Court Opinion

ID: 9851189
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 05:08:37.715633+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:20:51.012492
License: Public Domain

BUSSEY, Judge,
dissenting:
I must respectfully dissent to the remanding of this case for a new trial. The State’s evidence overwhelmingly establishes that on July 10, 1981, Jackie Frick was viciously attacked by the appellant with an aluminum baseball bat in the parking lot outside a bar in Stillwater, Oklahoma. As a result of the ruthless beating, the victim received multiple lacerations to the head, fractures of the skull, brain damage, hemorrhage, and dislocated teeth, and died several hours after the injuries were inflicted.
At trial, the State called fifteen witnesses and produced overwhelming evidence of the appellant’s guilt including testimony of the appellant’s girlfriend who witnessed the slaying and identified the appellant as the one who beat the victim to death. The State also introduced evidence that was discovered at the appellant’s residence: stereo equipment stolen from the victim’s trailer, a pair of tennis shoes, and a pair of blood-stained blue jeans. The State further introduced blood scrapings from the appellant’s ankles and the bloody baseball bat used in the beating. The blood on all of these items was type A, the victim’s blood type. In addition to this evidence, many individuals testified and all of the testimony unquestionably inculpated the appellant as the man who brutally, murdered Jackie Frick.
The appellant called no witnesses during the guilt stage of the proceeding.
This record is devoid of any evidence tending to establish that the jury ever saw the appellant shackled during the guilt stage of the trial. But to the contrary, the record reflects that the trial judge stated:
But my recollection is that the jury never saw the defendant moving about during the course of the trial. The jury always entered or exited at different time than the defendant, except when the defendant did take the stand in the punishment stage. And I assume, even though these chains were not readily observable, fact is, I didn’t even, he’s been up here several times and I didn’t even know he had chains on. But I assume the jury probably could have seen them during the sentencing stage.
*212I am of the opinion that the conviction should be affirmed, but that the cause should be remanded for resentencing pursuant to 1985 Okla.Sess.Laws, ch. 265, § 701.13 to ensure that the appellant is not prejudiced by the leg shackles which the jury observed during the sentencing stage of the trial. However, there is no reason to reverse this case for a new trial since the evidence of guilt is overwhelming, since there is a total lack of evidence that the jury ever observed the leg shackles during the first stage of the trial, and since the appellant is wholly unable to show that he was prejudiced during the guilt stage of the trial.