Court Opinion

ID: 9446109
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-03 21:46:24.594526+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:30:31.703414
License: Public Domain

DUFFY, Chief Judge
(dissenting).
I respectfully dissent. I am inclined to believe that the natural abhorrence that all good citizens must feel toward those engaged in the illicit narcotic business, has caused the majority of this panel to reach an erroneous conclusion.
No matter how vile or disgusting the charged criminal offense may be, the defendant thus charged still must be convicted by evidence that is convincing beyond a reasonable doubt. The burden upon the Government is unchanged. In my judgment, in the case at bar, the Government has failed to meet the obligation which rested upon it.
No narcotics were found in the possession of defendant, Fred Washington. He had no previous record of violation of the narcotics laws. The conviction of Fred Washington must stand or fall upon his identification by the sound of his voice. Neither agent ever had heard his voice before, yet, after his arrest on the fol*917lowing day, these agents claimed that the voice they then heard was the same voice they had heard the day before over the telephone.
In the opinion herein, the majority sets forth what it calls “uncontroverted facts,” but Mrs. Kernick testified she did not speak to Fred Washington on the phone. Further, Leon Washington, a brother of Fred, testified that he was the one who answered the phone and, of course, it was he who delivered the narcotics. We held in United States v. Bucur, 7 Cir., 194 F.2d 297, 304, that the representation of one party to a telephone conversation that he conversed with another was, in itself, an insufficient proof of authentication.
I concede that ordinarily, where the evidence is conflicting, we must accept that which is most favorable to the Government, and I also recognize the rule that the trier of the facts is the sole judge of the credibility of witnesses. However, there are rare occasions when the physical facts of a situation are such as to make the oral testimony utterly unbelievable.
The agents “suggested” to Mrs. Ker-nick that she call a certain telephone number and ask for Fred Washington. She did call the number. Apparently she talked in the usual manner with the telephone receiver at her ear. The conversation consisted of not more than thirty-five words, which ordinarily would consume about twelve seconds of time. It is the unbelievable testimony of the agents that as Mrs. Kernick was telephoning, each agent got his head close enough to Mrs. Kernick’s head so that he not only heard the voice on the other end, but heard it clearly and distinctly enough so that on the following day he was able to recognize the voice he had heard on the telephone as belonging to Fred Washington.
To me such an alleged performance was impossible. Maybe a two-faced Janus who was a contortionist, might have manipulated one of his right ears and one of his left ears so that both of the ears were touching a telephone receiver already occupied by the ear of a third person, but I doubt it. In the case at bar, we have the picture of not one but two agents getting close enough to a telephone receiver already at the ear of Mrs. Kernick, so that they not only heard a voice they never had heard before, but were able to take note of the quality and the sound of the same, and readily identify that voice the following day.
After the telephone call, and before seeing Fred Washington, agent Heisig ordered that Fred Washington be arrested. Heisig testified “I ordered the arrest, but I was not certain that the defendant was the same person to whom the phone call was directed.”
Disregarding, as we should, the identification of defendant, Fred Washington, by his voice, there is no competent or substantial evidence in this record to sustain the verdict of guilty. See Abrams v. United States, 250 U.S. 616, 619, 40 S.Ct. 17, 63 L.Ed. 1173.