State v. Williams, 40172

• Decision Date: 21 August 1979
• Docket Number: No. 40172,40172
• Citation: State v. Williams, 587 S.W.2d 618 (Mo. App. 1979)
• Parties: STATE of Missouri, Respondent, v. Clayton WILLIAMS, Appellant.
• Court: Missouri Court of Appeals

Page 618

587 S.W.2d 618

STATE of Missouri, Respondent, v.Clayton WILLIAMS, Appellant.

No. 40172.

Missouri Court of Appeals, Eastern District, Division Three.

Aug. 21, 1979.

Lang & O'Keefe, Karl F. Lang, Kevin M. O'Keefe, St. Louis, for appellant.

John D. Ashcroft, Atty. Gen., Paul Robert Otto, Asst. Atty. Gen., Jefferson City, George A. Peach, Circuit Atty., St. Louis, George R. Westfall, Pros.Atty., Clayton, for respondent.

CRIST, Judge.

Jury convictions of robbery first degree and armed criminal action.The court sentenced defendant to concurrent terms of twenty years and five years, respectively, under the Second Offender Act.We affirm.

Louis Black finished his work as a custodian at Mercantile Trust Company at 11:50 p. m. on June 21, 1977, and drove to a chicken restaurant on Grand Avenue in St. Louis, Missouri.After obtaining food, he returned to his white 1975 Buick LeSabre automobile.He was approached by three men; two of them displayed hand guns.Black's assailants ordered him into his car with them and directed him to drive to the corner of Grand and Kossuth, where they took his wallet, containing various personal papers, a Sears charge card and $46.00.

After taking his wallet, the men ordered him out of his car and drove it away.Black never saw his car again, but did identify various papers and the Sears charge card offered into evidence by the state as being items which had been in his wallet when it was stolen.

Black testified on direct examination that on two occasions St. Louis Police Officers showed him photographs of individuals in an attempt to establish the identity of three assailants.During the second display, conducted at his home, Black identified one of the photographs to be a picture of one of the assailants that sat in the back seat of the automobile.

Black was then asked if any of the assailants were in the courtroom.He said no one in the courtroom resembled any of the assailants.Defendant was present in the courtroom.

St. Louis Police Officer William McNabb thereafter stated on direct examination that on two occasions, he showed Black several photographs in an attempt to determine the identity of the assailants.He said the photographic display conducted at Black's home contained five photographs; one of those photographs was a picture of defendant.

McNabb was not asked, and did not state, whether Black identified one of those photographs as a photograph of defendant.

Defendant argues that McNabb's testimony was an attempt to bolster Black's identification testimony, constituting reversible error pursuant to State v. Degraffenreid, 477 S.W.2d 57(Mo. banc 1972).A proper objection was not offered when McNabb testified, and it was not raised...