Holloway v. State

• Decision Date: 02 November 1987
• Docket Number: No. CR,CR
• Parties: Brent Kevin HOLLOWAY and Ricky Delcamp, Appellants, v. STATE of Arkansas, Appellee. 87-82.
• Court: Arkansas Supreme Court

Page 796

738 S.W.2d 796

293 Ark. 438

Brent Kevin HOLLOWAY and Ricky Delcamp, Appellants, v. STATE of Arkansas, Appellee.

No. CR 87-82.

Supreme Court of Arkansas.

Nov. 2, 1987.

R. Kevin Barham, Paris, for appellants.

J. Blake Hendrix, Asst. Atty. Gen., Little Rock, for appellee.

NEWBERN, Justice.

The appellants, Brent Holloway and Ricky Delcamp, were tried together on charges arising from a police drug raid on a house where both lived. They were allegedly found to be in possession of drugs and drug paraphernalia. Both were found guilty. Holloway was sentenced to fifteen years imprisonment for possession of cocaine, and Delcamp was sentenced to thirty years imprisonment for possession of cocaine with intent to deliver. Both received seven year sentences and were fined $8,000 for possession of drug paraphernalia. Each appellant has filed a brief, and each raises some points which are the same as those raised by the other. Each also raises a separate point not raised by the other. We will discuss the points the appellants have raised in common and then discuss the matters raised individually by them. We find there was no prejudicial error, and thus we affirm.

About a week before the arrests in this case, the police had arrested for drug possession a person who became a confidential informant. The informant told the police that Delcamp was trafficking in drugs, and that he, the informant, had purchased drugs from Delcamp. The testimony showed that Delcamp's residence had been the subject of complaints by neighbors with respect to the heavy traffic in and out, especially at night. The informant was "wired" with a body mike and sent by the police to make a "controlled buy" from Delcamp at the latter's residence, using marked currency.

After being in the residence, the informant told the police he had seen quantities of cocaine in a box on the kitchen table and on a mirror on the kitchen table as well as drug paraphernalia throughout the house. He made the purchase as he had been instructed.

Based on the information given them by the informant, a warrant was sought by the police to search Delcamp's apartment. Circuit Judge Don Langston issued the warrant at 9:00 p.m. on March 7, 1986. The search began at 9:20 p.m. that evening. When the police entered the apartment, Delcamp was in the dining room where, on the dining room table, a bag filled with packets of what was later identified as cocaine was found. Four of the marked $20 bills were found on Delcamp's person. Delcamp's bedroom, identified by the personal items found there, was searched, and under a chair officers found a box containing drug paraphernalia along with more cocaine.

A bedroom identified as Holloway's was also searched, and a number of items of drug paraphernalia were found there along with a white powder identified by the testimony of a state chemist as cocaine residue. Holloway also admitted having used cocaine at Delcamp's residence earlier in the evening.

1. Disqualification

The most troublesome issue in this case is whether the circuit judge who tried this case should have disqualified when, in the process of a suppression hearing to determine the validity of the search warrant, it became apparent he would have to rule on the propriety of the warrant he had earlier approved. Canon 3.C. of the Code of Judicial Conduct, which was adopted by this court by per curiam order found at 254 Ark. 1075, 493 S.W.2d 422 (1973), provides:

(1) A judge should disqualify himself in a proceeding in which his impartiality might reasonably be questioned, including but not limited to instances where:

(a) he has a personal bias or prejudice concerning a party, or personal knowledge of disputed evidentiary facts concerning the proceeding;....

In Adams v. State, 269 Ark. 548, 601 S.W.2d 881 (1980), we cited the Canon as a basis for holding that a judge should have disqualified in a criminal trial in which his nephew was the prosecutor. In Bliss v. State, 282 Ark. 315, 668 S.W.2d 936 (1984), we were faced with a situation like the one before us now. We cited Adams v. State, supra, and said:

This Canon applies even though no request to disqualify and no objection to the failure to disqualify is necessary. We think the rule applied in Adams is equally applicable to the present case. The trial judge was required to rule upon the validity of a search warrant which he had issued. We think the trial judge should have recused.... [282 Ark. at 321, 668 S.W.2d at 940]

The Bliss case was retried and the convictions again appealed to this court. In our second opinion in the case, we said that in reversing the first judgment we "... held that the trial judge had erred in not requiring the prosecutor to file a bill of particulars and in not recusing with respect to a motion to suppress a search conducted on the authority of a warrant issued by the judge himself." Bliss v. State, 288 Ark. 546, 548, 708 S.W.2d 74, 75 (1986). Upon closer reexamination of the first Bliss opinion, however, we conclude that our reversal was based solely upon the failure to file a bill of particulars, and, although we said the trial judge should have recused from the suppression hearing, we did not say, or hold, that his failure to do so was reversible error.

