Hudson v. State

• Citation: 188 Ga.App. 684,374 S.E.2d 212
• Decision Date: 04 October 1988
• Docket Number: No. 76681,76681
• Parties: HUDSON v. The STATE.
• Court: Georgia Court of Appeals

Page 212

374 S.E.2d 212

188 Ga.App. 684

HUDSON v. The STATE.

No. 76681.

Court of Appeals of Georgia.

Oct. 4, 1988.

David B. Irwin, Covington, for appellant.

Robert F. Mumford, Dist. Atty., for appellee.

BEASLEY, Judge.

Defendant appeals his convictions of two counts of first degree forgery. OCGA § 16-9-1.

1. The first enumeration of error is that the trial court erred in permitting the State to use as a handwriting exemplar defendant's signature which was requested when he was fingerprinted.

According to the officer who booked defendant, he told defendant he needed defendant's fingerprints. He then testified: "I marked down the x's on the fingerprint card where I needed him to sign it. He signed it. I signed it. And I went ahead and fingerprinted him." Defendant had not been given the Miranda (Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966)) warnings at that time, but he was cooperative and did not object to signing or make any complaint about signing. The officer did not tell defendant that he had to sign the card, but merely told him to sign it. If defendant had refused, this would have been noted on the back of the card.

There is no indication that requiring the signing of the card was for any purpose other than as part of the administrative processing when defendant was booked. Nonetheless, the State ultimately decided to use the signature on the fingerprint card for comparison by an expert with the signatures on the checks allegedly forged.

Appellant relies exclusively on the State Constitution and cases construing it.

Art. I, Sec. I, Par. XVI, 1983 Ga.Const. provides: "No person shall be compelled to give testimony tending in any manner to be self-incriminating." In essentially the same character this right has been a part of the body of our constitutional law since 1861. It arises from the same roots as a provision in the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution. See the dissent of Justice Gunter in Creamer v. State, 229 Ga. 511, 522, 192 S.E.2d 350 (1972), for a brief historical description. Our courts have not given the Georgia provision the same construction as the federal courts have given to the federal provision, taking instead a broader view.

While the language of the Fifth Amendment has long been confined to "testimony," our provision prohibits the State from compelling the individual to affirmatively produce any evidence, oral or real, physical or by action. Creamer v. State, supra 229 Ga. at 516, 192 S.E.2d 350 says it means "all kinds of evidence ... all types of evidence." See also Johnson v. State, 156 Ga.App. 496, 499, 274 S.E.2d 837 (1980); OCGA § 24-9-20. This is predicated on the common law maxim that "no man is bound to accuse himself of any crime, or to furnish any evidence to convict himself of any crime." [Emphasis in original.] Marshall v. Riley, 7 Ga. 367, 370(3) (1849). See Underwood v. State, 13 Ga.App. 206, 208, 78 S.E. 1103 (1913). "The constitutional guaranty protects one from being compelled to furnish evidence against himself, either in the form of oral confessions or incriminating admissions of an involuntary character, or of doing an act against his will which is incriminating in its nature." [Emphasis in original.] Calhoun v. State, 144 Ga. 679 (1 & 2), 681, 87 S.E. 893 (1915).

We must consider the circumstances in which the affixing of the signature which was later used to convict, occurred. In this instance, the focus is on two aspects of the occurrence.

a) One is that Hudson was not being compelled to give evidence against himself. Instead, he was being "compelled," if that characterization should be attached to the request of the deputy sheriff under the circumstances of defendant being under arrest and in the booking process, to sign the fingerprint card so as to directly verify and record as fact the identification of the fingerprints as Billy Ray Hudson's. The purpose was to provide near-conclusive proof later, for administrative purposes, that this is the person who was arrested and booked.

Thus the purpose of obtaining the arrestee's signature was not evidence-gathering or investigatory but was quite another, a routine administrative purpose. Evidence to prove crime was not being sought. Hudson was not being requested "to perform an act resulting in production of incriminating evidence, ... [which] produces inadmissible evidence" as pointed out in Wessels v. State, 169 Ga.App. 246 (1), 312 S.E.2d 361 (1983).

The fact that the signature was later used as evidence against defendant does not tarnish its original innocent purpose, absent evidence of subterfuge. Of that there is no indication. In fact, the evidence is that the State did not even conceive of using the fingerprint card signature for comparison until after its efforts to locate other known handwriting had failed. As stated in Day v. State, 63 Ga. 667(2) (1879) and quoted in Creamer, supra, 229 Ga. at 516, 192 S.E.2d 350 one cannot compel another by force against his consent to do something "for the purpose of using it as evidence against him on the criminal side of a court."

