Court Opinion

ID: 9761633
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 01:48:22.86817+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:29:25.143530
License: Public Domain

ON MOTION FOR REHEARING OR TO TRANSFER
PER CURIAM.
The State filed a motion for rehearing or to transfer to the Supreme Court, citing State v. Cuckovich, 485 S.W.2d 16 (Mo. banc 1972), and the Court’s quotation at page 23 from 22A C.J.S. Criminal Law § 712, p. 966. This case and Cuckovich are disparate. The quotation is inapropos. In Cuckovich the revolver was taken from a dresser in the room at the time defendant was arrested. It was clearly connected with the defendant. It was of the same caliber as the revolved used in the killings. The bullets taken from the bodies and test bullets fired from the gun in evidence had the same general characteristics and some points of individual characteristics. This weapon was not found in the possession of Dexter Davis, or in the house where he lived. There is no showing of identity of caliber; no test shots were fired; no showing that the men accompanying defendant when he entered the automobile were his “criminal associates,” see above quotation, 485 S.W.2d 1. c. 23, or his “coconspirators,” as in State v. Richetti, 342 Mo. 1015, 119 S.W.2d 330, 340 (1938); no showing that either defendant or the men actually came from the *714house in which the gun was later discovered. This is a case like State v. Wynne, 353 Mo. 276, 182 S.W.2d 294 (1944), which Judge Holman differentiated in Cuckovich on the ground that the gun “was not shown to have been connected either with the defendant or the offense.” 485 S.W.2d 1. c. 23.
The State also disputes our finding that the case against defendant was not “especially strong,” arguing that it was as strong as it could be and that the statement in State v. Degraffenreid, 477 S.W.2d 57 (Mo. banc 1972), should be applied, namely, that error which in a close case might call for a reversal may be disregarded as harmless when the evidence of guilt is strong. That this case was not “as strong as could be” and had inherent weaknesses, for instance, that the store manager himself was unable to identify the defendant as a participant in the robbery, was pointed out in the opinion.
The motion for rehearing or to transfer to the Supreme Court is overruled.