Court Opinion

ID: 9640710
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 17:13:11.074246+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:10:31.301202
License: Public Domain

John I. Purtle. Justice, dissenting. I think we ought to follow the law but in doing so we should use common sense and apply that degree of justice which is compatible with the law. Basically, I disagree with this outrageous sentence, which indicates a need for sentencing guidelines at the state level. This appears to be a case where an employee becomes outraged and uncontrollable because he had been fired and his final check was not ready. His conduct is inexcusable and highly criminal. He ought to be punished but the courts should not act arbitrarily and unreasonably in response to the acts of an accused. There is no more justification for the reaction by the system than there is for the original action of the criminal. The majority opinion relies upon Ark. Code Ann. § 5-1-110(a)(5), which is also the foundation of this dissent. The case before us is a clear example of a continuing course of uninterrupted conduct and the law does not otherwise provide that specific periods of this conduct constitute separate offenses. Rhodes v. State, 293 Ark. 211, 736 S.W.2d 284 (1987), is cited in support of the majority. There is no comparison to be found between Rhodes and the present case. Rhodes was charged with offenses which were committed within a “few days” of each other. He robbed two citizens in separate robberies and a few days later had a shoot-out with officers who were trying to arrest him. He was charged with attempted murder for his resisting efforts. We properly held that there was no continuing course of conduct and each offense was a separate course of conduct. The opinion ended by stating: “He was not charged with several counts for the same continuous crime.” When the impulse is single only one charge is proper, no matter how long the action may continue. Rowe v. State, 271 Ark. 20, 607 S.W.2d 567 (1980). If the same conduct establishes more than one offense, a conviction may be had for only one. Swaite v. State, 272 Ark. 128, 612 S.W.2d 307 (1981). There is no separation of the acts by the appellant in this case. It was all one continuous course of conduct directed at obtaining his paycheck. When he completed his goal he left. This is not as though he went to each of the seven persons and addressed them separately or if he had shot each one of them. The statement that if he had killed all seven he could be punished for seven separate murders is scary. Of course he could be punished for separate murders. It takes separate impulses to commit multiple murders. But to assume he might have or could have killed seven people is very little stronger than locking up the first man you meet on the street because he might commit a crime. He might, but then he might not. This sentence is unconscionable and should be reduced to a sentence appropriate for the conduct attributable to the appellant in the case before us. It was, after all, but one uninterrupted course of conduct, lasting only a matter of minutes.