Court Opinion

ID: 9721419
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 08:58:53.310543+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:24:25.727449
License: Public Domain

DeBRULER, Judge,
concurring and dissenting.
I cannot join the opinion of the Court because it expressly declares that the basis for the mistrial declared upon the first trial of Count II, habitual criminal, has no legal significance in determining whether a retrial should be permitted. State v. McMillan, (1980) Ind., 409 N.E.2d 612 holds, as I understand it, that there is a right arising from Ind.Code § 35-50-2-8, to have a single jury determine guilt on the underlying felony and the question of whether appellant meets the prerequisites for sentencing as a habitual offender, but this right gives way to the public interest in augmenting sentences for those who are habitual offenders, when the first attempt to determine whether the accused is a habitual offender has resulted in a deadlocked jury. I am of the opinion that the law is not, and should not be, that this significant right must give way in like manner when the mistrial order has resulted from judicial or prosecutorial overreaching. Brown v. State, (1979) Ind., 390 N.E.2d 1058.
According to the record before us the prosecution was under an admonition by the trial court to instruct its witnesses “that it should not be attempted to be offered into *1091evidence that the defendant herein is charged with the burglary of Trout’s Jewelry Store.” The order book entry concerning the habitual offender hearing of February 12, 1980, reflects that a mistrial was declared following “comments of State’s counsel made during closing argument which makes [sic] reference to the fact that the defendant purportedly participated in the burglary of Trout’s Jewelry Store. . . . ” When the trial prosecutor characterized appellant’s conduct in this manner, as burglary rather than as theft, he sought an advantage over the accused in a criminal proceeding in which a fixed term of thirty years’ imprisonment was at stake, an advantage to which he was not entitled. This I regard as the type of overreaching which should not be permitted to override the interest of the accused in having his entire case disposed of before a single jury.
I would affirm the conviction for theft, but remand for resentencing in a manner which would deny the State the effect of the determination of habitual offender.