293, 83 S.Ct. 745, 9 L.Ed.2d 770; and Sanders v. United States, 373 U.S. 1, 83 S.Ct. 1068, 10 L.Ed. 2d 148) will disregard time limitations when this can be done without prejudice to the public interest in orderly criminal procedure. We are reviewing all of the claims of the defendant in this case and, as a consequence, the determination of the trial court to the effect that defendant's motion for a new trial was belated will not bar review of the claims of constitutional infringement. Thus, prejudice is absent. (3) There was evidence at this trial, as in the Lupino case, of other and separate crimes which include (a) joint participation by Azzone, Lupino, DeGoode, DeVito, and Mussehl in a robbery at Aynor, South Carolina, (b) joint participation of Azzone, Lupino, DeGoode, and Sam Cimin in a robbery in Minneapolis on September 26, 1953, and (c) an earlier robbery by these four of a Minneapolis gambler. As to the first and second of these separated and prior crimes, we have here the same problem as we did in the Lupino case. There we held the facts of the Aynor robbery to be admissible because the events related established defendant's motive. The evidence of the September 26, 1953, robbery was held admissible because the same persons participated in it as those who allegedly participated in the kidnaping of September 28, 1953    and because it was done at a time and in a way having evidentiary significance in this case. We did say that evidence as to the third robbery would not have been admissible ordinarily. The record in the Azzone trial discloses no waiver of the objection. Nevertheless, in our opinion, any error which may have occurred in permitting brief reference to this incident was without prejudice. Unquestionably, reference to the commission of prior crimes by a defendant influences jurors. But, in this case, the evidence as to the Aynor, South Carolina, robbery and the September 26, 1953, O'Hara robbery having been properly admitted, the reference to the robbery of the Minneapolis gambler by DeGoode, Lupino, Azzone, and Cimin would have slight additional impact. It is also to be remembered that all of this testimony came from DeGoode. If the jury had disbelieved him, his recitation of these prior occurrences would have no effect. If the jurors did believe DeGoode's account of DeVito's destruction (and the verdict of guilty returned against the defendant indicates that they did), the reference to the robbery of the gambler would have about the same effect as a bucket of water on a lake level. We note too the meticulous care with which the trial judge in his instructions emphasized to the jurors the importance of determining whether defendant was guilty of the crime charged without regard to whether he may or may not have been guilty of some other and different crime. These considerations combine to convince us that there was no possibility of prejudice in the admission of this testimony under the circumstances of the case. See, State v. Biehoffer, 269 Minn. 35, 129 N.W.2d 918. (4) We have read the argument of the county attorney to the jury in detail and we are satisfied that the discussion of the evidence was within permissible limits.