Petition of Pate
| Decision Date | 19 April 1962 |
| Docket Number | No. A-13157,A-13157 |
| Citation | 371 P.2d 500 |
| Parties | Petition of Gerald PATE for Writ of Habeas Corpus. |
| Court | United States State Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma. Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma |
Syllabus by the Court
1. Where a petition in habeas corpus is a collateral attack on the judgment and sentence involving admissibility of a confession on the ground it was involuntarily given, burden of proof is on the petitioner, and the proof must be clear and convincing to sustain the allegations.
2. A confession is inadmissible if obtained under any form of compulsion, so that to receive it in evidence would violate the defendant's constitutional privilege against self-incrimination and is inadmissible if made under such circumstances of hope or fear as to create a fair probability of its testimonial untrustworthiness.
3. Prima facie, any confession is admissible in evidence and where its admissibility is challenged by defendant burden is on him to show that it was procured by such means or under such circumstances as to render it inadmissible, unless evidence on part of state tends to show that fact.
4. Admissibility of a confession where it is challenged, is a question solely for court after hearing, in absence of jury, all evidence on each side respecting circumstances under which confession was made, and court is vested with a large discretion in determining matter.
5. After a confession has been admitted, defendant is entitled to have evidence in regard to circumstances under which it was made given anew to jury, not that jury may pass on its competency or admissibility, but for purpose of enabling them to judge what weight and value should be given to it as evidence, and on his request defendant is entitled to an instruction on that point.
6. The requirement of due process of law is met if the trial is had according to the settled course of judicial proceedings, and this process in the states is regulated by the law of the state.
7. The ultimate test of a confession is voluntariness, or, is the confession the product of an essentially free and unconstrained choice by its maker? If it is, if he has willed to confess, it may be used against him. If it is not, if his will has been overborne and his capacity for self-determination critically impaired, the use of his confession offends due process.
8. In a criminal case involving the voluntariness vel non [or not] of a confession, testimonial conflict is settled by the judgment of the state courts.
9. The mental state of involuntariness upon which the due process questions turns can never be affirmatively established other than circumstantially--that is, by inference.
10. In determining whether a confession was voluntary or involuntary, an examination of the entire record before us, including both the transcript of the habeas corpus proceedings, and the record of the trial in the case on its merits, must be made.
11. The Court of Criminal Appeals may take judicial knowledge of its own records in related matters, and turn to them for aid when it is appropriate so to do.
12. The inquiry is as to truthfulness and reliability of a confession made, and delay in arraignment does not ipso facto vitiate a confession, but if there is a question of such delay having brought about confession, then the jury may by proper instructions be required to consider whether a confession was coerced.
13. While, as a matter of procedural due process, a person accused of crime must be given a fair opportunity to try question whether he has been denied due process of law through procurement of a coerced confession, he is not entitled, through use of habeas corpus, to more, or to repeat trials of that question.
14. Where issues of fact as to whether due process has been denied have been tried in a state court, and those issues determined, the Fifth Amendment does not any more than does the Fourteenth, assume immunity from judicial error, and, more specifically, it does not authorize a second trial of the same issues under the guise of a petition for writ of habeas corpus. U.S.C.A.Const. Amends. 5, 14.
15. The Fourteenth Amendment does not provide review of mere error in jury verdicts, even though the error concerns the voluntary character of a confession. U.S.C.A.Const. Amend. 14.
16. Habeas corpus will not serve as a substitute for an appeal.
17. Only a lack of jurisdiction or errors or irregularities which divest the court of jurisdiction or render the judgment void can be raised by habeas corpus.
18. Where contentions are made and not supported by either argument or authority, the Court of Criminal Appeals will presume them to be void of merit.
Original proceeding in habeas corpus, wherein petitioner seeks his discharge from imprisonment in the State Penitentiary. Writ denied.
George Hill, McAlester, Kenneth B. Kienzle, Shawnee, for petitioner.
Mac Q. Williamson, Atty. Gen., Sam H. Lattimore, Asst. Atty. Gen., for respondent.
