Court Opinion

ID: 9704408
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 00:34:39.853324+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:22:02.216980
License: Public Domain

*226Concurring Opinion.
Hunter, J.
I completely concur in the majority opinion and add to it only because I wish to minimize any potential for confusion that might arise from what I believe is a misstatement of the facts in the dissenting opinion of Arterburn, J.
I.
Prior to the hearing on this petition on March 10, 1969, there were no papers or court records before this court relating to the circumstances surrounding the original apprehension of the petitioner on January 12. The only facts which were before this court were related to the “arrest” of the petitioner pursuant to a warrant which was issued on January IS. The petitioner and prosecutor seemingly had assumed that the legality of the petitioner’s incarceration would stand or fall on that arrest warrant. Both the majority and the dissent are in agreement that this is not so. If, in fact, there was a valid “sight arrest” [without a warrant] by a police officer with probable cause on January 12, the petitioner’s incarceration in the Hendricks County Jail would be lawful even if an arrest warrant was thereafter illegally obtained.
After the hearing and while this court was considering the merits of this petition, it became obvious that before we could determine the legality of the petitioner’s incarceration, the facts surrounding his original apprehension on January 12 would have to be known. The parties were then asked to stipulate as to the circumstances surrounding the original apprehension but were unable to do so. In lieu thereof, the petitioner filed a letter stating that “it is impossible to agree” on these essential facts, and the prosecutor filed an affidavit from the arresting officer. Of course, neither of these documents can serve as a sound basis for fact findings by this court.
*227In spite of this, the dissent has seen fit to set forth the assertions of the prosecutor, the prosecuting witness, and the arresting officer as “clear facts.” We simply do not have the evidence to become the triers of fact as regards the circumstances surrounding the petitioner’s original apprehension. The majority, therefore, has wisely refused to determine this issue and has decided instead to deal only with the legality of the petitioner's incarceration under the arrest warrant. This does not mean that the majority is “assuming that an arrest warrant was necessary in this case” as is stated in the dissent, but only that judgment is being withheld on this particular issue so that it may be determined by a court that has enough relevant information to make an informed decision on the matter.
II.
The dissent then turns to the charging affidavit. Noting that it was signed by a witness who allegedly also saw the petitioner commit the crime, the dissent concludes that “we cannot understand what stronger facts are necessary to show probable cause. . .” The dissent does not explain how any magistrate could have possibly known that the affiant was a witness to the crime on the date the arrest warrant was issued. The charging affidavit is couched in the language of the offenses Against Property Act and it states only that the affiant “is informed and believes” that petitioner perpetrated the attempted theft. Nowhere does the affidavit even infer that the affiant had actually witnessed the crime, and, if it had, the entire problem in this case could have been avoided. Rather, the only document which even mentions this essential fact is the so-called probable cause affidavit which was filed one month after this issuance of the warrant and which, even according to the dissent, is “an irrelevant and needless step in the proceedings.” Thus, what appears to Arterburn, J., as a “travesty on justice” is nothing more than the Kinnaird rule requiring only that the affiant allow the *228magistrate to determine probable cause by setting forth the essential facts, either in an affidavit or at a hearing. The majority opinion in no way requires more than an eye witness for probable cause, but it does require that such probable cause be known by magistrate who issues the arrest warrant.