U.S. v. White, 80-1939
| Decision Date | 15 June 1981 |
| Docket Number | No. 80-1939,80-1939 |
| Citation | 645 F.2d 599 |
| Parties | 7 Fed. R. Evid. Serv. 1543 UNITED STATES of America, Appellee, v. Luie Ernest WHITE, Appellant. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Eighth Circuit |
Raymond C. Conrad, Federal Public Defender, W. D. Missouri, R. Steven Brown, Asst. Federal Public Defender (argued), Springfield, Mo., for appellant.
Ronald S. Reed, Jr., U. S. Atty., Robert G. Ulrich, Asst. U. S. Atty. (argued), Springfield, Mo., for appellee.
Before LAY, Chief Judge, and STEPHENSON and ARNOLD, Circuit Judges.
Luie Ernest White appeals his two-count conviction for bank robbery and kidnapping in violation of 18 U.S.C. §§ 2113(a), (d) and 1201, respectively. The district court 1 entered a judgment of conviction on verdicts returned by the jury following a three-day trial. On appeal White contends that the district court erred in (1) failing to grant his motion for judgment of acquittal at the close of the Government's case-in-chief for lack of sufficient evidence to convict, (2) admitting into evidence a tool known as a dent puller, and (3) giving an alibi instruction concerning his codefendant which emphasized White's failure to present a defense to the crimes charged. We reject these contentions and affirm.
Darrell Spillers was the executive vice-president of the Cornerstone Bank, South West City, Missouri. 2 On March 11, 1979 Spillers and his family returned home from church around 9:00 p. m. There they were greeted by two men wearing ski masks and wielding pistols. One of the men asked Spillers how much money he had in the house. Apparently unsatisfied with the answer, the man asked Spillers what time the safes at the bank would be open the following morning and threatened to hold Spillers's wife hostage until that time.
Spillers then offered to go to the bank that evening and take all the money which was accessible to him before morning. The man instructed Spillers to return with at least $15,000 and threatened to kill his family if Spillers called for help. Until Spillers returned from the bank, his family, ordered to lie prone on the floor of the family room, was held at gunpoint.
When Spillers came home from the bank, the men counted the money and arranged for their getaway. 3 They demanded that Spillers accompany them on the first leg of their flight as insurance against the possibility that he had called for help while at the bank. One of the men took the driver's seat of Spillers's automobile and, with his compatriot in the back seat and Spillers in the front passenger's seat, proceeded through the northwestern corner of Arkansas into the northeastern corner of Oklahoma. There they passed a gold or brown Ford automobile backed into the driveway of what Spillers recognized as the old city garbage dump.
The driver pulled in past the driveway and at his compatriot's direction threw the keys to Spillers's car down the road. After Spillers heard the two men drive away in the Ford automobile, he searched unsuccessfully for his car keys. In short order he gave up looking for the keys and found a gas station back on the highway whose proprietor drove him home to his family. Because his telephone lines had been cut by the intruders, he took his family back to their church and called law-enforcement authorities.
Although none of the Spillers family was able to identify the men who had held them on March 11, at trial the Government introduced evidence which linked both White and his codefendant, William J. R. Embrey, 4 to the robbery of the Cornerstone Bank and the kidnapping of Spillers. Some of this evidence depended on the discovery of the stolen 1975 Ford Elite automobile used by the robbers (and identified by Spillers) as their getaway car. McDonald County Deputy Sheriff Lee Brodie found the car abandoned outside the Greenwood Church near South West City. The ignition switch of the automobile was missing from its steering column.
Documentary evidence established that Embrey had purchased a dent puller, a flat blade screw driver, and galvanized screws from a store then known as the Joplin Auto Supply Company on March 10, 1979, the date on which the getaway car had been stolen. 5 FBI Special Agent Steve Funderburk testified that dent pullers were commonly used in stealing an automobile to remove its ignition and therefore prevent its steering wheel from locking. 6 Special Agent Funderburk also testified that he had seized a dent puller, subsequently admitted into evidence, following a consent search of Embrey's mobile home.
Two of White's female acquaintances, Edna Jean Childress and Patty Ann Renfro, testified to statements made by White in mid-March 1979. In response to Ms. Childress's question as to how he made a living, both women testified, White claimed to rob banks and pointed to a newspaper article on the Cornerstone Bank robbery. Ms. Childress testified that White
said that they had stolen a car and went to the banker's home and had kept the banker's family there and sent the banker after the money, and the banker came back and then they took the banker to a dirt road and let him out, and then they took the car and parked it in a churchyard. * * * He said that he wore coveralls with a ski mask.
Special Agent Funderburk testified that he had scrutinized local press coverage of the robbery and, although many of the details in White's admissions were matters of public knowledge, that the stolen getaway car had been abandoned in a churchyard was not. 7
Finally, the Government introduced the testimony of Franklin Sanders, a convicted burglar and cousin of Darrell Spillers. Sanders recalled that in January or February 1979 he and Embrey had generally discussed the possibility of robbing different places, including the Cornerstone Bank. Thereafter on March 8, 1979, Embrey drove White to Sanders's residence in Noel, Missouri, and White asked Sanders if he would take a ride with them. Embrey then drove White and Sanders to South West City. On the way to South West City Embrey asked Sanders to point out the house of Darrell Spillers. In South West City White noted the location of the Cornerstone Bank, and in due course Sanders pointed out the Spillers residence. As they reached the residence Embrey remarked that they "would have to go in after them."
They proceeded through town to a package liquor store and turned back. After leaving the liquor store White...
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