State v. White
| Decision Date | 14 December 1964 |
| Docket Number | No. 47341,47341 |
| Citation | 247 La. 19,169 So.2d 894 |
| Parties | STATE of Louisiana v. Van Norman WHITE. |
| Court | Louisiana Supreme Court |
E. Drew McKinnis, Baton Rouge, for defendant.
Jack P. F. Gremillion, Atty. Gen., M. E. Culligan, Asst. Atty. Gen., Sargent Pitcher, Jr., Dist. Atty., Ralph L. Roy, Asst. Dist. Atty., for appellee.
Van Norman White was charged under R.S. 14:62 with simple burglary of Evans Electrical Supply, Inc., in Baton Rouge. Represented by counsel, he was tried before a jury, adjudged guilty, and sentenced to seven years' imprisonment in the state penitentiary. From this conviction and sentence he has appealed, relying on several bills of exception.
This bill was taken to the overruling of a motion to quash the bill of information. The primary complaint urged by appellant in this bill is that he was arrested on December 28, 1962, for the offense of which he now stands convicted; that he was kept in jail for five months and 18 days; that during this time no charges were filed against him and he was without counsel; that his constitutional right to a speedy trial was so flagrantly violated that he is entitled to his discharge.
The burglary of which the accused has been convicted is alleged to have been committed on June 6, 1961. Under date of May 20, 1962, a search warrant was issued to search the premises occupied by appellant and his wife for stolen property, and pursuant to this warrant numerous articles of property were seized by the executing officers, some of which were subsequently identified as having been taken from the electrical supply company in the burglary. Shortly afterwards, on June 5, 1962, a warrant of arrest was issued for the accused, and on December 28, 1962, he was arrested and incarcerated in the parish jail. The bill of information charging him with the crime was filed on June 13, 1963.
We cannot understand how the mere fact that appellant was kept in jail for the period alleged could constitute a bar to his prosecution under a bill of information valid on its face and thus entitle him to be released. Appellant does not contend that he has been denied a fair trial by this circumstance alone. He does not say that he was held incommunicado, that he sought to be released, or that he asked for and was denied either a preliminary examination or a writ of habeas corpus. See State v. Banks, 111 La. 22, 25, 35 So. 370.
Under the law of this state a motion to quash may be urged for 'any defect fatal to the validity of the proceedings'. R.S. 15:286. In the instant case, even if we should concede that the accused was denied a speedy trial though he did not request one, the motion to quash will not lie on this ground because this denial is not a 'defect fatal to the validity of the proceedings'; it cannot be considered a defect in the proceedings leading to the filing of the bill of information and his subsequent trial and conviction.
This court is not willing to order the release and discharge of the convicted murderer, rapist, robber, or other criminal under the circumstances and for the reasons set forth in this bill. To do so could serve only to encourage crime by removing the fear of punishment, completely overlook the right of the people to be secure in their persons, lives, and property, make a mockery of law enforcement, and create the utmost disrespect for the courts.
We recognize, of course, that the courts are the guardians of the rights guaranteed to the people by the Constitution; but if a right is infringed, the remedy must be an appropriate one and must be a natural consequence of the infringement of the right. For example, if an accused is compelled to confess to a crime, the remedy for this wrong is to bar the admission of the confession into evidence against him. Again, if evidence is obtained through an illegal search warrant, the remedy for this violation of a the accused's right to be protected against unreasonable search is to prohibit the admission on his trial of the evidence thus illegally obtained. We cannot agree with counsel for the accused in the instant case that any wrong done the accused by a perhaps unreasonably lengthy imprisonment without the filing of a charge has as its remedy the dismissed of the entire prosecution against him. The interests of our society will not permit this serious crime for which the appellant has been sentenced to serve seven years at hard labor to be 'wiped out' because he was detained in jail five months between his arrest and the filing of the information.
In support of his contention that the bill of information should be quashed and that he should be ordered discharged, appellant calls our attention to the case of State of Louisiana ex rel. Byrnes v. Walker, Warden, 217 F.Supp. 168 (E.D.La.1963). In that case the court found that numerous federal constitutional rights were violated, but this is not so here. For instance, in the present case the inculpatory statement of the accused was made to the officers immediately after his arrest and not (as in the Walker case) after a long period of confinement and just before the filing of the bill of information. Moreover, in our view even the fact that a confession is made after a long confinement and just before the filing of the formal charges is not grounds for quashing the bill of information, but is merely a matter to be taken into consideration in determining the admissibility of the confession--that is, whether it was freely and voluntarily made--, and at the most would entitle the accused to a new trial if the confession has been used against him.
A prospecitive juror after being examined on his voir dire was challenged by the defense for cause, and the challenge was overruled. The prospecitve juror stated at first that he was not sure he could give the accused a fair and impartial trial because he had known the accused and was under the impression that one who knew an accused or knew anything that the accused had done in the past to make him 'swing his judgment' should not be on the jury. The court then examined the juror at length and ascertained from his replies that he would try the case according to the law and the evidence fairly and squarely both for the State and for the defense, would render a conscientious, fair verdict after hearing the evidence and the law as given by the court, and was confident that what he had heard or thought would not in any way influence his verdict.
We think the ruling of the trial judge was correct, for a consideration of the prospective juror's entire examination shows that he was neither biased nor prejudiced against the accused but would try the case on the law and the evidence adduced during the trial. In State v. Jones, 38 La.Ann. 792, a juror on his voir dire stated 'That from his knowledge of the previous character of the defendant that he had some little prejudice against the defendant, but that he could lay this aside and try the case according to the law and the evidence regardless of this prejudice and do exact justice between the State and this defendant, and be governed by the law and the evidence'. In that case this court found the juror to be qualified and said it knew of no law which under the condition of mind disclosed by the juror himself would disqualify him as a juror. The same is true in the instant case.
Bill No. 3, which was taken to protect the appellant's rights under Bill No. 2, 1 was reserved to the overruling of his peremptory challenge after he had exhausted the 12 peremptory challenges granted to him by law.
In the course of his opening statement the assistant district attorney said: 'As I have said, the State will prove that this accused when questioned about this air conditioning unit, particularly, offered no explanation other than he knew it was stolen and he was in possession of it.' Counsel for the accused objected and moved for a mistrial, which was refused.
Appellant argues that he was under no duty to make any statement while he was in the custody of the police officers, and that it was reversible error for the assistant district attorney in his opening statement to comment upon the fact 'that he made no statement during the course of such investigation'.
An accused, of course, has no duty to make any statement whatever to investigating officers. The bill discloses, however, that appellant offered no explanation of his possession of the air conditioning unit other than that he knew it was stolen and that he was in possession of it. In other words, what the assistant district attorney was saying is that although the accused offered no explanation of his possession, he did state he knew the air conditioner was stolen and admitted his possession.
As shown by the opening statement, which is in the record, the assistant district attorney informed the jury that the State would establish that the accused freely and voluntarily made this inculpatory statement; and since the State intended to prove the inculpatory statement in its case against the accused, the assistant district attorney was duty bound to mention it in his opening remarks in order for the statement to be admissible in evidence against the accused during the trial of the case. Moreover, the remark of the assistant district attorney was proper since the State relied on a legal presumpion set out in R.S. 15:432. 2
In the course of his opening statement the assistant district attorney said:
Counsel objected to the statement and reserved a bill, contending that...
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