Court Opinion

ID: 9466297
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 01:11:18.947393+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:39:39.223862
License: Public Domain

HENLEY, Circuit Judge,
concurring.
The opinion of the majority is based on the proposition that whereas a confession related to the corpus delicti or fact of the commission of a crime which involves physical damage to person or property must be corroborated, there need in such a case be no link, outside the confession, between the injury and the person who admits having inflicted it. While it must be conceded that this court1 along with other appellate courts,2 following Supreme Court dicta,3 has tended to exclude the identity of the accused from the corroboration requirement, this exclusion has been criticized4 and I am far from persuaded that it is sound. However, I concur in the result reached by the majority because I am convinced that evidence corroborating defendant’s admissions of his connection with the bank robbery was sufficient to warrant a jury inference of the truth of the admissions. Opper v. United States, 348 U.S. 84, 93, 75 S.Ct. 158, 99 L.Ed. 101 (1954).
The government established that the bank robber wearing the ski mask was a tall and slender Caucasian with dark eyes and brown hair. The jurors had an opportunity to observe the defendant throughout the trial and to determine the extent to which he fit the general description of the robber. Parenthetically, it may be noted that Opdahl has not contended that his physical description is unlike that of the robber.
Furthermore, the government established that a ski mask, apparently worn by the tall slender robber during the robbery, contained hair samples microscopically similar in all identifiable characteristics with defendant’s hair.
In United States v. Massey, 594 F.2d 676 (8th Cir. 1979), this court found matched hair samples to be of substantial probative value and concluded that evidence of hair samples microscopically similar to samples of defendant’s hair was the “linchpin” which enabled the court to uphold the conviction. Similarly, in this case, I believe that the evidence of hair samples, considered along with the other evidence, is sufficient to corroborate defendant’s admissions as to his connection with the crime. Thus, I join in affirming the conviction of Richard Opdahl.

. United States v. Stabler, 490 F.2d 345, 349-50 (8th Cir. 1974); Fisher v. United States, 324 F.2d 775, 779 (8th Cir. 1963).

. See, e. g., United States v. Johnson, 191 U.S. App.D.C. 193, 196, 589 F.2d 716, 719 (D.C. Cir. 1978); United States v. Begay, 441 F.2d 1136, 1137 (10th Cir. 1971); Rodriquez v. United States, 407 F.2d 832, 834 (9th Cir. 1969); Hicks v. United States, 127 U.S.App.D.C. 209, 215 n. 6, 382 F.2d 158, 163 n. 6 (D.C. Cir. 1967); United States v. Braverman, 376 F.2d 249, 253 (2d Cir. 1967); Caster v. United States, 319 F.2d 850, 852 (5th Cir. 1963). But see Palacios v. Government of Guam, 325 F.2d 543, 546 (9th Cir. 1963).

. Wong Sun v. United States, 371 U.S. 471, 489-90 n. 15, 83 S.Ct. 407, 9 L.Ed.2d 441 (1973); Smith v. United States, 348 U.S. 147, 154, 75 S.Ct. 194, 99 L.Ed. 192 (1954).

. See, e. g., Developments in the Law—Confessions, 79 Harv.L.Rev. 935, 1082-83 (1966); Note, Proof of the Corpus Delicti Aliunde the Defendant’s Confession, 103 U.Pa.L.Rev. 638, 676-77 (1955).