Court Opinion

ID: 9765844
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 04:21:42.693356+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:30:16.153562
License: Public Domain

Supplemental Opinion on Denial of Rehearing delivered February 13, 1984 Steele Hays, Justice. Appellant’s petition for rehearing insists that our opinion of December 13,1983, (Williams v. State, 281 Ark. 91, 663 S.W.2d 700 (1983) erred in two respects: in assuming that it was the appellant, and not the state, who proposed a lesser charge in exchange for his confession and in disregarding the law that a confession obtained by a promise of reward may not be used against a defendant. But we adhere to our position on both counts because the record shows unmistakably that it was the appellant who initiated the proposal — Detective Jones testified to that effect and his testimony s,tands unrefuted, and we think the law was correctly applied. However, we believe a supplemental opinion is in order since an important point of law is involved, and was not fully developed in our first opinion. When the voluntariness of a confession is raised on appeal, we independently review the circumstances in their entirety to determine whether the confession is trustworthy. The burden rests on the state, but unless we can say the trial court clearly erred in determining the preponderance of the evidence, we will affirm. Davis v. State, 275 Ark. 264, 630 S.W.2d 1 (1982); Harris v. State, 244 Ark. 314, 425 S.W.2d 293 (1968). Here, the single circumstance supporting appellant’s position lies in the state’s having admittedly agreed to charge appellant with first degree murder in return for his agreement to give a statement about the Hoyt Green murder.1 However, that fact in itself is not what makes a confession unreliable. An examination of all the attendant circumstances includes those circumstances surrounding any agreement such as this one. When all the factors are considered, we conclude that the confession was voluntarily given: 1) appellant had not been subjected to lengthy interrogation, he was questioned briefly on May 8 and not again until he requested the meeting of May 14; 2) appellant was not without counsel, he had a lawyer, evidently retained, though he chose to meet without him; 3) the Miranda warnings were repeatedly read to appellant; 4) it was appellant who conceived and proposed that he give a statement in exchange for a charge of first degree murder; 5) at the time the agreement was reached appellant had not been charged in the Green murder, he was at most a suspect; 6) the agreement was not reached with the police, who are sometimes accused of overstepping the strict restraints of the law, but with a seasoned deputy prosecutor of more than twenty years affiliation with the office; 7) appellant did not mistakenly rely to his detriment on a false promise (in contrast to the cases cited in our opinion of December 13, 1983 at p. 95), the state kept the bargain and appellant benefited by it; 8) finally, and notably, appellant does not claim he was lured by the hope of reward into giving a false statement, thus, the truth of the statement he gave under oath to the deputy prosecutor remains utterly unchallenged by him. When the case law applicable to these facts is examined we think it has been correctly applied and the confession was properly admitted. The fact that it was appellant who initiated the proposal is a key factor and one which has been seen by many courts as significantly different from the opposing situation, where the state initiates the proposal and uses it to beguile the suspect. In Whitworth v. State, 117 S.E. 450 (1923), tjie Supreme Court of Georgia said that the hope of reward which will exclude a confession must be one which another holds out to the accused to elicit it. More recently that same court observed in upholding a confession that the hope of benefit for the confession was not induced by the officers, but proceeded from the accused himself. In Foster v. State, 72 Ga. App. 237, 33 S.E.2d 598 (1945) it was said, “A hope or fear which originates in the mind of the person making the confession and which originates from needs of his own planting will not exclude a confession.” The Kansas Court of Appeals has said that if the defendant solicits the promise, he cannot claim to have been the victim of compelling influence. State v. Baker, 4 Kan. App. 2d 340, 606 P.2d 120 (1980). In State v. La Pean, 247 Wis. 302, 19 N.W.2d 289 (1945), the Wisconsin Supreme Court upheld a confession on circumstances closely resembling those at hand. The accused asked to have the charge reduced from frist degree murder to third degree. The officer said he would take it up with the prosecutor, who then accompanied the officer to the jail, agreed to the proposal, and defendant’s written confession was obtained and upheld. Other cases to the same effect are: State v. Jordan, 114 Ariz. 452, 561 P.2d 1224 (1976); Eakes v. State, 387 So. 2d 855 (Ala. Crim. App. 1978); People v. Nicholas, 112 Cal. App. 3d 249, 169 Cal. Rptr. 497 (1980); People v. Coddington, 123 Ill. App. 2d 351, 259 N.E.2d 382 (1970); People v. Hubbell, 54 Cal. App. 2d 49, 128 P.2d 579 (1942); People v. Sourisseau, 62 Cal. App. 2d 917, 145 P.2d 916 (1944); State v. Nunn, 212 Or. 546, 321 P.2d 356 (1958). Nor is there any assertion by the appellant that the promise of a lesser charge lured him into a false statement. Where the defendant conceives the plan and bargains for its acceptance in return for what he now claims was wrongfully obtained, it is incumbent on him to show he was coaxed into giving a statement that was not true. This is the position taken in other jurisdictions. In State v. Nunn, supra, the test was said to be, was the inducement held out to the accused such that there is any fair risk of a false confession, for the object of the rule is not to exclude a confession of truth, but to avoid the possibility of a confession of guilt from one who is in fact innocent. The issue is, “Whether the methods used produced an untrue acknowledgment of guilt,” [R. W. v. State, 135 Ga. App. 668, 218 S.W.2d 674 (1975)] and, “Were the circumstances such as to result in an untrustworthy confession.” [In Interest of G.G.P., 382 So.2d 128 (Fla. Dist. Ct. App. 1980)]. In State v. La Pean, supra, the court said, “The only question is whether this confession was obtained by promises which induced [the accused] to make an untrue or untrustworthy confession.” See also United States v. Gorayska, 482 F. Supp. 576 (1979) and Greenwood v. State, 107 Ark. 568 (1913). Having made an independent review of the entire circumstances presented to the trial court, we are unable to say that on a preponderance of the evidence, the trial court’s findings that the confession was made knowingly and voluntarily is clearly erroneous. The petition for rehearing is denied. Justices George Rose Smith and John Purtle would grant petition for rehearing. Justice P. A. Hollingsworth not participating.  Appellant’s confession was essentially an admission that he and a companion approached Hoyt Green to rob him, appellant having the pistol; that when Green resisted, the two started running but the companion took the gun from appellant, went back and shot Green.