Court Opinion

ID: 9766711
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 04:57:04.33225+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:30:25.056841
License: Public Domain

CLARK, Chief Judge,
concurring.
I concur in affirmance of the conviction in this case but write to express my view that the discussion under sub-heading I in the principal opinion is unnecessary and inappropriate because it addresses a subject not raised in the appellant’s point of error.
The point set out in appellant’s brief, which is the subject of discussion in subheadings I and II of the principal opinion, reads as follows:
“The trial court erred in submitting Instruction No. 5, the verdict directing instruction, because the indictment and amended information charged defendant with offenses conjunctively while Instruction No. 5 charged in the disjunctive thus the court’s instruction constructively amended the charge.”
Appellant was tried on an amended information charging felony stealing, § 570.030, RSMo.1978. The means by which the stealing was accomplished consisted of false representations that by use of occult powers, appellant would ward off misfortune and illness faced by the victim. The information set out in the conjunctive four false representations on which the victim was alleged to have relied as a basis for payment of money to appellant. At trial, evidence of the four misrepresentations was presented but the verdict directing instruction informed the jury a guilty verdict could be returned upon finding that any one of the misrepresentations was made.
This factual and procedural history, taken with the statement of the point on appeal, demonstrate that the only issue for decision is whether the variance between the information and the instruction result in the statement of two different offenses *58or, as appellant's brief frames the question, whether the deviation constructively amended the information. The principal opinion deals with this issue in sub-heading II of the opinion, albeit tersely, and reaches the correct result.
The issue of whether appellant’s constitutional entitlement to a unanimous jury verdict for conviction in a criminal case under Art. I, § 22(a) of the Constitution of Missouri and the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution was breached by the disjunctive submission of the case is not raised or briefed by appellant or respondent and the discussion of the question in sub-heading I of the principal opinion is therefore unnecessary to disposition of the appeal. Were that question before this court, the writer would entertain doubt as to whether the conviction could be affirmed. People v. Failla, 64 Cal.2d 560, 51 Cal.Rptr. 103, 414 P.2d 39, 44 (banc 1966); People v. Heideman, 58 Cal.App.3d 321, 130 Cal.Rptr. 349, 355 (1976); Johnson v. United States, 398 A.2d 354, 369 (D.C.App.1979).