Court Opinion

ID: 9465996
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 01:02:23.560732+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:39:29.250214
License: Public Domain

EDWARDS, Chief Judge,
concurring.
I concur with Judge Peck in affirming the District Judge’s grant of the writ of habeas corpus. I also join his opinion’s recital of the facts in this case. I write separately only because I feel I should state my views on the somewhat difficult constitutional problem upon which decision of this case turns.
There are three Supreme Court cases which, taken together, seem to me to require the result which we reach: Thompson v. Louisville, 362 U.S. 199, 80 S.Ct. 624, 4 L.Ed.2d 654 (1960); In re Winship, 397 U.S. 358, 90 S.Ct. 1068, 25 L.Ed.2d 368 (1969); Vachon v. New Hampshire, 414 U.S. 478, 94 S.Ct. 664, 38 L.Ed.2d 666 (1974).
The holding of the Thompson case is:
The ultimate question presented to us is whether the charges against petitioner were so totally devoid of evidentiary support as to render his conviction unconstitutional under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Decision of this question turns not on the sufficiency of the evidence, but on whether this conviction rests upon any evidence at all.
Thompson v. Louisville, supra, 362 U.S. at 199, 80 S.Ct. at 625.
The holding in the Winship case is:
Lest there remain any doubt about the constitutional stature of the reasonable-doubt standard, we explicitly hold that the Due Process Clause protects the accused against conviction except upon proof beyond a reasonable doubt of every fact necessary to constitute the crime with which he is charged.
In re Winship, supra, 397 U.S. at 364, 90 S.Ct. at 1073.
The holding in the Vachon case is:
In these circumstances, the conviction must be reversed. “It is beyond question, of course, that a conviction based on a record lacking any relevant evidence as to a crucial element of the offense charged . . violate[s] due process.” Harris v. United States, 404 U.S. 1232, 1233 [92 S.Ct. 10, 12, 30 L.Ed.2d 25] (1971). (Douglas, J., in chambers); Thompson v. Louisville, 362 U.S. 199 [80 S.Ct. 624, 4 L.Ed.2d 654] (1960); Johnson v. Florida, 391 U.S. 596 [88 S.Ct. 1713, 20 L.Ed.2d 838] (1968); see also Adderley v. Florida, 385 U.S. 39, 44 [87 S.Ct. 242, 245, 17 L.Ed.2d 149] (1966).
Vachon v. New Hampshire, supra, 414 U.S. at 480, 94 S.Ct. at 665.
These cases show that state court criminal convictions are vulnerable to federal habeas corpus attack where there is failure of proof of an essential element of the crime. Mullaney v. Wilbur, 421 U.S. 684, 95 S.Ct. 1881, 44 L.Ed.2d 508 (1975). In Brooks v. Rose, 520 F.2d 775 (6th Cir. 1975)1, Judge Weick accurately stated the habeas corpus law which may be deduced from the Supreme Court cases cited above:
[A] conviction which is totally devoid of evidentiary support as to a crucial element of the offense is unconstitutional under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Vachon v. New *1216Hampshire, 414 U.S. 478, 94 S.Ct. 664, 38 L.Ed.2d 666 (1974); Thompson v. Louisville, 362 U.S. 199, 80 S.Ct. 624, 4 L.Ed.2d 654 (1960); Phillips v. Neil, 452 F.2d 337, 342 (6th Cir. 1971). Such a claim is reviewable in a federal habeas corpus proceeding..
Brooks v. Rose, supra at 777.
Turning now to the facts of our present appeal, both my colleagues agree there is evidence of guilty conduct on the part of habeas petitioner Speigner. If this record involved Speigner’s conviction for possession of a stolen automobile, the habeas petition would doubtless have been summarily dismissed. The same may likewise be said if he, on this same record, had been tried for violating one of the Ohio criminal statutes derived from the common law offense of accessory after the fact of murder. E. g., Ohio Rev.Code Ann. § 2917.22; State v. Young, 7 Ohio App.2d 194, 200-01, 220 N.E.2d 146, 151 (1966).
What is clearly lacking in this record is any evidence at all that petitioner Speigner 1) fired either of the fatal shots, or 2) was ever on the scene of the murder or 3) participated in any way in the killing.
Second degree murder in Ohio is defined by statute:
No person shall purposely and maliciously kill another. Whoever violates this section, except in the manner described in sections 2901.01, 2901.02, 2901.-03, and 2901.04 of the Revised Code, is guilty of murder in the second degree and shall be imprisoned for life.
Ohio Rev.Code Ann. § 2901.05.
In the Va chon case the Supreme Court opinion summarized the missing element of the crime there involved as follows:
We therefore agree with Justice Grimes, dissenting, that “there is no evidence whatever that the defendant sold the button, that he knew it had been sold to a minor, that he authorized such sales to minors, or that he was even in the store at the time of the sale.”
Vachon v. New Hampshire, 414 U.S. supra at 480, 94 S.Ct. at 665.
Paraphrasing the above, the factual record in this case shows: There is no evidence whatever that the defendant killed Bell, that he participated in any way in the killing, or that he was ever on the scene of the killing. Thus there is no proof whatever of the most essential element of the crime of second degree murder.
I join in the affirmance of the District Court’s issuance of the writ in case Ohio does not see fit to try him upon another charge arising out of the events portrayed in this record.

. The dispute between the majority and minority opinion in the Brooks case hinged largely upon the question of whether expert testimony of legal insanity was rebutted by the lay testimony. This question is not involved in the instant case and, hence, I see no challenge to the validity of Brooks.