Court Opinion

ID: 9628829
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 09:32:42.502824+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:07:12.048703
License: Public Domain

OPINION ON REHEARING
The Appellant was sentenced to death for the offense of Murder in the First Degree, in violation of 21 O.S.Supp.1973, § 701.1(8), in the District Court, Garfield County. On Appeal that sentence was modified to life imprisonment and affirmed as modified by opinion of this Court rendered in the above styled and numbered cause on March 17, 1977. A' Petition for Rehearing has been timely filed.
In his petition, the appellant raises four grounds which he argues merit a rehearing of the cause. However, after careful consideration of the arguments, we are of the opinion that the petition should be denied.
The Appellant first urges that he was entitled to an instruction on Murder in the Second Degree because the evidence, if believed, tended to show that he was outside the death home at the time the fatal *1386shots were fired. Title 21, O.S., § 172 provides that all persons “concerned in the commission of crime . . . ” whether or not they directly commit the act constituting the offense, and even though not present, are principles in the crime, and triable as such. Neither .the fact the appellant was outside the home, nor the fact that the trial court gave an instruction on accomplices acts to negate the appellant’s liability as a principle for the murder of the Thrasher family. The record shows that the jury was properly instructed on the need for premeditation for a finding of guilt of First Degree Murder, and from their verdict we must conclude that they did find the requisite premeditation.
The Appellant next argues that as a result of Davis v. Georgia, 429 U.S. 122, 97 S.Ct. 399, 50 L.Ed.2d 339 (1976) we must overrule our holding in Justus v. State, Okl.Cr., 542 P.2d 598 (1975), that 21 O.S.Supp.1973, § 701.1, et seq., was not governed by Witherspoon v. Illinois, 391 U.S. 510, 88 S.Ct. 1770, 20 L.Ed.2d 776 (1968). The holding of Witherspoon and Davis is that a prospective juror cannot-be excluded from the jury unless he or she is “irrevocably committed, before the trial has begun, to vote against the penalty of death regardless of the facts and circumstances that might emerge in the course of the proceedings.” Witherspoon, supra. The Court in Davis stated that if a prospective juror is improperly excluded under such a test, then “any subsequently imposed death penalty cannot stand.” Since in the present case we have already modified the appellant’s sentence to life imprisonment, this ground for rehearing is without merit.
The Appellant’s third contention is that there is an unconstitutional conflict between the statutes providing for prosecution by indictment and by information. We have considered this contention in our original opinion in this case, and the appellant raises no new matter in this regard.
And, finally, the appellant asks for a rehearing on the issue of disclosure by the State of evidence within its possession, arguing that reports received from law enforcement agencies in other states were clearly exculpatory, and as such should have been disclosed to the appellant before trial. He suggests that in our original opinion we applied the wrong test, and cites to us Chapman v. California, 386 U.S. 18, 87 S.Ct. 824, 17 L.Ed.2d 705 (1967). However, the appellant has apparently misunderstood our opinion. Chapman v. California, supra, established the original harmless error rule to be applied to Federal Constitutional errors; however in our opinion where we stated that “the chain of speculative possibilities here is too long to support the defendant’s argument of prejudice” we did not mean that the lack of prejudice made the error harmless; we meant that the defendant’s argument was too speculative to support the allegation of error.
For the foregoing reasons we are of the opinion, and so hold that the Petition for Rehearing is without merit, and the clerk of this Court is directed to issue the Mandate forthwith.
BLISS, J., concurs.