Court Opinion

ID: 9764082
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 03:09:23.997805+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:29:53.208975
License: Public Domain

CLINTON, Judge,
dissenting.
In extensive litigation concerning criminal identification records in its files the FBI was admonished that it “cannot take the position that it is a mere passive recipient of records received from others” since by its maintaining and disseminating those records it “puts into the system a capacity for both good and harm,” Menard v. Saxbe, 498 F.2d 1017, 1026 (D.C. Cir. 1974). Nevertheless, the court was later forced to acknowledge that “the FBI is not and cannot be the guarantor of the accuracy of the information in its criminal files,” Tarlton v. Saxbe, 507 F.2d 1116, 1128 (D.C. Cir. 1974); see, on remand, 407 F.Supp. 1083 (D.C.1976), proposed corrective measures. Notwithstanding unwillingness of the FBI to vouch for the data it disseminates and recognition by the federal judiciary that inaccuracies inhere in the “practical limits” to its responsibility id. at 1127, today this Court permits a prosecutor to harm an accused by claiming a prior conviction reported on an FBI “rap sheet” over the earnest protestations of his trial counsel that there never was a conviction and given an opportunity the truth of the matter would be demonstrated.
As I understand their stated positions, all my Brothers then writing in Zillender v. State, 557 S.W.2d 515 (Tex.Cr.App.1977) did not disagree with the statements of law made by the majority at 517:
“The generally acknowledged policies of requiring specific objections are twofold. First, a specific objection is required to inform the trial judge of the basis of the objection and afford him the opportunity to rule on it. Second, a specific objection is required to afford opposing counsel an opportunity to remove the objection or supply other testimony, (citing authority) In accordance with these policies, a number of exceptions to the general rule that a party cannot complain on appeal to the overruling of a general objection or an imprecise specific objection have been created, (citing authority) Thus, where the correct ground of exclusion was obvious to the judge and opposing counsel, no waiver results from a general or imprecise objection.”1
Now, keeping Zillender’s teachings in mind, let us examine the colloquy between counsel and court, noting editorial comments in the margin.
“Q: Have you ever been convicted of a felony before, Mr. Van Sickle?2
MR. FLORES: Your Honor, objection.3 May we approach the bench?
* * * * * *
(CONFERENCE at the bench outside the hearing of the jury, between all counsel and the Court:)
MR. FLORES: I would like to have a hearing on this outside the presence of the jury. We have talked to the Judge in Oklahoma and he told us it was a deferred judgment4 and that the record has *100been expunged.5
MR. BORCHERS: Unless it is a conviction for purposes of probation 6
THE COURT: He is on the stand, and for the purpose of impeachment — here is a case;7 it is Simmons v. State,8 Do you want to read it?”
The questions and answers that followed in front of the jury are reproduced in the majority opinion, and need not be repeated here. As to the admission of that material before the jury, the majority concludes that error was not preserved for appellate review, and faults appellant for not presenting the necessary documentary proof to obtain exclusion of the evidence. Therein is the nub of my disagreement.
The district attorney may become a loose cannon unless the accused has first secured him. Without himself presenting any evidence of a conviction and against protestations that there is none — it having been ordered expunged — the prosecutor is permitted to pretend that there has been because the accused fails to produce documentary proof to the contrary. “Where are your papers?” — heretofore alien to this country — is made a proper question in a court of law.
Kafkaesque, the majority now requires a citizen to be prepared to demonstrate that he is not a convict by immediately producing papers of an event that has been ordered obliterated from the pages of the history of his personal life. Patently, one who has been given to understand that he is not a convict should not be expected to anticipate a claim that he is and to be ready to prove that he is not. But, just as surely, should the claim be made the citizen who requests it ought be allowed to demonstrate that the claim is false.
Whether the prosecutor is asking in “good faith” is beside the point. What is at issue here is a matter of due process and due course of law. Even granting he is free to disbelieve a testifying accused, to allow a prosecutor to reject representations of his attorney, an officer of the court, is to nullify the respective roles of the judge of the trial court and the attorney. The majority seeks to avoid this issue by casting the colloquy before the trial court in terms of “defense counsel told the prosecutor that the conviction was invalid.” The record shows that defense counsel represented to the court that the Oklahoma judge “told us it was a deferred judgment and that the record has been expunged” — an entirely accurate statement as it turned out. The representation was for the court to determine, not for the prosecutor to disbelieve. The determination by the trial court, based on Simmons v. State, supra, was erroneous, *101and the testimony it permitted was manifestly harmful.
I dissent.
ONION, P. J., and ROBERTS and PHILLIPS, JJ., join.

. All emphasis is supplied throughout by the writer of this opinion unless otherwise indicated.

. Curiously enough, propriety of simply asking the question seems to depend on what the facts of its answer are; see, e. g., Smith v. State, 409 S.W.2d 409 (Tex.Cr.App.1966) and cases cited therein.

. As will immediately appear, counsel was voicing an objection to the question and to what would surely follow if the matter were pursued; his effort was to prevent the skunk from getting into the jury box.

. Section 3d(c), Article 42.12, V.A.C.C.P., provides as to a dismissal of proceeding of and dismissal from a deferred judgment or adjudication: “A dismissal and discharge under this section may not be deemed a conviction for the *100purposes of disqualifications or disabilities imposed by law for conviction of an offense.

. Can there be any doubt about what the trial court was being informed and asked to rule on? The lawyer wanted a hearing to prove what he had just stated so that the matter would not be pursued further in front of the jury. This portion of the scenario is right out of Smith v. State, 409 S.W.2d 409 (Tex.Cr.App.1966) and Maddox v. State, 115 S.W.2d 644 (Tex.Cr.App.1938).

. Can there be any doubt about the prosecutor’s apprehension of the meaning and effect of the statement of counsel for appellant as to the status of the Oklahoma case?

. A trial judge who produces at the Bench a lawbook or reproduction of an opinion believed to be on the very point being raised is either clairvoyant or has been alerted informally that the matter is likely to come up. In any event, the statement of the trial court shows it understood the problem and thought it resolved by the case cited, believed the opportunity sought by counsel was not necessary and concluded the matter was, therefore, closed.

. Obviously the reference is to Simmons v. State, 456 S.W.2d 66, at 70-71 (Tex.Cr.App.1970): “A person who is a witness may be asked, for the purpose of impeachment, if he has not been convicted for a felony or an offense imputing moral turpitude. If he denies it, the State, by proper proof, may show the truth of such statement so denied. * * *
The witness can be compelled to answer that he has been convicted ... if such is the fact, or the record of conviction can be introduced to attack his credibility.”