Douglas v. Com.
| Decision Date | 03 July 1979 |
| Parties | Johnny Ray DOUGLAS, Appellant, v. COMMONWEALTH of Kentucky, Appellee. Jesse Irvin PAYNE, Appellant, v. COMMONWEALTH of Kentucky, Appellee. |
| Court | United States State Supreme Court — District of Kentucky |
Terrence R. Fitzgerald, Chief Appellate Defender, Daniel T. Goyette, Deputy Public Defender, Louisville, for appellants.
Robert F. Stephens, Atty. Gen., Reid C. James, Asst. Atty. Gen., Frankfort, for appellee.
On December 31, 1977, two armed black males entered the Holiday Inn Southeast in Jefferson County, where they forced three employes to hand over their wallets and emptied the motel cash register. Appellants were jointly tried for these offenses in Jefferson Circuit Court. Johnny Ray Douglas was convicted on four counts of first-degree robbery and sentenced to imprisonment for 40 years. Jesse Irvin Payne was found guilty on four counts of first-degree robbery and one count of being a second-degree persistent felony offender and sentenced to 60 years' imprisonment.
We will begin by discussing the common assignments of error raised by appellants. First, they submit that the refusal of the trial court to give the requested instruction on the presumption of innocence constituted a denial of due process of law. We have examined the evidence and the arguments of trial counsel, and we conclude that the failure to give this instruction viewed in the totality of the circumstances, did not deprive appellants of due process of law. Kentucky v. Whorton, --- U.S. ----, 99 S.Ct. 2088, 60 L.Ed.2d 640 (1979).
Appellants next contend that the trial court's instruction defining reasonable doubt deprived them of due process of law. The instruction complained of is substantially the same as that given in Taylor v. Kentucky,436 U.S. 478, 98 S.Ct. 1930, 56 L.Ed.2d 468 (1978), and we decline to hold it unconstitutional until the Supreme Court of the United States sees fit to do so.
Thirdly, appellants allege that the trial court committed error by telling the sheriff, in the presence of the jury, that appellants (who were free on bail prior to trial) should consider themselves in custody and by later allowing appellants to be escorted into the courtroom by the sheriff. Appellants argue that they were portrayed as prisoners "in the toils of the law" and were therefore denied a fair trial. We, however, agree with the trial court that "it would be impossible as a practical matter to conduct a trial without the jury seeing some sign that the defendants are not entirely free to come and go as they please." The custody here was minimal, and no error was committed.
The final assignment of error raised by both appellants is that it was improper to permit convictions on separate counts for robbery of the Holiday Inn and robbery of Joseph Gnau. We disagree. Appellants forced Gnau at gunpoint to surrender his wallet, then ordered him to accompany Douglas to another room to open the motel cash register. Under KRS 515.020, a person is guilty of first-degree robbery when he is armed with a deadly weapon and threatens the use of deadly force upon another person while in the course of committing theft. The taking of Gnau's wallet and the taking of the motel's money clearly constituted two separate thefts. The fact that the same person was threatened during the commission of each theft in no way merges the two...
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Payne v. Smith
...Payne and Douglas were subsequently convicted. Their convictions were affirmed by the Supreme Court of Kentucky. Douglas v. Commonwealth, 586 S.W.2d 16 (Ky.1979). All of the arguments discussed below were addressed and rejected by the state supreme Having exhausted their state remedies, the......
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Douglas v. Commonwealth, No. 2006-SC-000882-MR (Ky. 12/20/2007), 2006-SC-000882-MR.
...the jury's verdict; and the fact that Douglas had duly appealed his 1978 conviction, which this Court affirmed. Douglas v. Commonwealth, 586 S.W.2d 16 (Ky. 1979). Douglas moved for a directed verdict, on the ground that without a judge's signature the 1978 judgment had not been proven, but ......
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Jackson v. Com.
...that separate convictions on separate counts for robbery of a hotel and robbery of the employees thereof was proper. Douglas v. Commonwealth, Ky., 586 S.W.2d 16 (1979). We should not continue the esoteric precedence of a century ago in a time when we have surely lost much of our innocence, ......
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Garrett v. Commonwealth Of Ky.
...of the property whereof he was robbed," Lamb v. Commonwealth, 266 Ky. 561, 564, 99 S.W.2d 441, 442 (1936); see also Douglas v. Commonwealth, 586 S.W.2d 16, 18 (Ky. 1979), the "victim" of a robbery is now considered to be the person upon whom force was used or threatened. Ross v. Commonwealt......