Washington v. State
| Decision Date | 07 January 1986 |
| Docket Number | 1 Div. 782 |
| Citation | 507 So.2d 1358 |
| Parties | Joseph WASHINGTON v. STATE. |
| Court | Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals |
W. Gregory Hughes, Mobile, for appellant.
Charles A. Graddick, Atty. Gen., and M. Beth Slate, Asst. Atty. Gen., for appellee.
Appellant Joseph Washington was indicted for murdering Sharon Mitchell and Lester Collins with a pistol. The evidence indicated that he pursued them in a car, overtook them in a parking lot of a Church's Fried Chicken Store in the Crichton section of Mobile, and shot them to death. The jury convicted Washington of these charges and he was sentenced to 99 years' imprisonment in each case, sentences to run consecutively.
Appellant Washington first contends that the court should have granted a mistrial because of a remark made in summation. The remark was:
"One thing you can do is to let the pistolmen and the gunmen know that you can [sic] execute two helpless people like bugs and then kill a witness and they can walk."
The driver of the pursuit and getaway car was understood to have been one Adam Lilly, a person of diminished mental capacity. While the accused was in jail awaiting trial, Adam Lilly was shot to death by persons unknown. Adam Lilly's death certificate was introduced into evidence at the trial and indicated gunshot wounds as the cause of death.
The state presented evidence of two persons who were in jail at the time Washington was in jail. One of them testified that Washington was looking for someone who would silence Lilly, whom Washington apparently believed was the only witness. Another testified to Washington's remarks indicating relief when he heard the witness had been shot dead.
After the statement by the prosecutor, the trial judge gave curative instructions after sustaining the appellant's objection and denying a mistrial. The court said,
The standard to be applied in testing language on a motion for mistrial is set out in Birmingham News Company v. Payne, 230 Ala. 524, 162 So. 116, 117 (1935). To call for a mistrial, the argument to the jury must be (1) improper and illegal, and (2) of such prejudicial character that its probable effect is ineradicable by exclusion and rebuke on the part of the Court. We find that the trial court properly denied the motion for mistrial.
The other two assignments of error also relate to the death of Adam Lilly.
The appellant contends that the court should have sustained his objection when, during summation, the following occurred:
The appellant contends that this constitutes reversible error under the case of Tillman v. State, 374 So.2d 922 (Ala.Cr.App.1979). Tillman, however, deals with the situation where the prosecutor stated a substantive fact which was not in evidence or which would not be legal evidence if offered as such, "... yet which would have a natural tendency to influence the finding of the jury." Edson v. State, 53 Ala.App. 460, 463,...
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Fairchild v. State
...prejudicial character that its probable effect is ineradicable by exclusion and rebuke on the part of the Court." Washington v. State, 507 So.2d 1358 (Ala.Cr.App.1986). Furthermore, in Donnelly v. DeChristoforo, 416 U.S. 637, 643, 94 S.Ct. 1868, 1871, 40 L.Ed.2d 431 (1974), the Supreme Cour......
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King v. State
...1361. The Supreme Court went on to reverse this court's decision, which had affirmed the conviction of Washington in Washington v. State, 507 So.2d 1358 (Ala.Cr.App.1986), reversing on the grounds that the following statement by the prosecutor was so improper, as to constitute reversible "A......
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Ex parte Washington
...that there are facts he is not allowed to present to the jury, standing alone, does not justify a reversal." Washington v. State, 507 So.2d 1358 (Ala.Crim.App.1986). We It has long been the rule in Alabama that, although counsel should be given considerable latitude in drawing reasonable in......