Court Opinion

ID: 9672028
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 03:47:31.957554+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:16:13.761906
License: Public Domain

George Rose Smith, Justice, concurring. Owing to the absence of proper objections in the trial court I concur in the result, but I do not agree with the majority’s conclusion that the information was sufficient to charge the offense of robbery with a firearm. The majority have not quoted the charging sentence of the information, by which the prosecuting attorney accused “Curtis Haynie of the crime of robbery committed as follows. . .” The word “firearm” was not used at all, which distinguishes this case from Redding v. State, where the defendant was accused of “the crime of robbery with the use of a firearm.” In the case at bar the information, in giving the details of the crime, did state that the defendant was armed with a pistol. That detail was not an essential part of the information. In fact, in Ridgeway v. State, 251 Ark. 157, 472 S.W. 2d 108 (1971), the information, in charging an assault with intent to kill, stated that the assault had been made with a deadly weapon, namely, a knife. The proof, however, showed that the defendant had committed the assault by shooting the prosecuting witness twice with a pistol. We affirmed the conviction, rejecting the argument that there was a fatal variance between the information and the proof. Hence in the case at bar the prosecution could have obtained a conviction by showing that the robbery was committed with a knife or even with no weapon at all. If the State intends to subject the accused to the possibility of fifteen years’ additional confinement because a firearm was used, the information ought to be explicit in making that intention clear. That is, the information ought to charge robbery committed with the use of a firearm. Certainly a rule to that effect would impose no burden whatever upon the prosecuting attorney, but it would unmistakably inform the accused of the precise offense being charged. Surely that is the minimum to which he is entitled.