Court Opinion

ID: 9859848
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 22:48:28.105457+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T11:08:37.602597
License: Public Domain

PEDERSON, Justice,
dissenting.
A threat may not always supply the connecting link between an act and the person who made the threat but, if it ever could be the link, it would have to apply to McMor-row in this case. McMorrow told Cobler that he found some ball bearings on the ground outside Overvold Motor Company, where some windows had previously been broken. He also told Cobler that if he was not paid $10,000, Overvold would probably lose more windows. Several windows were subsequently broken and two ball bearings, which appear to fit the holes made in the windows, were found outside. McMorrow doesn’t appear to deny that he intended his remarks to be a threat.
. Most crimes that are committed are not forecasted in detail by the persons who intend to commit them. It has happened in arson cases, and 6A C.J.S. Arson § 43, states the general rule to be that evidence of threats is admissible to prove motive and malice, “and to connect the accused with the crime.”
The threat to destroy showroom windows with ball bearings is of such a peculiar nature as to be a natural connection between the person making that threat to the evidence that the showroom windows were thereafter destroyed by ball bearings. The peculiar nature of this threat, and the subsequent consequences, i. e., that windows were broken and ball bearings were found nearby, are factors which, when added to the other circumstantial evidence given, lead me to believe that there was competent evidence to warrant the jury returning a conviction.
State v. Holy Bull, 238 N.W.2d 52 (N.D.1975), upon which the majority places great reliance, does not indicate that if there had been evidence that Holy Bull had threat*290ened to stab Robert L. French to death, the connection would not have been made between Holy Bull and the stabbing.
Whether or not Herout could testify that the voice he heard on the telephone was like McMorrow’s voice would not, in my opinion, be any more significant in this case than the threat, in connecting McMorrow with the crime. Both are items of circumstantial evidence which can supply the connecting link.
The risk, of course, is greater of a “frame” when one makes threats. However, courts do not owe a threatener absolute protection from the consequences of the threat. The conviction should be affirmed.