Childs v. State
| Decision Date | 25 October 1966 |
| Docket Number | 6 Div. 166 |
| Parties | Willie Joe CHILDS v. STATE. |
| Court | Alabama Court of Appeals |
Morel Montgomery, Birmingham, for appellant.
Richmond M. Flowers, Atty. Gen., and John C. Tyson, III, Asst. Atty. Gen., for the State.
The indictment as returned by the grand jury contained three counts. Count I charged burglary. Count II charged larceny. Count III charged the offense of buying, receiving, concealing, etc., stolen property. At the conclusion of the testimony, on motion of the state, Counts II and III were stricken. Defendant was convicted of burglary under Count I and was sentenced to imprisonment in the penitentiary for a term of five years.
Count I charges burglary of the 'shop, store or warehouse of The Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company, a corporation, in which goods, merchandise or television sets, things of value, were kept for use, sale or deposit.'
Mr. P. R. Smith testified he was office manager of the Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company's retail store at 700 South 21st Street, Birmingham; that the Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company is a corporation; that it sells tires, appliances, televisions, car and home merchandise. On Monday morning, March 1, 1965, when he came to work the 'door between the service department and the sales display room was torn down--splintered--and one window comes from the back of the building through the recap shop had been broken and the double doors had been opened from the inside.' The window and the double doors opened onto an alley. The shattered door was on the inside of the building; that he was in the store when it closed Saturday night and everything was in order at that time, with the door and window intact and locked. There were around twenty-five General Electric television sets in the store when it closed Saturday night. Sixteen television sets, including one color set, and radios and stereos were missing from the store on Monday morning; that he had serial numbers on two of the television sets, one of which was a color and the other was a portable model.
Phillip Witherspoon testified he had entered a plea of guilty to the charge of burglarizing the Goodyear Store; that he went to the store with Willie Joe Childs, this defendant, in a Buick automobile belonging to Gaines Hicks; that defendant broke into the place and witness followed him inside; that they carried out televisions, radios and hi-fies and put them in the car and drove to Graymont Avenue and Second Street, where they picked up Gaines Hicks; that witness stayed there while Hicks and defendant drove off with the television sets; that they were gone about fifteen minutes and when they returned Hicks, witness, defendant and another fellow, whose name he thought was Henry Miller, went back to the Goodyear store in a Chevrolet panel truck, like a station wagon, and got another load of television sets; two trips were made to Benny Jones' apartment and television sets were left there. This was about 10:30 or 11:00 Sunday morning. That same afternoon a television set and a hi-fi were delivered to Prynter Howard.
Prynter Howard was next called as a witness for the state, but he refused to testify, one the advice of his counsel.
Benny Jones, who was under a charge of buying and receiving stolen property arising out of the incident at the Goodyear store, testified: Sometime in March I saw Willie Joe Childs at my apartment. I saw Childs first and then I saw Witherspoon. When I first saw the defendant he was outside my apartment with two or three fellows. They were in a '56 or '57 Buick automobile. They had seven televisions in the car and one of them asked if I wanted to buy one. I told him I didn't have any money and they asked if I knew anybody that might want one. I called a friend of mine. After the conversation they carried them out to another place. I bought one of the television sets. Willie Childs was in the car and he got out and came upstairs behind the fellow that brought the television up to my apartment. He didn't say anything to me. I saw him again the same day with Phillip Witherspoon and three others. This time they came over in a station wagon. I talked to Gaines Hicks in the presence of Willie Childs but I did not have a conversation with Childs. Hicks said he had more televisions, I think he said eight. He didn't say anything about where they came from. The televisions were in the station wagon and me and Henry Miller carried them to Henry Albert Stueckler's house. I drove the station wagon. Phillip Witherspoon, Hicks and Childs went out to the car wash and waited for me. Henry Stueckler operates the car wash at Twenty-second Avenue and Twenty-sixth Street, North, and I delivered seven of the televisions to the car wash and the other eight sets to his house. Stueckler paid me $650.00 for them and I gave the money to Gaines Hicks.
Henry Albert Stueckler testified he stands charged with buying, receiving and concealing stolen property, concerning television sets taken from the Goodyear store. He stated that Sunday, February 28, 1965, Benny Jones and a boy named Hicks delivered television sets to his place of business at 2201 Twenty-sixth Street, North and on the same date Benny Jones and Henry Miller delivered television sets to his home at 1120 Oak Grove Road. All of these fellows were colored. Henry Miller works for him. The television sets were delivered in a Cadillac convertible and a '57 Chevrolet panel truck, which would look more like a station wagon if it had windows in the side. A total of eleven television sets were delivered to him. The one that went to his home was a color set. He paid Benny Jones $650.00 for televisions. Detective Jake Turner picked up the television sets the following Tuesday.
J. B. DePriest testified that on February 28, 1965, he was living at Henry Albert Stueckler's home. He was present when two colored boys delivered two or three television...
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...for which the defendant is on trial. Yarber v. State, Ala., --- So.2d ---- (1978). the Court distinguished Yarber from Childs v. State, 43 Ala.App. 529, 194 So.2d 861 (1966) on the basis that in Childs the accomplice-witness Admitted his participation in the crime for which both he and the ......
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