Court Opinion

ID: 9586393
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 23:10:04.958238+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:30:00.794812
License: Public Domain

BRETT, Presiding Judge
(specially concurring) .
The medical testimony offered by the State clearly showed that the prosecutrix had experienced sexual intercourse with someone, before she was examined on the evening of February 28, 1966. Notwith*947standing defendant’s alibi, the conflict of testimony offered was resolved by the jury. From the record, it also appears ‘that the evidence was sufficient to sustain the jury’s verdict.
However, as Judge Bussey points out in his opinion the defendant failed to offer objections to the testimony concerning defendant’s lineup identification; and on cross-examination, defense counsel extensively examined the witnesses who participated in that lineup. (See Appendix to Judge Bussey’s opinion). Nonetheless, this point was vigorously argued before the full Court.
As Judge Nix stated in Gillespie v. State, supra:
“The court is of the opinion that failure to object and pursuing the matter at great length on cross-examination takes said testimony out of the category of reversible error though it may well have influenced the verdict.” p. 455.
Nonetheless, from the record one draws the conclusion that the lineup might have been improved upon, even though there is nothing contained in the record to constitute reversible error. Therefore, this writer is of the opinion, any doubt concerning this fact should be resolved in defendant’s favor, which seems to warrant modification of defendant’s sentence, and I therefore agree that defendant’s sentence should be modified from life imprisonment to a sentence of forty-five (45) years imprisonment, and as so modified the judgment and sentence should be affirmed.