Court Opinion

ID: 9776922
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 19:48:51.283157+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:11:29.028471
License: Public Domain

ON state’s motion for rehearing
MORRISON, Presiding Judge.
The state, through her district attorney and our esteemed state’s attorney, urges this court to pass upon the admissibility of the confession as a matter of law. They insist that we rule directly upon the question about which we expressed grave doubt in our original opinion.
In so ruling, two fundamental concepts should be borne in mind:
1. Any ruling we make is based upon the record before uS and will not be binding if upon another trial there is additional or different evidence.
2. If we held the confession admissible as a matter of law, such holding would be subject to review by the Supreme Court of the United States. It would be futile for this court to hold the *461same admissible when we were convinced that the Supreme Court of the United States, in line with their other decisions, would hold the same inadmissible.
In 1942, that Court, in Ward v. Texas, 316 U. S. 547, 86 L. ed. 1663, said:
“This Court has set aside convictions based upon confessions extorted from ignorant persons who have been subjected to persistent and protracted questioning, or who have been threatened with mob violence, or who have been unlawfully held incommunicado without advice of friends or counsel, or who have been taken at night to lonely and isolated places for questioning. Any one of these grounds would be sufficient cause for reversal.” (Emphasis ours.)
Now, let us see how the facts before us fit this rule.
Appellant was first interrogated on January 23, was taken into custody on January 24, and was subjected to “persistent and protracted questioning” until he finally signed the incriminating statement sometime late in the day on January 28. We do not attach the importance to the trip to Austin and the two trips to Beaumont as was attributed in the earlier cases, because we judicially know that in this sparsely settled state of ours the situs of a scientific test is often some distance from the scene of the arrest; but we do attach a great deal of importance to the time consumed in questioning an accused before he finally signs the incriminating statement.
The time consumed in questioning the appellant appears to be the same as that which caused the Supreme Court of the United States in Fikes v. Alabama, 352 U. S. 191, 1 L. ed. 2d 246, 77 Sup. Ct. 281, reh. den. 352 U. S. 1019, 1 L. ed. 2d 451, 77 Sup. Ct. 553, to hold the confession inadmissible. In that case, as in the case at bar, the relatives of the accused made application to see him during the time he was being questioned and were refused. See also Watts v. Indiana, 338 U. S. 49, 53, 93 L. ed. 1801, and the cases cited in the recent annotation which appears in 1 L. ed. 2d at page 1735.
We do observe, however, that the appellant lived in San Augustine County and the crime for which he was tried was committed in Sabine County, and we find no logical explanation for the appellant being incarcerated in the jails for Tyler and Jasper Counties during the course of his interrogation. This *462moving from jail to jail in order to suspend the writ of habeas corpus is what this court condemned in Hubbard v. State, 153 Texas Cr. Rep. 143, 217 S.W. 2d 1019, and Hergesheimer v. State, 139 Texas Cr. Rep. 427, 141 S.W. 2d 598.
Probably more important is the fact that the appellant was held “incommunicado without advice of friends or counsel.” In Gasway v. State, 157 Texas Cr. Rep. 647, 248 S.W. 2d 942, and Hulen v. State, 157 Texas Cr. Rep. 507, 250 S.W. 2d 211, wherein the accused was carried from the place of his arrest to a scientific test, we were careful to note that the officers notified his family where they were taking the accused. In the case at bar, the appellant’s daughter inquired of the sheriff of San Augustine County on January 25 where the appellant might be found, and the sheriff was unable to tell her. On January 27, the appellant’s two sons made inquiry at the Jasper County jail for the appellant, and the person in charge was unable to tell them where he was. Later that night, the sheriff of San Augustine County said that the appellant was in the jail at Hemphill in Sabine County, and when they arrived there early the next morning the appellant was no longer there. On January 30, they again went to the jail in Jasper, Jasper County, and asked to see the appellant and were told that he was not there, but they were able to see him through the bars in the jail. The jailer later admitted the appellant was there but still refused to let them see him. They were then told that they could not see the appellant until they secured the permission of Sheriff Smith of Sabine County, and when they talked to Sheriff Smith he refused to let them see the appellant until he “got through with the case.”
Following the taking of the statement from the appellant, the sheriff who then had him in custody refused to allow the appellant’s attorney to confer with him in private and refused to permit appellant’s attorney to have him examined by a doctor unless another doctor of the officer’s choosing was present at the examination.
Consideration is given to these events, which occurred after the signing of the incriminating statement, in weighing the testimony of the arresting officers that it was freely and voluntarily made. Haley v. Ohio, 332 U.S. 596, 92 L. ed. 224, 68 Sup. Ct. 302.
As pointed out in the original opinion, it is a further undisputed fact that the appellant was shown a gory picture of the deceased lying on the floor in a pool of blood and was required *463to hold it for twenty-five minutes while he was being interrogated shortly before he signed the incriminating statement.
We have concluded from what has been said above and in our original opinion that the Supreme Court of the United States would hold this confession inadmissible as a matter of law. Having so concluded, it becomes our duty to hold accordingly.
The state’s motion for rehearing is overruled.