Court Opinion

ID: 9532426
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 04:21:13.156666+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:28:45.586797
License: Public Domain

HAYS, Vice Chief Justice
(dissenting):
The majority seems to have abandoned its appropriate role as an appellate court in reviewing this case. The trial judge more than six months after the actual trial held a hearing on defendant Smith’s motion for a new trial. At this time he heard an array of convict testimony which attacked the veracity of the state’s witness, Mahan, and attempted to establish that Mahan had bragged about being an agent of the county attorney. There was no doubt that each witness had nothing but contempt for Mahan.
The trial judge’s comment at the close of the hearing puts the matter in proper perspective:
“And it’s not improbable at all considering the rather unsavory character of Mr. Mayhem (sic) that he was telling around down there that he had a deal with the County Attorney’s office. I do not or cannot find any quarrel with that testimony. * * * I still cannot disregard the nature of this testimony coming from the mouths of the witnesses of this character, so to speak, in the face of Mr. Berger’s flat denial which is completely unimpeached that he did not at any time make a deal with him, if any deal was made.” RT p. 127.
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“We must deal here with it being1 a principle of law, that it’s merely impeaching evidence and not sufficient for a motion for a new trial.” RT p. 128.
Brushing aside the testimony of convicts or ex-convicts who were busily grinding personal axes, we have the unimpeached testimony of the then Deputy County Attorney Berger. The only way around Berger’s testimony is to say that the circumstances reflect so strongly against that testimony that he is a perjurer and a liar. The trial judge who has the role of weighing the evidence chose not to do so. There is evidence to support the position of the trial judge, and it does not affirmatively appear that there has been an abuse of discretion. State v. Turner, 92 Ariz. 214, 375 P.2d 567 (1962).
In the absence of a finding that Mahan was an agent of the law enforcement officials the notes which are the center of the controversy here are admissible. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals disposed of this problem in Stowers v. United States, 351 F.2d 301 (1965) in the following language:
“Before there was an opportunity for consultation with counsel, appellant and Kirtley were placed in such proximity as to permit of conversation. There is no evidence that the two were so placed in furtherance of a Government plan or ruse or trick to obtain evidence of admissions on the part of either. No recording or transmittal device was concealed, as in the case of Massiah v. United States, 377 U.S. 201, 84 S.Ct. 1199, 12 L.Ed.2d 246 (1964), upon which appellant strongly relies.” 351 F.2d at 302.
I have raised a question as to how truly the record reflects an agency relationship existing between Mahan and the County Attorney’s Office; however, my objections also go to the basic issue of the supposed deprivation of constitutional rights. For *108the purpose of the following comments I shall assume that the agency relationship did exist.
What has happened to the time honored goal of the courts, the ascertainment of truth? Why do the Marquis of Queens-bury rules apply only to the state? The words of Justice White bring these questions into sharp focus in his dissent in Massiah v. United States, 377 U.S. 201, 84 S.Ct. 1199, 12 L.Ed.2d 246 (1964):
“It is therefore a rather portentious occasion when a constitutional rule is established barring the use of evidence which is relevant, reliable and highly probative of the issue which the trial court has before it — whether the accused committed the act with which he is charged * *. With all due deference, I am not at all convinced that the additional barriers to the pursuit of truth which the Court today erects rest on anything like the solid foundations which decisions of this gravity should require.” 377 U.S. at p. 208, 84 S.Ct. at 1204.
I am well aware that citing dissents is often indicative of having forever lost the game, but some encouragement may be found in the fact that a majority of the United States Supreme Court in Miller v. State of California, 392 U.S. 616, 88 S.Ct. 2258, 20 L.Ed.2d 1332 dismissed the writ of certiorari as improvidently granted. Justice Marshall wrote a lengthy memorandum decision concurred in by Chief Justice Warren, Justice Douglas and Justice Brennan, which strongly dissented from the dismissal of the writ. The facts in that case bear a strong resemblance to the facts here.
In Miller, supra, an undercover agent employed by the Sheriff was placed in the same cell with the defendant who was charged with the murder of her husband. The defendant at this time had an attorney, who had in fact set up a watch on her cell to prevent communication with her by the law enforcement officials. The undercover .agent was permitted at the trial to testify a? to admissions made by the defendant.
I am also aware that there may be a variety of reasons why the majority of the court in Miller dismissed the writ of certiorari, but I must at least be permitted the hope that the United States Supreme Court may as it has in similar matters, recede from the doctrine of Massiah, supra.
I am not outraged by the facts of this case (as we originally stipulated they might be) nor am I upset by the actions of the sheriff in the Miller case. A system of justice which countenances the “dirty business” of informers in narcotics cases does violence to logic in its scurrying to align itself with none but the angels in this situation.
In this case there has never been any question as to the defendant’s guilt. The sole issue for determination throughout the trial was whether the defendant was legally insane. Testimony as to defendant’s actions and utterances while incarcerated have often been admitted to shed light on this issue, even those actions and utterances outside the presence of his attorney.
Furthermore, there has been no question but that the defendant wrote the two notes to Mahan, which were introduced into the case as Exhibits 88 and 89. They read as follows:
EXHIBIT 88:
“Jack, I don’t blame you for asking that question Jack, we’ve got to depend on each other.
I’m going to tell the truth, I’m not just lying in order to get out of here. Right after that shooting in Mesa I left my gun on the counter to go into the other other section of the building.
As I was walking over there 2 cops came right in the door behind me — they were between me & my gun so they got me — & that’s the truth — I’ve told a lot of people that I just gave up because I didn’t want to fight — But that’s just what I want them to believe — because I’m trying for that hospital. You can see how much I trust you Jack — If the *109wrong people got hold of this note they could really hang me up.
O.K. Jack?
EXHIBIT 89:
The reason for my not writing out is that if a phycharist (sic) could get áhold of something that I’d written, he could tell them if I’m completely off my rocker or not. My attorney is making everyone on the outside think that I’m completely insane. Right now he’s getting letters out for me so I'm not worried.”
No one has denied that the defendant was the author of the two notes and that he passed them through the bars of his cell to Mahan. Under the instructions as to the law, given by the Court, the jury could surely conclude that the writer of the two notes had a sane and lucid mind.
I respectfully dissent.
UDALL, J., concurs.