People v. Rankin
| Decision Date | 07 September 1976 |
| Docket Number | No. 26562,26562 |
| Citation | 554 P.2d 1107,191 Colo. 508 |
| Parties | The PEOPLE of the State of Colorado, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Steve RANKIN, Defendant-Appellant. |
| Court | Colorado Supreme Court |
J. D. MacFarlane, Atty. Gen., Jean E. Dubofsky, Deputy Atty. Gen., Robert C. Lehnert, Asst. Atty. Gen., Denver, for plaintiff-appellee.
Miller & Gray, P.C., Robert Bruce Miller, Boulder, for defendant-appellant.
The defendant, Steve Rankin, was charged and convicted by a jury of dispensing dangerous drugs. C.R.S.1963, 48--8--2. 1 The primary issue on appeal is the sufficiency of the evidence to sustain the conviction. The record establishes that the prosecution failed to established the Corpus delicti. Therefore, the defendant's motion for a judgment of acquittal should have been granted.
The defendant, who was 18 years of age and attended high school with the other witnesses to the transaction, was arrested after Jeffrey Lebsack ingested two pieces of a blotter and suffered an increase in blood preassure, rapid pulse, and dilation of his eyes. The symptoms which accompanied Lebsack's objective signs were loss of memory, increased sensitivity to light, and dizziness. As a result, Lebsack told his father that he had taken LSD which he obtained from Mark Willey. The father took his son to the Loveland Hospital where a general surgeon conducted an examination and measured Lebsack's vital signs. The surgeon had no experience with hallucinogenic drugs, but administered a tranquillizer and caused Lebsack's condition to stabilize and return to normal.
Subsequently, Willey was arrested and provided evidence which implicated the defendant. Willey was granted immunity and testified for the prosecution. His testimony, together with that of the doctor, Lebsack, the sheriff, and an agent from the Colorado Bureau of Investigation, constituted the prosecution's case.
In essence, the prosecution proved that the defendant had on two occasions given Willey a pill. One pill was described as a 'purple band.' Willey used that pill, together with another unidentified pill which he got from someone else, and thereafter experienced hallucinations. The second pill, which he obtained from Rankin and was said to be LSD, was melted down by Willey and put on two pieces of blotter paper. The blotter paper was then put in a bottle with eight other pieces of blotter paper. The next day, one of the pieces of blotter in the bottle was cut into quarters by Willey and one quarter was sold to Lebsack for $1.25. Lebsack thereafter swallowed the piece of blotter and had no ill effects. He then demanded his money back and was given a larger piece of the blotter which produced the symptoms and signs which are described herein. Willey could not identify the blotter fragment as the one impregnated with the material from the pill obtained from Rankin. Moreover, Lebsack had no prior experience with LSD which would support a conclusion that he ingested LSD which the defendant provided. No expert testimony was offered to prove what was on the blotter. The only prosecution testimony to establish that the blotter contained LSD consisted of the...
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...1872. See Dougherty v. People, 1 Colo. 514, 524 (1872). Since then, we have consistently applied this rule. See People v. Rankin, 191 Colo. 508, 510, 554 P.2d 1107, 1108 (1976); People v. Smith, 182 Colo. 31, 33, 510 P.2d 893, 894 (1973); Meredith v. People, 152 Colo. 69, 71, 380 P.2d 227, ......
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People v. Quinn, 88CA1086
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People v. Robson, 02CA1435.
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Burying the Body—dismantling the Corpus Delicti Rule and Adopting the Trustworthiness Standard
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