Court Opinion

ID: 9647794
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 13:50:47.875966+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:11:53.510307
License: Public Domain

*332CONCURRING OPINION ON APPELLANT’S MOTION FOR REHEARING
ONION, Judge.
The dissent is apparently grounded upon the belief that appellant’s counsel first elicited testimony as to the oral confession leading to the recovery of the license plates. The record as to the direct examination of Chief of Police Cook reflects the following:
“Q. I see. Where did you get these license plates JGV767?
“A. Over on the east side of Mud Creek on Highway 204.
“Q. Highway 204?
“A. Yes sir.
“Q. Where abouts were they?
“A. They were thrown out in the woods out in a brush pile.
“Q. I see. How did you know that they were out there?
“MR. THOMAS D. WHITE: Your honor, we object to any — well, may I take him on Voir Dire just a minute.
“THE COURT: You may.
“MR. THOMAS D. WHITE: It was not through anything that this boy told you that you found those plates, by this boy I mean Charles William Lee.
“A. Not what he told me.
“MR. THOMAS D. WHITE: Yes sir. Now you were told by another person where those plates were, is that right, Chief?
“A. Best of my recollection it was three of them that told me.
“MR. THOMAS D. WHITE: Your honor, may we have the jury retired just a minute ?
“THE COURT: Ladies and gentlemen of the jury please retire until the Court sends for you.” (Emphasis supplied.)
It is clear from the above, that the State sought to introduce the oral confession without laying the proper predicate. Apparently trying to lay the basis for his objection, appellant’s counsel took Chief Cook on voir dire. After establishing that the license plates were not found by anything said by the appellant, the appellant’s counsel asked the question and received the answer which the dissent contends opened the door. After the jury had retired at appellant’s counsel’s request, he objected that there had been no showing of the proper warnings, including the right to remain silent, the right to counsel, etc. He further pointed out to the court that the witness merely said, “three of them,” without identifying which persons he had in mind. The objection was overruled and thereafter in the jury’s presence, over vigorous objections, the “three of them” were then identified and oral statements attributed to the appellant and his co-defendants during interrogation and leading to recovery not only of the license plates but also an air cleaner and business papers were repeatedly introduced.
I, therefore, concur in the reversal of this cause for the failure of the prosecution to demonstrate that the warnings and waiver required by the decision in Miranda v. State of Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694, were given prior to the admission into evidence of appellant’s oral confession which supposedly lead to the fruits of the crime.
The record clearly reflects that appellant and his co-defendants were taken into custody in Henderson, Rusk County, on the 15th day of March, 1965, by Officer Jolly. After being held over night they were taken into custody and removed by the Chief of Police Cook and Deputy Sheriff Horton to Jacksonville, Cherokee County. Thereafter, they were interrogated by the two officers and it was from this interrogation the oral confessions resulted.
*333Generally, oral confessions made while a defendant is in confinement or in custody of an officer have long been inadmissible in Texas. It is only those oral statements of fact or circumstances that are found to be true, which conduced to establish the accused’s guilt such as a finding of secreted or stolen property, or the instruments with which he states the offense was committed, that are rendered admissible by the statute.
Statutory warnings long required for written confessions were not required for an oral confession leading to the fruits of the crime under the provisions of Article 38.22, Vernon’s Ann.C.C.P., in effect at the time of appellant’s trial. The fact, however, that the Texas statute did not require warnings prior to the giving of such oral confessions leading to the fruits of the crime does not affect the applicability of Miranda to the confessions in question. This trial commenced on April 17, 1967, after the effective date of Miranda. See Johnson v. State of New Jersey, 384 U.S. 719, 85 S.Ct. 1772, 16 L.Ed.2d 882.
For the reasons stated, I concur in the reversal of this cause.