State v. Buteau.
| Citation | 68 A.2d 681,136 Conn. 113 |
| Court | Supreme Court of Connecticut |
| Decision Date | 16 August 1949 |
| Parties | STATE v. BUTEAU. |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
James Buteau was convicted of murder in the first degree in the Superior Court in New Haven County, Troland, J., after a plea of not guilty and jury trial, and he appealed.
The Supreme Court of Errors, Maltbie, C. J., affirmed the judgment holding that confessions made by defendant were properly admitted and that instructions given were not harmful error.
Philip R. Pastore, Special Public Defender, and William T. Holleran, Assistant Special Public Defender, New Haven, for appellant (defendant).
Abraham S. Ullman, State's Attorney, New Haven, with whom was Arthur T. Gorman, Assistant State's Attorney, New Haven, for appellee (state).
Before MALTBIE, C. J., and BROWN, ELLS and DICKENSON, JJ., and ALCORN, Superior Court Judge.
The defendant was found guilty of murder in the first degree and has appealed to this court. The state claimed: On October 25, 1946, the manager of a store in Meriden, James A. Leach, was killed. The defendant and Albert Berard had entered the store just before closing time with the intent to secure the proceeds of that day's sales; they concealed themselves on a lower floor near a rear door until it was locked; they then proceeded to a room on an upper floor where they found Leach; both men were armed; when Leach started to call for help, both men shot, and four bullets struck him; and these bullets came from two different revolvers. The defendant testified before the jury in his own behalf. He did not claim to have proved that he had not participated in the events leading up to the shooting of Leach but did claim that the revolver he had with him was not loaded; that, while he knew Berard had a revolver in his hand while going to the upper floor, he did not know whether it was loaded; and that while he was still on the stairway Berard entered a room at its top, and the defendant heard shots. By reason of his participation in the events leading up to the death of Leach, the defendant was, upon his own claims of proof at the trial, guilty of murder in the first degree, whether or not he was present at the actual shooting or in fact fired one of the bullets that struck Leach. State v. Cots, 126 Conn. 48, 59, 9 A.2d 138.
Because of a conflict of interest between the defendant and Berard and because the public defender was representing the latter, the court appointed a special public defender to represent the defendant and ordered that the two be tried separately.
The defendant has assigned error in the denial by the trial court of his motion to set the verdict aside and in various matters occurring in the conduct of the trial. The principal claim of error in the latter category is the admission in evidence of his examination before the deputy coroner for New Haven county on August 30, 1947, and of a signed statement made by him in the office of the state's attorney on September 3, 1947, in both of which the defendant in effect confessed his participation in the affair, although maintaining that Berard alone shot Leach. The evidence was offered as a part of the state's case in chief, and had it not been admitted it may well have been that the defendant would not have testified. For that reason, the admission of the testimony, if erroneous, cannot be claimed to have been harmless. On the other hand, the defendant's testimony accorded with his claims of proof, stated above, and the trial court's refusal to set the verdict aside as against the evidence cannot be held to be erroneous.
When the state called the deputy coroner and started to question him as to the examination of the defendant before him, the defendant objected. Thereupon the jury were excused and the trial court heard evidence over a period of some days from numerous witnesses as to the circumstances of the arrest of the defendant, his detention thereafter, and the making of the statements. It made a finding of facts which it found proven, upon the basis of which it admitted in evidence the examination and the signed statement. The defendant claims that we should ourselves examine the evidence offered and, regardless of any finding by the court, determine the admissibility of the examination and statement. In State v. Palko, 121 Conn. 669, 681, 186 A. 657, we held that it was error to exclude a confession as involuntary where the trial court based its ruling in part upon a reason not correct in law and nothing in the ‘undisputed evidence’ indicated that it was involuntary; but in that case the record contained no finding of facts by the trial court and no question of the propriety of our consulting the evidence was raised. It is not the proper function of this court to find facts upon conflicting testimony; and for us to determine the admissibility of evidence where there is such a conflict might well result in prejudice to the defendant, because the trial court might find facts which we, because of such a conflict, would be unable to consider. Whether such evidence as was offered in this case should over objection be produced before the jury depends upon findings by the court of the surrounding circumstances made upon the basis of any evidence relevant to that issue produced before it. State v. Willis, 71 Conn. 293, 313, 41 A. 820; 3 Wigmore, Evidence, 3d Ed., § 861; 2 Wharton, Criminal Evidence, 11th Ed., § 594. In this case the trial court properly found the facts upon the basis of which it admitted the evidence. Its finding was open to attack on the same basis as any other finding it made. The defendant, while claiming that we should go directly to the evidence, seeks also to have certain of the trial court's findings stricken out and certain facts added. We approach the question before us upon the latter basis. We do not, by following this procedure, deprive the defendant of any benefit he might have had from our adoption of the other method, because his attacks upon the trial court's finding have compelled us to read the evidence and consider all the claims he has advanced.
The defendant claims, first, that he was under illegal restraint and that either this fact in itself rendered the evidence inadmissible or it was inadmissible because it was the result of such detention; and secondly, that the examination and statement were not voluntary.
No purpose would be served by reciting in detail the facts found with such corrections as we must make in them. About 2:30 a. m. on August 23, 1947, certain police officers, acting under instructions of the commissioner of state police, found the defendant on a street in Meriden and brought him to the office of the commissioner in the headquarters of the state police in Hartford. There he was questioned, principally by the commissioner, for some two hours. About 4 a. m. the commissioner told him that he was under arrest for murder. At the close of the interrogation he was confined in a cell in the building. Early the next afternoon he was taken to the state police barracks at Bethany. On the way a stop was made at the home of the state's attorney for New Haven County, and the officers with the defendant were given a warrant, signed by the coroner for New Haven County, directing the arrest of the defendant and his detention at the barracks. The defendant claims that for several reasons the warrant was defective, but, as we shall point out later, we have no need to consider the question so raised. The defendant was confined at the barracks until August 30; he was interrogated by police officers from time to time; one day he was taken by police officers to Meriden and in their company followed closely behind another group of officers whom Berard was guiding over the route which, apparently, he said he had taken on the night of the crime. On one occasion, while the defendant's sister was visiting him, he made a written statement in her presence; later that day he admitted for the first time that he had been in the store on the night of the crime. The next day he was taken by the officers to the state's attorney's office in New Haven, and, except for a time while he was taken to lunch at a public eating place, he was kept there from about 10 a. m. to 5:30 p. m.; and he was questioned from time to time and was confronted by Berard.
The next day, August 30, on order of the deputy coroner, the defendant was brought before him and the examination took place the admission of which in evidence is claimed by the defendant to have been erroneous. Before the examination the defendant was cautioned as to his constitutional rights, including his privilege not to testify, and he stated his willingness to do so. There were present at the hearing, in addition to the deputy coroner, his secretary, a state police detective and the county detective. At the conclusion of the examination the deputy coroner issued a warrant for the defendant's arrest and committal to the New Haven county jail. The warrant was in the customary form of that used by coroners. After its issuance the defendant was taken to Meriden and, accompanied by police officers, he traversed the route he claimed that he and Berard had taken the night of the crime to various points in the city and through the store. During the forenoon of September 3, 1947, the defendant was brought from the county jail to the Superior Court room in New Haven; in his presence the court made an order for the calling of a grand jury, and on the statement of the defendant that he was in no position to employ counsel the court informed him that a competent, experienced attorney would be appointed to look after his interests, which was done. Thereafter, he was taken to the state's attorney's office and was questioned from time to time; when he indicated that he would like to change a statement he had previously made, Captain Carroll of the state police, who was present, said he would take a statement from him after they had...
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