Grove v. State

• Decision Date: 07 February 1963
• Parties: , 211 Tenn. 448 Willie GROVE, Tommie Lee Walker and Robert Lee Walker v. STATE of Tennessee.
• Court: Tennessee Supreme Court

Page 871

365 S.W.2d 871

15 McCanless 448, 211 Tenn. 448

Willie GROVE, Tommie Lee Walker and Robert Lee Walker v. STATE of Tennessee.

Supreme Court of Tennessee.

Feb. 7, 1963.

Rehearing Denied March 28, 1963.

Hugh Stanton and William E. Cleaves, Memphis, for plaintiffs in error.

George F. McCanless, Atty. Gen., Lyle Reid, Asst. Atty. Gen., Nashville, for the State.

BURNETT, Chief Justice.

The plaintiffs in error along with one, Dewey Davis, were indicted for armed robbery. Dewey Davis was acquitted. Grove was sentenced to serve ten (10) years in the penitentiary; Tommie Lee Walker was sentenced to serve fifteen (15) years in the penitentiary; and Robert Lee Walker was entenced to serve fifteen (15) years in the penitentiary. From these convictions these three parties have seasonably appealed. Able briefs have been filed and arguments heard, and after spending considerable time in reading this long record, which consists of four volumes and close to twelve hundred pages, and studying the authorities, we have the matter for disposition.

On the night of July 29, 1961, which was a Saturday, the Ham-Kirk Drivein Grocery in Memphis was robbed of an amount of money in excess of $500.00. This robbery was committed between 11:30 and 11:40 on this night. This Drivein Grocery is one of those grocery stores that stays open very late at night and is just what is says, a drivein, where the front of the store opens up and people can be seen therein making their purchases. At the time of this robbery there were some four or five patrons in the store making purchases. The store at that time was being run by one, Garzoli. As Garzoli was about to take the payment for certain groceries from one of his customers, he was confronted by two colored boys with white handkerchiefs over their faces, that is, covering from the nose down, and one of these boys pointed an automatic pistol at him and said 'Give it up, fat boy.' Then he was told by the other boy, 'Open it up', meaning the cash register. Garzoli opened it up and with the help of one of these boys stuffed the money, including pennies, change and things like that into a paper sack which one of these boys had. These two boys immediately turned and ran from the store. As soon as they ran away Garzoli phoned the police and told them that he had been robbed.

One of two colored boys working in the store then ran out the way the robbers had run, then came back to the store and got his car and followed what he thought was the car in which these boys were that had robbed the store. The car he was following was later identified by him as a 1952 Mercury. This car as it sped up the street contained four colored men.

After this report was made to the police they put out a notice to all patrol cars, and about 12:00 o'clock a police patrol saw Grove sitting in a 1952 Mercury, parked on a lot in the front of a barber shop at Castalia and Boyle Streets in Memphis, which was a little over two miles from the scene of the robbery. The officers investigated and decided that Gover was not the one wanted and released him. A few minutes later Grove was stopped by another patrol car and held until officers who were investigating the crime came to talk to him.

The robbery was investigated by four colored detectives. Between 12:30 and 1:00 o'clock on Sunday morning of the 30th after making a number of inconsistent statements which were noted by the officers, and being advised by the officers that his car was seen leaving the scene Grove admitted the robbery to Officer Turner. Grove gave the officers the names of his companions. Tommie Lee Walker was arrested at 2:30 A.M. at his home, Dewey Davis was arrested at 3:45 A.M. at his home, and Robert Lee Walker was arrested at 6:00 o'clock in the morning at the home of and in bed with a girlfriend.

Robert Lee Walker, Tommie Lee Walker and Dewey Davis denied participation in this robbery until they were confronted with Willie Grove who about 6:30 in the morning told them that he had told the officers about the robbery and had told them that they had all been engaged in it. After this then they all admitted it. The accounts of the robbery were reduced to writing and signed by the defendants in the presence of the white Captain of the Police Department on Sunday following the robbery.

