Court Opinion

ID: 9778590
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 21:13:23.695986+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:33:11.987938
License: Public Domain

WOODLEY, Presiding Judge
(concurring).
I concur in the opinion prepared by Special Judge Meade F. Griffin.
As further ground for overruling the contention that the admission of appellant’s statement was not reversible error under the Massiah rule, I would add the following.
Ground of error No. 1, which presents the contention that the admission in evidence of appellant’s statement violated his constitutional rights under Miranda, makes no contention that the statement was in-culpatory or incriminating.
The ground of error reads:
“The court erred in admitting in evidence an oral statement given by the appellant to a police officer after indictment in the absence of counsel and at a time when the appellant had employed an attorney.”
The statement under the ground of error quotes the statement to which it refers as follows:
“Q. (Bogard) So I said ‘Pat, are they going to convict you ?’ And he said: T don’t see how they can.’ He said ‘over there at Parmer County, they will have to have farmers on the jury.’ And said: ‘Any time they do.’ He said, ‘I can’t see how a farmer can convict me of taking something from somebody that was stealing from them and selling it to them for what it was worth.’ ”
The statement in support of the ground of error No. 5, which complains that the evidence was insufficient to corroborate the testimony of the accomplice witness Brock, includes the following:
“The conversation that the appellant had with Officer Brock cannot be considered corroboration of Brock due to the very nature of the statement made.”
The argument in support of ground of error No. 5 includes the following:
"The testimony of Officer Bogard as to statements made to him by appellant would furnish no corroboration for at most it would only show an opinion by the appellant as to why a jury in Parmer County would not convict him, but would fail to show any incriminating evidence as such.”
In Massiah the Supreme Court dealing with incriminating statements obtained by trickery or deception said:
“All that we hold is that the defendant’s own incriminating statements, obtained by federal agents under the circumstances here disclosed, could not constitutionally be used by the prosecution as evidence against him at his trial.”
Appellant’s able counsel concedes, and I agree, that the statement is neither a confession or admission of guilt, nor is it incriminating. As I see it, the statement was neither inculpatory nor exculpatory.
*174The question is whether the Massiah rule should be extended in this state to exclude the statement, whether incriminating or not, and whether obtained by trickery or deception or not.
It is my view that it should not, and I direct attention to the fact that such a holding in this appeal would not be subject to review by the Supreme Court by appeal or certiorari, the conviction being reversed on other grounds.
I would also direct attention to the fact that the rule which requires the appellate court to treat this and the companion case of Ysasaga v. State as showing reasonable doubt of the sufficiency of the evidence1 presupposes that the appellate court has found that there is sufficient evidence from which the jury might reasonably conclude that every other reasonable hypothesis than guilt was excluded and absent the rule applied2 the evidence in each case is sufficient to sustain the conviction.3
I do not understand that the sufficiency of the evidence herein, absent the rule applied in Ysasaga v. State, supra, rests in any way on the statement of appellant to Deputy Sheriff Bogard.

. 24 Tex.Jur.2cl 427, Evidence, Sec. 745.

. See Footnote 1, supra.

. This is important in view of the fact that in the event of another trial the state may not be able to introduce the testimony of the “Spanish boy”, but may satisfactorily account for its failure to do so or show that neither the Spanish boy nor his testimony was in fact available to the prosecution, or that it would not have cast additional light on the facts.