Court Opinion

ID: 9846857
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 03:49:37.343643+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:16:56.140411
License: Public Domain

SPECIAL CONCURRING OPINION
NIX, Presiding Judge.
Though I concur in the ultimate conclusion of Judge Bussey, I feel compelled to elaborate further upon defendant’s proposition number one dealing with the preliminary hearing. The Statute of the State sets forth in clear and concise language that the defendant has a right to subpoena witnesses at a preliminary hearing and examine them under oath. Title 22, O.S., § 257, which reads as follows:
“At the examination the magistrate must, in the first place, read to the defendant *613the complaint on file before him. He must, also, after the commencement of the prosecution, issue subpoenaes for any witness required by the prosecutor or the defendant’’ (Emphasis ours.)
The Statute [22 O.S. § 259] further says:
“When the examination of witnesses on the part of the State is closed, any witness the defendant may produce must be sworn and examined.” (Emphasis ours.)
I feel that the statute should be complied with, or repealed.
The Legislature does not enact statutes to be warped or twisted and interpreted to suit the converse of a particular situation.
It is well conceded that a preliminary hearing is not a trial to determine the guilt of accused, but only the two issues: “Was a crime committed, and is there reasonable cause to believe the defendant committed it ?” However, this does not mean that only the state can put on witnesses and the magistrate allowed to call a halt to the proceeding under the auspices that he has been satisfied with the evidence.
Defendant certainly has a right to produce evidence material to the two issues as stated above. The materiality of evidence as to these two issues is broad in scope and the magistrate should restrict the testimony with caution, or else defendant may be denied the right of being properly confronted with his accusers. Though not so designated bylaw, the preliminary hearing in American Jurisprudence has been recognized as a median serving several purposes. First, .it permits the state as well as the defendant to preserve the testimony of witnesses, in lieu of depositions. Witnesses die, leave the state, abscond, and are often unable to be found. Next, it is a procedure whereby defendant may discover what testimony is to be used against him at the trial, as he may examine witnesses in detail and be prepared to cope with their testimony at the time of trial.
This matter has previously been discussed in conference and it is the concensus of this Court’s opinion that this decision is not to restrict the defendant in his rights under the law as it pertains to preliminary hearings, - but does fortify the magistrate in his right to restrict it to those witnesses who possess information relative or material to the issues.
Therefore, the rule laid down in Parmenter v. State, Okl.Cr., 377 P.2d 842, still prevails.