Court Opinion

ID: 9742711
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 21:18:34.57788+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:24:35.122760
License: Public Domain

Knutson, Chief Justice
(concurring specially).
In order that there may be a majority of the court to answer the questions submitted to us by the trial court, I reluctantly concur in the result reached by Mr. Justice Otis.
I think that the first question submitted to us should be answered in the negative without any qualifications. What we are now doing is to remand the case with leave to defendant to do something that in my opinion is impossible. The only way that it could be known that the jury decided the case exclusively on the grounds of an alibi would be if the court submitted the case to the jury on the theory that unless they found an alibi they must find defendant guilty as charged. Were such an instruction given, it is obvious that we would promptly reverse.
In every criminal case it is necessary that the jury be unanimous in a decision for either a conviction or an acquittal. No one can now know on what basis any of the 12 members of the jury voted for an acquittal. It is necessary that the jury be instructed that the defendant is clothed with the presumption of innocence and that the state must *90prove every essential element of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt before there can be a conviction. For all that anyone knows, there may be 12 reasons why the 12 members of the jury vote for an acquittal. As a matter of fact, they can vote for an acquittal even though they have no reason at all. It is obviously for that reason that Minn. St. 621.12 was enacted, which reads:
“Every person who, having entered a building under such circumstances as to constitute burglary in any degree, shall commit any crime therein, shall be punished therefor as well as for the burglary, and may be prosecuted for each crime separately.”
In State v. Haclcett, 47 Minn. 425, 50 N. W. 472, the question involved here was answered as clearly as it can be answered. Hackett was indicted, charged with, and convicted of the crime of grand larceny in the second degree. He appealed from an order denying a new trial. He was also indicted, tried, and acquitted of the crime of burglary in the first degree. In this latter trial, testimony was introduced tending to show that at the same time and place of the alleged burglary defendant stole the property described in the grand larceny indictment. This testimony was produced for the purpose of proving an intent to commit and the commission of the crime of burglary. The court held that the larceny and the alleged burglary were committed and were parts of the same transaction. The court referred to our statute, Penal Code of 1886, § 393, which stated that “[a] person who, having entered a building under such circumstances as to constitute burglary in any degree, commits any crime therein, is punishable therefor, as well as for the burglary; and may be prosecuted for each crime separately,” and pointed out that (47 Minn. 427, 50 N. W. 473) “[a]l-though declared by statute, this is no new statement of the law applicable to the case at bar.”
Here, the state was required to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that defendant (1) with the intent to commit some crime therein, (2) broke into, and (3) entered the dwelling house of another, in which (4) there was a human being, (5) under circumstances not amounting to burglary in the first degree, before defendant could be convicted. How it is now possible to show that the jury based its verdict entirely *91upon a finding that defendant was not at the place of the alleged burglary is something that it is impossible for me to comprehend.
It may be true that there are authorities to the contrary, but our statute and our case law permit the indictment and trial of a defendant for both the burglary and the crime alleged to have been committed as the foundation for the burglary charge, and I think we need go no further than our own opinions. If we must do so, I think that the case of Hoag v. New Jersey, 21 N. J. 496, 122 A. (2d) 628, affirmed, 356 U. S. 464, 78 S. Ct. 829, 2 L. ed. (2d) 913, contains a most convincing argument in favor of so holding.
The Washington court in State v. Barton, 5 Wash. (2d) 234, 105 P. (2d) 63, came to the same conclusion, and the quotation contained in the opinion of Mr. Justice Otis from that case is in my opinion unanswerable. How a defendant can now go back and show — either from the transcript, the court’s charge, or the arguments of the attorneys — that the only issue submitted to the jury upon which it based its decision was an alibi is incredible to me. Even though the county attorney may have stipulated that defendant was acquitted on the issue of identity raised by his alibi, such stipulation, in my opinion, must be disregarded since no county attorney has any more right to speculate as to the reason for a jury’s verdict than does the court or anyone else. It may be that the county attorney may try a criminal case on a stipulation of facts and the issues entered into between the parties after he has carefully investigated the facts, but that does not authorize him to stipulate on appeal what he thinks the jury may have based its decision on where several issues are involved, such as we have here. I therefore think that the question submitted should be answered in the negative without any qualification as is required by both statute and case law in this state.
Our former chief justice, Roger L. Dell, who took part in the hearing and consideration of this case, resigned before the opinion was issued. He was of the same opinion as I am as shown herein.