Simply put, Hudson was not being requested to furnish something which was contemplated to be used as evidence of crime, but was instead being requested to record the identification of his fingerprints by way of writing his signature on the fingerprint card, as part of the standard booking procedure. It was not done to "further the prosecution," in words found in Meriwether v. State, 63 Ga.App. 667, 670(2), 11 S.E.2d 816 (1940). The court there also distinguished Blackwell v. State, 67 Ga. 76 (44 Am.R. 717) (1881), because the forced profert of defendant's leg was for an evidentiary purpose, id., 63 Ga.App. at 672, 11 S.E.2d 816, whereas requiring defendant to go from his cell to a nearby room was for the purpose of placement for inspection in a lineup and did not aid in the process of identification. And as recognized in State v. Thornton, 253 Ga. 524, 525(2), 322 S.E.2d 711 (1984), requiring the defendant to do an act for "the purpose of producing evidence to be used against him" is the area of activity governed. The purpose of the requested act by the school official was also instrumental in the ruling that the student's emptying of her pockets was not violative of the self-incrimination provision, in State of Ga. v. J.T., 155 Ga.App. 812, 273 S.E.2d 214 (1980).

The constitutional bar is that "No person shall be compelled to give testimony tending in any manner to be self-incriminating." When scrutinizing the particular evidence claimed to have been unconstitutionally obtained, the law looks not only at whether it was compelled, whether the defendant gave it or it was instead simply taken from him, who did the compelling, and whether the evidence was self-incriminating, but it also looks at whether what was obtained was evidence.

The State cannot demand it of defendant by court order, as part of its evidence-gathering function, when it has charged that person with crime. State v. Armstead, 152 Ga.App. 56, 262 S.E.2d 233 (1979). "To force the defendant, then, to produce samples of his handwriting--potentially incriminating evidence which may be used as evidence in the defendant's prosecution--would violate constitutional sanctions against self-incrimination." Id. 152 Ga.App. at 57, 262 S.E.2d 233. See also Johnson v. State, supra, in effect reversing denial of a motion to quash the State's notice to produce.

Just as not all compelled evidence is prohibited, depending on who is doing the compelling (the assistant principal in State v. J.T., supra), so not all matter emanating from an act of defendant and later used in evidence constitutes what would be classified as "evidence of crime" when it is being originated.

Obviously, a person's own signature would be "self-incriminating" by its very nature, if it links defendant to the crime charged. A forgery case, as here, could rarely if ever be proved without a known handwriting of the defendant, created somewhere, at some time, by himself. Thus, whether it is within the prohibited species of self-incriminating acts depends on the circumstances under which it occurs.

Since at the time and under the circumstances in which the signature was given, it did not constitute "evidence" against defendant, its later use as evidence was not precluded. In so holding, we do no disservice to the meaning of the constitutional provision.

b) This brings us to the second aspect of importance here, the question of compulsion.

"It has ... frequently been held that where a person after arrest does an act voluntarily or without objection which tends to incriminate himself it is not error or unconstitutional to allow evidence of the act in the trial of the case. Whippler [v. State, 218 Ga. 198, 203, 126 S.E.2d 744 (1962) ]; Thomas v. State, 213 Ga. 237, 239 (98 SE2d 548) (1957) and cases cited." State v. J.T., supra. See also Montgomery v. State, 174 Ga.App. 95, 96(1), 329 S.E.2d 166 (1985).

Examples where the state constitutional prohibition against compelled self-incrimination was violated include: compelling a suspect to hand over lottery tickets, Grant v. State, 85 Ga.App. 610, 69 S.E.2d 889 (1952); requiring an operator of a motor vehicle to drive it upon scales, Aldrich v. State, 220 Ga. 132, 137 S.E.2d 463 (1964); requiring defendant to produce physical evidence under old Code § 38-801(g), Johnson v. State, supra; requiring defendants after an illegal arrest to surrender their clothing, Raif v. State, 109 Ga.App. 354, 136 S.E.2d 169 (1964); compelling a resisting defendant to submit a handwriting exemplar, State v. Armstead, 152 Ga.App. 56, 262 S.E.2d 233 (1979).

We are reminded of the admonition found in Underwood v. State, supra: " 'Courts should liberally construe the constitutional provisions against compelling the accused to be a witness against himself, and refuse to permit any first or doubtful steps which may invade his rights...