Court Opinion

ID: 9851742
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 05:18:53.680953+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:22:14.341045
License: Public Domain

BUSSEY, Judge,
concurring in part, dissenting in part:
I agree that the judgment and sentence in the burglary conviction should be affirmed; however, I do not agree to the reversal of the arson conviction insofar as it was based upon Rhode Island v. Innis, supra. The record reveals that the defendant’s counsel specifically stated that he had no objection to the admission of the gas can at trial; thus,"the defendant is prohibited from asserting this error on appeal by 12 O.S.1981, § 2104(A); see also for instance, Thacker v. State, 303 P.2d 449 (Okl.Cr.1956).
Furthermore, if the alleged error had been properly preserved for appellate review, I am of the opinion that the gas can should not be suppressed, as I do not agree with the majority opinion’s interpretation and application of the Supreme Court’s holding in Rhode Island v. Innis, supra. In that case, the defendant had been arrested near a school for the shotgun murder of a taxicab driver and the armed robbery of another. With knowledge that the shotgun was very possibly concealed in close proximity to a school near the location where the defendant was arrested, the police officers, who were transporting Innis to the station house, engaged in a conversation regarding the danger the weapon posed to the children. Consequently, Innis responded with a request to return to the scene as he “wanted to get the gun out of the way because of the kids in the area of the school.” The police were found to have improperly engaged in a practice which they “know [or should have known] is reasonably likely to evoke an incriminating response from a suspect.” However, in the case at bar, I am of the opinion that the mere signing of a consent to search form of his residence so that illgotten goods could be expeditiously regained, was not an incriminating response prohibited by Rhode Island v. Innis. Nothing in the record supports the holding that the finding of the gas can was a result the law enforcement agents could or should have reasonably known would follow from the defendant’s signing of the consent to search form.