We now conclude that our statement in the first Bliss opinion went too far with respect to recusal. Canon 3.C. (1)(a) does not require recusal when the judge has obtained knowledge of the facts of the case before him from previous judicial proceedings in that very case. State v. Thompson, 150 Ariz. 554, 724 P.2d 1223 (App.1986); Jones v. State, 416 N.E.2d 880 (Ind.Ct.App.1981); Manning v. Engelkes, 281 N.W.2d 7 (Iowa 1979); Reading v. Ball, 291 S.C. 492, 354 S.E.2d 397 (Ct.App.1987). See also In re Kean, 520 A.2d 1271 (R.I.1987).

At least one court has said specifically, with reference to the canon, that participation of a judge in a probable cause determination does not necessarily disqualify him from trying the case on the merits. See State ex rel. French v. Hendricks Superior Court, 252 Ind. 213, 247 N.E.2d 519 (1969). See also Jones v. State, supra; Stiles v. State, 156 Ind.App. 675, 298 N.E.2d 466 (1973).

While we have no Arkansas case, other than the first Bliss opinion, interpreting the canon in this respect, we have earlier cases indicating that a judge is not disqualified as the result of participation as a judge in an earlier phase of the litigation. See Bates v. State, 210 Ark. 1014, 198 S.W.2d 850 (1947), in which the court said, in response to an allegation that the judge who tried the defendant for murder had participated in questioning him before the trial, "... [t]he presence of the trial judge could have been in the line of his judicial duties, that is, these questions and answers could have been in a habeas corpus proceeding to consider bail, or they could have been in a hearing to see if the defendant should be committed to the State Hospital to determine his sanity." 210 Ark. at 1024, 198 S.W.2d at 855. It was held that Bates's proof that the trial judge was involved without showing that the involvement was "improper," was insufficient for reversal. See also Bledsoe v. State, 130 Ark. 122, 197 S.W. 17 (1917), in which we held that Ark. Const. art. 7, § 20, did not require disqualification of a judge who had previously participated in a grand jury hearing related to the trial. We held the judge was not disqualified because the constitutional provision disqualifying a judge who has participated as an attorney or counsel in a case did not apply to bar a judge who had participated after he assumed his official duties.

We agree with the decisions of other jurisdictions holding that Canon 3.C. (1)(a) of the Code of Judicial Conduct is not meant to preclude participation of a judge who has obtained knowledge of a case through previous judicial participation in it.

2. The affidavit

The appellants argue that the affidavit upon which the search warrant was based misled the judge by not mentioning that the informant was a person who had been convicted of a previous drug offense and was under charges at the time he cooperated in this case. They rely on Ark.R.Crim.P. 13.1 and its provision that if the affidavit is based on hearsay the affiant shall "set forth particular facts bearing on the informant's reliability and shall disclose, as far as practicable, the means by which the information was obtained."

In United States v. Leon, 468 U.S. 897, 104 S.Ct. 3405, 82 L.Ed.2d 677 (1984), the Supreme Court said that if the magistrate issuing a warrant is misled by information in the affidavit and the affiant knew it was false or there was a reckless disregard for the truth, the evidence may be suppressed despite the good faith reliance of the police upon the warrant. The appellants have not demonstrated that any false statement was made by the police to Judge Langston when he issued the warrant. The warrant noted that the informant made statements "with full knowledge of his penal interest." That was surely sufficient to alert the judge that the informant had something to lose or to gain with respect to his "penal interest" by cooperating with the police. Moreover, this is not a case in which the affidavit was based solely upon the hearsay statements of the informant. The police had ascertained there were probably drugs and paraphernalia in Delcamp's residence, and that drug selling was occurring there, through their participation in setting up the "controlled buy." They knew that the informant, on the day the search was conducted, had entered that residence with no cocaine on his person and with $100 in marked bills, and that he had come out of the house in possession of cocaine and without the money. We have no doubt that the requirement of Illinois v. Gates, 462 U.S. 213, 103 S.Ct. 2317, 76 L.Ed.2d 527 (1983), that the magistrate make a practical, common sense determination whether there is probable cause for a...