Court Opinion

ID: 9542421
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 16:34:13.168858+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:07:53.449218
License: Public Domain

Dissent
Jackson, J.
For the purpose of this dissent it is sufficient to say this entire transaction is so tainted with entrapment that the judgment should be reversed.
The police officers, among other things, according to their own testimony, and that of the State’s witness Paul J. Ray directed the witness Ray to break the law by driving his car, after dark, with the headlights not burning in order to give the police officers cause to arrest the witness and the appellant.
After procuring the commission of the illegal act by Ray, they arrested and searched appellant and later his dwelling, all without a warrant. Such action on the part of the officers cannot be tolerated, and in my opinion, vitiates this entire proceedings. If the police can procure, by their counsel and advice, the violation of law with impunity in order to make an arrest, no citizen is secure and such action is a direct violation of constitutional and civil rights.
Finally no witness testified that appellant had possession of the narcotic; the witness Ray who testified for the State *315and who was the informant and the willing tool of the officers who engineered the entrapment, testified that one Mr. Neusbaum reached down and put the pink Kleenex down under the seat of the car.
In view of the circumstances in the case at bar the imposition of the penalty here imposed, i.e., “not less than twenty years nor more than life,” cannot and should not be affirmed.
This cause should be reversed and remanded to the trial court with instructions to grant appellant’s motion for a directed verdict filed at the conclusion of the State’s evidence in chief and to expunge its judgment of conviction heretofore rendered herein.
Note. — Reported in 214 N. E. 2d 380.