Court Opinion

ID: 9646165
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 12:50:39.750409+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:11:34.787748
License: Public Domain

FLANIGAN, Judge,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent.
The principal opinion considers ten points raised by the defendant and holds that all ten are invalid. I concur fully in nine of those rulings. My dissent is confined to the ruling on defendant’s fourth point. In my opinion that point is a valid one and the trial court committed reversible error in admitting, over defendant’s objection, evidence concerning the burglary of Kathryn Dickson’s apartment on November 26,1980.
The state argues that the evidence was admissible as tending to identify defendant as the rapist of Kay Ogborn. The principal opinion agrees with the state. I disagree.
“When admitting evidence of other crimes, it is important that the trial court consider not only the rule of exclusion but also the matter of discretion. Some courts proceed on the assumption that the decision of admitting or not admitting such evidence turns solely upon the ascertainment and application of the rule, in other words, whether or not the evidence comes within a certain category which constitutes an exception to the rule of exclusion. This should not, however, be a matter of pigeonholing, but one of balancing, on the one hand the actual need for such evidence, and on the other the degree to which a jury may be prejudiced against the defendant by hearing such evidence. The matter should be one of careful discretion on the part of the trial court. This is especially true when the ultimate purpose of the State is to prove the identity of an accused.” State v. Burr, 542 S.W.2d 527, 531[4] (Mo.App.1976). See also State v. Cheesebrew, 575 S.W.2d 218, 223[9] (Mo.App.1978); State v. Hamell, 561 S.W.2d 357, 360 (Mo.App.1977).
The state’s expert witness, Dr. Briner, testified that in his opinion defendant’s right shoe produced the marks on the piece of mud found in Miss Ogborn’s bathroom. Dr. Briner also testified that defendant’s shoe produced the shoe print behind Apartment A near the northwest corner of 421 Sheridan and the print in the piece of mud found at the edge of the patio of Apart*163ment C of 415 Sheridan.1 Dr. Briner’s opinion was that “no other shoe of the same size and same brand could have caused those shoe prints.” Significantly Dr. Briner was unable to provide specific identification with respect to the mud chips collected from the Dickson apartment.
As the principal opinion points out, Dr. Briner’s testimony would justify the inference merely that the mud chips “could have” come from the same shoe which left mud in the Ogborn apartment. In other words, the physical evidence in the Dickson apartment contained only “class characteristics,”2 while the evidence inside the Og-born bathroom and the two outdoor prints had “individual characteristics.”
The state’s evidence showed that a specific shoe, that of the defendant, produced the markings in Miss Ogborn’s bathroom and the two outdoor prints. That was strong evidence indeed on the issue of the identity of the rapist. On the contrary, the physical evidence collected from the Dickson apartment possessed only class characteristics which added nothing on the issue of identity. The state does not claim that the evidence was sufficient to show that defendant committed the burglary of the Dickson apartment. Evidence of the Dickson burglary contributed nothing to the state’s burden of proof.
In State v. Strickland, 530 S.W.2d 736 (Mo.App.1975), the residence of one Lee was located “next door” to the townhouse apartment of Murray. Defendant was charged with burglary of the Murray apartment on November 14, 1973. The state introduced evidence of pry marks found that day on the door of the Lee residence. Defendant was found in a nearby alley. Near him was found a tire iron which fitted snugly into the marks on Lee’s door. Defendant was not linked by fingerprints to the tire tool nor was it ever seen in his possession. The court of appeals held that the trial court erred in receiving evidence of the attempted burglary of Lee’s apartment because defendant was not connected with the incident at Lee’s door.
In State v. Mathis, 375 S.W.2d 196 (Mo.1964), defendant was charged with the burglary of a store room located at 1210 Truman Road in Kansas City on August 29, 1962. The state, over defendant’s objection, introduced evidence that after midnight on that date a policeman found defendant sitting in a car parked at 1401 Truman Road. The state’s evidence showed that the building at 1401 Truman Road had been broken into, that it had recently been painted, and that at the time of his arrest defendant had paint on his hands similar to that on the building. The court rejected the state’s argument that the break-in of the building at 1401 Truman Road was part of the “res gestae.” It pointed out that commission of the burglary at 1201 Truman Road “was necessarily a completed transaction separate and apart from the commission of a second burglary or unlawful breaking two blocks distant.” At p. 199[4] the court said:
“The state contends that the evidence which admittedly tended to show that defendant broke into the office building at 1401 Truman Road was properly admitted over objection because it tended to establish intent, absence of mistake or accident, a common scheme or plan embracing the com*164mission of two or more crimes so related to each other that proof of one tended to establish the other, or the identity of the defendant. We cannot agree. The crimes were not related, and the fact that defendant may have broken into a building at 1401 Truman Road could not tend to show his intent to commit an unrelated burglary at some previous time two blocks away at 1210 Truman Road. Neither could it tend to show absence of mistake or accident in breaking into the building at 1210 Truman Road, or the identity of the one who did so.”
Under the foregoing authorities, evidence of the Dickson burglary was inadmissible. That the error was prejudicial is demonstrated by the fact that the prosecutor, in his final argument to the jury, said: “I’ll call your attention to the apartment down the street, he got 20 bucks out of there too, but, when he dragged those muddy footprints up those stairs and saw that some young lady in Apartment J had a big man with her, then he went down a half a block away and got into Kay Ogborn’s apartment and she did not have a man there. His intention was to rape.”
In my opinion defendant’s fourth point is meritorious and the judgment should be reversed and the cause remanded for new trial.

. These two prints are respectively referred to as “the full imprint” and “the TRAX imprint” in the principal opinion.

. This reference to Dr. Briner’s testimony is based on the most favorable view of the evidence from the standpoint of the state. State's Exhibit 10 consisted of “three small wedge-shaped pieces of mud” found in the Dickson apartment. Dr. Briner compared Exhibit 10 with defendant’s shoe. This testimony ensued:
“PROSECUTOR: Dr. Briner, after making your comparisons and analysis were you able to arrive at an opinion as to the origin of the pieces of mud?
“DR. BRINER: If we refer, want to refer to each one of them separately, No. 10, the wedge-shaped pieces of mud, we were able to match in varying relatively unique class characteristics but not individual characteristics, to areas on the shoe, which the pieces of wedge fit into the shoe, as well as there are some, a couple, in places where there are protrusions on the side of the shoe which would then cause an indention in the piece of mud, and we felt, even though they, that was, was quite unusual, we did not, we were not able to ascribe class characteristics to it because we only had one point of comparison.”