Scamahorne v. Com.
| Decision Date | 01 May 1962 |
| Citation | 357 S.W.2d 30 |
| Parties | Joe SCAMAHORNE, Appellant, v. COMMONWEALTH of Kentucky, Appellee. |
| Court | United States State Supreme Court — District of Kentucky |
John S. Kelley, Bardstown, Hobson L. James, Elizabethtown, for appellant.
John B. Breckinridge, Atty. Gen., John B. Browning, Asst. Atty. Gen., Frankfort, for appellee.
Appellant, Joe Scamahorne, was convicted in the Nelson Circuit Court of the offense of carrying concealed a deadly weapon. See KRS 435.230(1). He was sentenced to two years in the penitentiary.
The judgment must be reversed because another crime of which appellant was accused was injected into the trial. The pertinent facts in this connection reveal that appellant was apprehended at Balltown in Nelson County under a warrant which issued from Barren County, the arrest having been made by two detectives of the Kentucky State Police. It developed that appellant then had upon his person a .38 caliber pistol, the possession of which he disclosed to the officer, and which circumstance thereafter resulted in his indictment, trial and conviction in Nelson County of the charge now before us.
The sole issue in the instant case was whether the weapon was concealed. Appellant raised no question as to the validity of the warrant which issued from Barren County and the legality of the arrest thereunder in Nelson County. Notwithstanding this fact, both detectives were allowed to state, over the objection of counsel, when asked what the warrant of arrest was for, that the accusation contained therein was 'bank burglary.'
Was this evidence incompetent and prejudicial? We believe it was.
The question of what the Barren County warrant was for was in no way pertinent to the particular offense which appellant was charged with having committed. Therefore, it was error to permit the Commonwealth to place in evidence an accusation of an infamous crime which was independent of, and unconnected with, the one for the commission of which appellant was on trial. See Turpin v. Commonwealth, Ky., 352 S.W.2d 66; Acres v. Commonwealth, Ky., 259 S.W.2d 38; Swanger v. Commonwealth, Ky., 255 S.W.2d 38; Peck v. Commonwealth, 286 Ky. 347, 150 S.W.2d 919; Howard v. Commonwealth, 110 Ky. 356, 61 S.W. 756.
In the interest of justice we conclude appellant should be given another trial free from damaging statements as to the perpetration of another totally unrelated crime he may have perpetrated in another county. Only the preliminary fact that appellant was taken...
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Metcalf v. Com., No. 2003-SC-0098-MR.
...of C.I.] in order to exclude evidence of the prior offense [videotaping of S.K.]." Funk, 842 S.W.2d at 480. See also Scamahorne v. Commonwealth, 357 S.W.2d 30 (Ky.1962) (conviction for carrying a concealed deadly weapon discovered during service of arrest warrant reversed because of admissi......
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Metcalf v. Commonwealth, 2003-SC-0098-MR (KY 4/21/2005)
...of C.I.] in order to exclude evidence of the prior offense [videotaping of S.K.]." Funk, 842 S.W.2d at 480. See also Scamahome v. Commonwealth, 357 S.W.2d 30 (Ky. 1962) (conviction for carrying a concealed deadly weapon discovered during service of arrest warrant reversed because of admissi......
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Kerr v. Commonwealth
...of an arrest warrant because the trial court admitted evidence that the warrant was for a charge of bank burglary. Scamahorne v. Commonwealth, 357 S.W.2d 30 (Ky.1962). Likewise, in Metcalf v. Commonwealth, 158 S.W.3d 740 (Ky.2005), the Court reversed a conviction because officers testified ......
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Wilson v. Com.
...for which he was on trial, was reversible error. He relies on Turpin v. Commonwealth, Ky., 352 S.W.2d 66 (1961), and Scamahorne v. Commonwealth, Ky., 357 S.W.2d 30 (1962). Appellee counters that this general rule does not apply in a case where the defense counsel precipitated the questions ......