Court Opinion

ID: 9685386
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 14:35:30.071006+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:18:05.318499
License: Public Domain

Caporale, J.,
concurring.
I find much of merit in my learned brother White’s dissenting opinion. However, in my view, its reasoning is inapplicable because it attaches no significance to the unique circumstance under which the case at hand arises. Notwithstanding the mistaken reference in the information to the statute concerning a refusal to submit to testing, Neb. Rev. Stat. § 39-669.08 (Reissue 1984), it is clear that everyone at the trial court level — prosecution, defense, and judge — read the information as if it referred to the statute concerning the admittedly separate *421and distinct offense of driving while under the influence of alcohol or other drugs, Neb. Rev. Stat. § 39-669.07 (Reissue 1984).
While I certainly agree that it is not the office of this court “to shroud an obvious error made by the State,” indeed this court has a positive duty to do otherwise, the unique posture of this case renders the State’s error harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. The defendant, Jim D. Blankenfeld, was actually tried on the basis that his license to operate a motor vehicle had been permanently revoked under the then-existing law because he persisted in driving while drunk. Absolutely no one, least of all Blankenfeld, was misled into thinking anything other than that. In that unique setting I have no difficulty in saying that this court should review the matter on the theory on which it was tried, as it does civil cases. Union Pacific RR. Co. v. Kaiser Ag. Chem. Co., ante p. 160, 425 N.W.2d 872 (1988); Donahoo v. Nebraska Liquor Control Comm., ante p. 197, 426 N.W.2d 250 (1988); Kearney Clinic Bldg. Corp. v. Weaver, 211 Neb. 499, 319 N.W.2d 95 (1982). I therefore concur in the result reached by the majority.
Fahrnbruch, J., joins in this concurrence.