Court Opinion

ID: 9712812
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 05:00:31.245266+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:23:14.522243
License: Public Domain

HESTER, Judge,
concurring and dissenting:
I agree with and join the majority’s Opinion with the exception of the point discussed below. The defendant urges, and the majority agrees, that a new trial be granted on the basis of testimony given by Deputy Sheriff Rentschler, the undercover agent. Said testimony consisted only of the following:
Q. “Did you have any conversation with him (the defendant) at that time?
A. It was mostly talk about drug transactions. He told me how he went thru college . . .. ”
(N.T. p. 7).
At that point he was immediately interrupted by the assistant district attorney. The majority would grant a new trial holding that:
“We believe that the only inference that could be drawn from the statement made by the deputy sheriff was that there were many drug transactions engaged in by this defendant while he was in college. It may not necessarily be that the jury would draw the inference that the defendant actually worked his way through college by selling marijuana, but it is quite clear to us that the jury should have inferred that the defendant engaged in at least some drug transactions while in college.” (p. 401).
*274The majority concludes that the testimony in question constitutes an improper reference to prior criminal activity. I do not agree. There is nothing in the answer to indicate, or that could support the assumption, that the defendant sold drugs while in college.
The defendant received a fair trial. He, as stated in the majority Opinion, was a person “who had already been selling large quantities of drugs prior to the police ever meeting him.” He sold 25 pounds of marijuana to the agent for $8,500.00.
A new trial is not warranted.
I respectfully dissent.