Court Opinion

ID: 9542608
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 16:36:28.475044+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:08:23.827552
License: Public Domain

*518Dissenting Opinion.
Arterburn, J.
I must dissent to the majority opinion. It holds that a warrant issued on the basis of an affidavit filed and approved by the prosecutor in due form, charging one with knowingly receiving stolen property (a felony) is invalid for all purposes, including the arrest and any search flowing from the arrest. The implications of this holding are enormous.
This majority opinion directly defies the statute, Burns’ § 9-1001, which says that “When an indictment is found or an affidavit filed against a person charging him with the commission of an offense (felony) the court or a judge thereof shall, . . . direct the clerk to issue immediately a warrant of arrest returnable forthwith.”
In other words, this case holds that there must be a hearing in every case before a judge, showing probable cause, before any arrest warrant may be issued, regardless of the fact that the prosecuting attorney approves an affidavit filed charging an offense. While the charge filed is sufficient to bring a defendant to trial, under the holding in this case it would not be sufficient to arrest him. We are now holding that a defendant should have a hearing on probable cause for the issuance of a warrant for his arrest in every case, then later a trial to determine whether or not he is guilty, then an appeal, and finally another trial in what is considered a post-conviction remedy — four trials or hearings — and then finally he goes to the United States Supreme Court. There is justification for the public’s resentment of a cumbersome legal procedure in the courts.
I do not wish to be counted among those, in this time of lawlessness, who propose such a procedure in what should be a rather simple process of determining whether or not a person is guilty. The ultimate object of any trial should be merely to determine the truth and not to hamper either of the parties in getting to the truth. The procedure used should have that main objective.
*519The majority opinion attempts to rest its position on the case of Giordenello v. United States (1958), 357 U. S. 480, 78 S. Ct. 1245, 2 L. ed. 2d 1503, claiming it interpreted a constitutional question, when in my opinion it was based solely upon the Federal statutory criminal procedure for the issuance of warrants.
There is still another reason why the arrest was valid. In this case the evidence shows that one of the two purveyors of the stolen goods gave a statement to the police that he stole the goods and then sold them to the appellant, after telling the appellant they were stolen goods. If police may not arrest upon such information, then no arrest, in my opinion, is any longer valid in the State of Indiana. In this .case we would have to hold the affidavit by the prosecutor was valid for charging the crime and trying the defendant, yet invalid to make an arrest or to search his home where he was arrested and where the stolen goods were found. This stretching of so-called constitutional principles is too thin for me to see.
Again this Court has changed the law that has prevailed since Indiana became a state and which procedure has worked as well, if not better than any proposal.
I point out finally that the Court has gone out of its way in handing down this majority opinion, since the transcript does not have in it any clerk’s record of the court’s action whatever. None of the exhibits in the transcript are certified to as part of the record. There is no judgment or sentencing by the trial court certified to by any clerk’s record. In my opinion the appeal -without question should be dismissed, since there can be no appeal unless there is a judgment.
I am sorry to see the Court take this uncalled for course and paint itself in a corner in the face of a legislative enactment to the contrary.
Note. — Reported in 242 N. E. 2d 500.