Court Opinion

ID: 9685100
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 14:23:04.863575+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:18:02.292960
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing
LOZIER, C.
In his motion for rehearing, defendant asserts that he is now in possession of newly discovered evidence, “the import of which would have resulted in a verdict of acquittal had this evidence been known by and available to appellant at the time of the trial.” He states that two witnesses would [331] now testify in corroboration of his alibi between 2 p. m. and 6 p. m., January 15, 1949; and that these witnesses could not be located at trial time although “defendant, his counsel, his family and friends made every effort possible to locate them.”
Attached to defendant’s motion is a copy of an affidavit, dated October 21, 1950, by Carl Davies in which Davies asserts that he, and he alone, committed the burglary and larceny, and thai he pleaded guilty thereto on December 9, 1949. (This was the same day defendant was sentenced.) Defendant now asserts that this evidence was not available to him at trial time “for the reason that defendant had no reason to anticipate such evidence, nor could it have been discovered and used if anticipated due to the fact that an information was pending against this witness at the time of said cause and the *1000witness was cautioned by tbe trial court that it was his constitutional right to refuse to answer any question if he thought such question to be self-incriminatory. ” For this reason, defendant argues, “even if this evidence could have been anticipated, it would have been unavailable to him at the trial; therefore, his inability to discover same at that time, or at any time prior thereto, does not constitute lack of due diligence.”
We note that this assignment as to newly discovered evidence is made for the first time in the motion for rehearing. See 24 CJS, Crim. Law, Sec. 1830, p. 663; 3 Am. Jur., App. & Error, Sec. 798, p. 347; Johnson v. State, 131 Tex. Cr. 23, 95 SW 2d 697; and Turpin v. State, 149 Tex. Cr. 179, 192 SW 2d 277. However, had the assignment been made at the initial hearing of this appeal it could not have been sustained.
This court has only appellate jurisdiction in felony cases. 1945 Cons., Art. V, Sec. 3. We cannot “retry” defendant or grant him a new trial on the ground of newly discovered evidence. We can only review the proceedings of his trial as shown by the record before us in this appeal. See 24 CJS, Crim. Law, Sec. 1831, p. 668. (As to jurisdiction of the trial court and the appellate court to entertain such a motion pending appeal or after affirmance of convibtion, see Anno., ALR 1091.)
In State v. Baldwin, (Mo. Sup.) 281 SW 943, this court, on its own motion, granted a rehearing to the defendant upon affidavits which were “very convincing evidence that the appellant is not guilty of the crime for which he was tried and that the verdict of the jury was a most grievous miscarriage of justice.” However, “none of the foregoing considerations could justify reversal of the judgment against appellant, because they do not appear in the record before this court, and his conviction, unjust though it may be, must be affirmed or reversed upon the record made at his trial. If that judgment was rendered after a fair trial, it cannot be overturned, even though appellant be in fact not guilty. In that event, he must be remitted to executive clemency alone.”
We do not have for review the propriety of any action of the trial court in denying a new trial because of this newly discovered evidence. See Annos.: 158 ALR 1062, 74 ALR 757; and 33. ALR 550.. However, we observe, without so ruling, that apparently defendant has not shown due diligence and that the discovered testimony as to defendant’s alibi was cumulative. We also note that Davies was not a codefendant, was defendant’s witness, and waived his right to refuse to testify; and that the perjured testimony of which defendant now complains was given at defendant’s instance in defendant’s behalf by one for whose credibility defendant himself had vouched.
*1001We have again studied the record in this case. We have found nothing suggesting that defendant did not have a fair trial or one in which there was reversible error. Therefore, the motion for rehearing is overruled.
Van Osdol and Aschemeyer, GO., concur.
PER CURIAM:
The foregoing opinion by Lozier, C., is adopted as the opinion of the court.
All the judges concur.