Court Opinion

ID: 9517786
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 00:32:32.053588+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:15:46.689579
License: Public Domain

DeBRULER, Justice,
dissenting.
The majority reasons that the State’s identification witness, Molden, had had a good opportunity to observe the two would-be robbers, and that his observations of them on the night in question provided an “ample independent basis for his in-court identification,” which provided in turn a proper basis upon which this Court might declare that the error in admitting evidence of Molden’s lineup identification was harmless error beyond a reasonable doubt. When the prosecution succeeds in presenting evidence of a pretrial identification made in violation of the accused’s Sixth Amendment rights during its case-in-chief at trial, as was accomplished at this trial, it has successfully exploited the primary illegality and is prohibited from enjoying the benefit of that exploitation by showing that the evidence had an independent source. Moore v. Illinois, 434 U.S. 220, 98 S.Ct. 458, 54 L.Ed.2d 424 (1977); Gilbert v. California, 388 U.S. 263, 87 S.Ct. 1951, 18 L.Ed.2d 1178 (1967); Hatcher v. State (1981), 275 Ind. 49, 414 N.E.2d 561. (Pivarnik, J., dissenting). The most stringent standards of harmless constitutional error apply when, as here, one of the most basic constitutional rights, the right to counsel, has been violated. In order to affirm this conviction, this Court must declare a belief that the evidence of the pretrial identification did not influence the jury in arriving at its verdict of guilty. Chapman v. California, 386 U.S. 18, 87 S.Ct. 824, 17 L.Ed.2d 705 (1967). Here, the witness observed the men, first at a distance and then for several minutes from behind a vehicle in a parking lot. The two men had their faces partially covered for some of these minutes. The witness did not see facial hair, whereas appellant had a moustache. He was unable to pick appellant out of a second lineup. There was no immediate chase of the vehicle, but it was picked up some time later. I am unable to declare a belief that the jury was not comforted by the evidence of appellant’s selection by the witness from a lineup of several persons, in achieving that moral certainty beyond a reasonable doubt of guilt. I would therefore reverse and remand for a new trial at which the evidence of the pretrial identification at the lineup would be excluded.
DICKSON, J., concurs.