On Sunday morning following the robbery there was a line-up held at the police department at which Robert Lee Walker was identified by the cashier of this grocery, Garzoli, as the one with the gun. This identification was made by a red shirt and blue pants that Robert Lee Walker had on, and which had been described to the police before. He had on this same outfit in the line-up. Immediately after the line-up Garzoli and two of the boys who worked there in the store and two or three customers who were present at the line-up went up into another room where the defendants were all present with officers, and there discussed their participation in the robbery. All these witnesses, that is the storekeeper, the patrons in his store and the delivery boys testify very positively that the statements given by the defendants appeared to have been voluntarily made and that none of them appeared to have been mistreated or coerced.

As a matter of fact in this large record, one reading the first 156 pages of Volume I finds sufficient evidence, if it is believed by the jury, to convict each of these plaintiffs in error. In this evidence there is the evidence of Garzoli, one or two of the patrons and the colored boys who were working there. They made some identification by the red shirt and the blue pants, and then this boy definitely identifies this car in which Grove was found sitting later as the car in which these four men were going up the street near where the robbery had happened shortly after the robbery. Then, at this line-up and in the room where they all went after the line-up they testify that Grove there made statements in their presence, and in the presence of the other defendants, accusing the others of the commission of this crime. This accusation was not denied by any of the others. Thus it is, that under this kind of situation there would be ample evidence to convict them all if the jury believed it.

Suffice it to say that in the confessions and in the statements made they all say that Dewey Davis had nothing to do with it except he was along for the ride. There is some evidence that the gun which was used belonged to the father of Dewey Davis, but in Dewey Davis' confession and in the statements to others it is said that he didn't know anything about it until after the robbery had taken place. It is probably for this reason that the jury acquitted him. Another statement that should be made by us at this time is that in the cross-examination of all State's witnesses they were each subjected to cross-examination by three good lawyers and thus it is that there was no stone left unturned in ferreting out the question of guilt or innocence of these parties through this cross-examination conducted in an excellent and fair manner. We make this observation merely to show that the jury had an ample opportunity through the cross-examination by defense counsel as well as some of their own questions to determine the guilt or innocence of these parties, and as to whether or not the confessions which were reduced to writing and signed by each of them on Sunday following the robbery were due to coercion and force, or whether the confessions were involuntarily or voluntarily made.

Another thing that should be commented on here, too, is the fact that after Officer Turner had testified and answered certain questions about coercion, beating with night sticks and things of that kind, the jury was excused and the trial court heard the evidence pro and con as to whether or not these statements were voluntarily and freely made or were produced by hope of reward. After hearing this testimony the trial judge made a very clear, fair and frank statement, which shows no doubt whatsoever in his mind that the confessions of these four people 'were freely and voluntarily made; that the same defendants, Willie Grove, Tommie Lee Walker, Robert Lee Walker and Dewey Davis, were not influenced by any hope or offer of reward; that no coercion or threats were used and no promise of immunity made.' After this for many, many pages the trial was conducted on this feature of the thinkg before the trial judge and his finding was made thus; then the trial proceeded by the introduction through the white Police Captain of the written confessions and then the State closes and these various defendants took the witness stand along with their witnesses and they attempted to establish alibis. This, of course, was all offered before the jury after the trial judge had concluded as above, and he then let all of this go to the jury as to whether or not there was coercion, fear or beating or whatnot, and the jury then had the additional opportunity to, and did, properly pass upon these questions.

When the defendants took the stand they each denied any participation in the robbery and stated at length that they were beaten severely and repeatedly until they confessed. This on rebuttal was denied by the respective officers. It was likewise shown on rebuttal by reporters from at least the two leading newspapers in Memphis, one of whom had been on the police beat for some forty years, that on the day following this robbery these reporters as well as others had appeared at a press conference where television pictures, etc., were taken of these four defendants, and that these reporters talked to each of these defendants and that these defendants admitted to them there that they had committed this robbery. These reporters likewise say they saw no evidence whatsoever, nor was any complaint made of any beating, coercion or anything of that kind. When the various defendants took the stand they absolutely said that...