Stokes v. State, J-87-33

• Decision Date: 09 June 1987
• Docket Number: No. J-87-33,J-87-33
• Citation: 738 P.2d 1364
• Parties: Janie Lee STOKES, Appellant, v. The STATE of Oklahoma, Appellee.
• Court: United States State Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma. Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma

Page 1364

738 P.2d 1364

Janie Lee STOKES, Appellant, v. The STATE of Oklahoma, Appellee.

No. J-87-33.

Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma.

June 9, 1987.

Rehearing Denied July 31, 1987.

Mark A. Graziano, Asst. Public Defender, Tulsa, for appellant.

Davis Moss, Dist. Atty., A.J. Shultz, Asst. Dist. Atty., Tulsa, for appellee.

OPINION

BRETT, Presiding Judge:

Appellant, Janie Lee Stokes, a juvenile age 16, was charged as an adult in Tulsa County District Court Case No. CRF-86-38. She pled guilty to Robbery With a Dangerous Weapon, Count I, and Assault and Battery With a Dangerous Weapon, Count II. At the time this appeal was lodged, she had not been sentenced.

Between the reverse certification hearing and the trial date appellant filed an application with this court for a writ of mandamus requesting the trial be stayed pending an appeal to this court. This Court declined to assume jurisdiction.

Appellant was walking down the street in a residential area of Tulsa; the victim, Billy Jo Hutchins, was working in her front yard. Ms. Hutchins reluctantly let appellant in her house when appellant approached her to use the phone and the bathroom. When appellant finished in the bathroom, she hit Ms. Hutchins in the head allegedly with her hand, knocked her down, and drug her by the hair into the kitchen. She then told her to give her her rings and "stuff". Appellant, again using Ms. Hutchins' hair, drug her down to the basement where she was tied and gagged. Appellant had a six inch kitchen knife by now and she demanded Ms. Hutchins give her the car keys. After Ms. Hutchins told her where the keys were, appellant made two very deep gashes in Ms. Hutchins' legs and stole the car.

This version of the facts is according to appellant's statement to the Court when her guilty plea was entered. The victim's testimony at the preliminary hearing and reverse certification hearing was essentially the same although the victim was not certain if the first blow to her head, which was from the back, was with a purse or another similar instrument. This blow broke a facial bone and injured the victim's eye which resulted in vision impairment.

In appellant's first proposition of error she is challenging the order denying her request for reverse certification. See 10 O.S.Supp.1986, § 1104.2. She claims the evidence at the preliminary hearing was only sufficient, if at all, for a charge of Robbery by Force and since that charge is not one of the ones enumerated in the reverse certification provisions of the code she should have been tried as a juvenile. 10 O.S.Supp.1986, § 1104.2(A). Appellant is contending that the weapon was introduced too late in the sequence of events to transform the robbery from being one committed "by force" to one committed "with a dangerous weapon."

When appellant pled guilty she waived any irregularities in the preliminary hearing except jurisdictional questions. This waiver includes the issue that the crimes charged were inappropriate in light of the facts presented at the preliminary hearing. Starks v. State, 523 P.2d 1108, 1110 (Okl.Cr.1974). Appellant is not asking the Court to allow her to withdraw her guilty plea; she is questioning the propriety of the charge as applied to the facts in her case. See Ledgerwood v. State, 455 P.2d 745 (Okl.Cr.1969); Slayton v. Willingham, 726 F.2d 631, 634 (10th Cir.1984). Cf. Maynard v. State, 715 P.2d 1341 (Ok...