This is an original action for writ of habeas corpus, filed in this Court on December 4, 1961, by Gerald Pate. Petitioner alleges that he is being held in the Oklahoma State Penitentiary under a void judgment and sentence of death, entered February 9, 1961 by the district court of Pottawatomie County, Oklahoma, for the murder of Mary Jane Haygood by strangulation, committed in said county on September 16, 1959. A hearing was granted petitioner, and he was present in court for the hearing on February 20, 1962.
The conviction was appealed to this Court, and affirmed, as reported in Pate v. State, Okl.Cr., 361 P.2d 1086.
This proceeding involves the matter of post-conviction remedies. Hence at the out-set we desire to call attention to the fact that this Court has looked with favor upon such pleas, and granted relief, both by appeal and habeas corpus in proper cases, particularly where we have been of the opinion that the defendant has met the burden of proof sufficient to justify relief, and we have denied such application only where the burden was not met. Benton v. State, 86 Okl.Cr. 137, 190 P.2d 168; In re Application of Fowler, Okl.Cr., 356 P.2d 770; De Wolf v. State, 96 Okl.Cr. 382, 256 P.2d 191, and other cases.
This petition is a collateral attack on the judgment and sentence, involving admissibility of three confessions on the ground that they were involuntarily given. The first confession was to the officers, the second to the County Attorney, and then to Don Loftis, television photographer. In such cases, involving collateral attack, the burden of proof is on the petitioner, and the proof must be clear and convincing to sustain the allegations. Nelson v. Burford, 92 Okl.Cr. 224, 222 P.2d 382; Ex parte Parrott, 97 Okl.Cr. 8, 256 P.2d 462.
In Hendrickson v. State, 93 Okl.Cr. 379, 229 P.2d 196, this Court reviewed the many authorities touching upon the admissibility of confessions as violative of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. Therein, among other things, it was said:
'A confession is inadmissible if obtained under any form of compulsion, so that to receive it in evidence would violate the defendant's constitutional privilege against self-incrimination and is inadmissible if made under such circumstances of hope or fear as to create a fair probability of its testimonial untrustworthiness.
'Prima facie any confession is admissible in evidence and where its admissibility is challenged by defendant, burden is on him to show that it was procured by such means or under such circumstances as to render it inadmissible, unless evidence on part of state tends to show that fact.
'Admissibility of a confession where it is challenged, is a question solely for court after hearing, in absence of jury, all evidence on each side respecting circumstances under which confession was made, and court is vested with a large discretion in determining matter.
'After a confession has been admitted, defendant is entitled to have evidence in regard to circumstances under which it was made, given anew to jury, not that jury may pass on its competency or admissibility, but for purpose of enabling them to judge what weight and value should be given to it as evidence, and on his request defendant is entitled to an instruction on that point.'
This record discloses that the trial court on the merits employed the foregoing principles in submitting the issue of the confessions to the jury, including that of according Pate the right to offer any proof throwing light upon the question of the character of the confessions as to their admissibility or lack of it.
At the conclusion of this proof by the State the petitioner's counsel announced he was ready for the jury to be recalled. He at no time indicated he desired to offer any proof on the issue, until Pate testified on the question of the admissibility of the confessions in his defense in chief. Furthermore, the trial court properly instructed the jury on the consideration to be accorded the written confession (upon which the case must stand or fall), and the jury's prerogatives in determining the weight to be given the confession. Therein Judge Byrum said:
'You are instructed that in this case, the State has offered testimony tending to show that the defendant made a certain statement after his arrest and while he was in custody charged with the offense on which he is being tried, and which statement is relied on in part to establish the defendant's guilt of the offense charged against him; and the Court instructs you if you find and believe from the evidence that such statement was made by the defendant, that a confession by one charged with an offense should be carefully scrutinized and received with great caution, and when deliberately and voluntarily made may be considered as evidence for or against the person making it the same as any other evidence, but if same was made under promise of reward, or was induced by threats, or was otherwise involuntary, then the same should be wholly disregarded by the jury.
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