Adkins v. Commonwealth

647 S.W.2d 502, 1982 Ky. App. LEXIS 286
CourtCourt of Appeals of Kentucky
DecidedDecember 17, 1982
StatusPublished
Cited by12 cases

This text of 647 S.W.2d 502 (Adkins v. Commonwealth) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Kentucky primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Adkins v. Commonwealth, 647 S.W.2d 502, 1982 Ky. App. LEXIS 286 (Ky. Ct. App. 1982).

Opinion

GUDGEL, Judge:

Appellant Edwin Morris Adkins appeals from a Jefferson Circuit Court judgment which adjudged him guilty of the felony offense of Theft by Unlawful Taking and of being a Persistent Felony Offender in the first degree. Appellant contends that the trial court erred in five respects: (1) by refusing to order the Commonwealth to comply with the terms of a plea bargaining-agreement, (2) by refusing to suppress identification evidence, (3) by refusing to grant his motion for a mistrial, (4) by refusing to give his tendered jury instructions, and (5) by refusing to grant his motion for a directed verdict on the PFO charge. We disagree with all of his contentions. Hence, we affirm.

[504]*504On March 3, 1981, William Noblitt, the store manager of Stewart’s Department Store in Dixie Manor, noticed appellant and another man talking while examining some long dresses. As Noblitt watched, the other man put four of the dresses over his shoulder, placed his pea-coat on top of them, and both men then walked rapidly to an exit. Noblitt followed them and attempted to stop them by placing a hand on each man’s shoulder, whereupon appellant shoved him away. Noblitt then grabbed the man with the dresses, and appellant again shoved him. The two men then ran in opposite directions.

Noblitt gave a description of the men to the police and, after being shown a photo-pack of individuals, was able to pick out appellant as one of the individuals who participated in the theft. Appellant was arrested, indicted, and tried for the felony offenses of Theft by Unlawful Taking, KRS 514.030, Complicity, KRS 502.020, and Persistent Felony Offender in the first degree, KRS 532.080. The jury found appellant guilty of all but the complicity charge. This appeal followed.

First, appellant contends that the court erred by overruling his motion to compel the prosecution to abide by the terms of a plea bargain agreement. We disagree. Although appellant’s attorney engaged in plea bargain negotiations with the Commonwealth’s attorney, appellant was not present during the negotiations. When the case was called in district court, the Commonwealth’s attorney who was present on that date refused to make any agreement and appellant was bound over to the grand jury.

Appellant argues, citing Santobello v. New York, 404 U.S. 257, 92 S.Ct. 495, 30 L.Ed.2d 427 (1971), Workman v. Commonwealth, Ky., 580 S.W.2d 206 (1979), and Brock v. Sowders, Ky., 610 S.W.2d 591 (1980), that the fundamental fairness guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment makes it reversible error for a trial court to permit the government to welsh on a bargain with an accused. We agree with appellant that this is the law in Kentucky. In the case at bar, however, no agreement was ever personally entered into between appellant and the Commonwealth. The cases cited by appellant require the Commonwealth to comply with the terms of an offer only if the accused has taken action detrimental to his own interests in reliance on the offer. Here, because appellant never personally accepted the Commonwealth’s offer, it remained an offer and was revocable by the Commonwealth at any time. Commonwealth v. Brown, Ky., 619 S.W.2d 699 (1981). The trial court therefore did not err in denying appellant’s motion to compel the Commonwealth to comply with the alleged agreement.

Next, appellant contends that the court erred by denying his motion to suppress Noblitt’s testimony that he had identified appellant from a photographic line-up and his in-court identification of appellant based on that line-up. Appellant argues that the photographic line-up by which Noblitt identified him was impermissibly suggestive because the other individuals in the photo-pack shown Noblitt did not bear a sufficient physical resemblance to him. We disagree.

The admission of testimony that a witness has previously identified a defendant in a photographic line-up denies that defendant due process only if the photographic identification procedure is so impermissi-bly suggestive as to give rise to a substantial likelihood of misidentification. Simmons v. United States, 390 U.S. 377, 88 S.Ct. 967, 19 L.Ed.2d 1247 (1968), Beecham v. Commonwealth, Ky.App., 594 S.W.2d 898 (1979). The Kentucky cases in which this standard has been applied indicate that a photograph identification procedure is im-permissibly suggestive only when elements in the photographs other than minor variations in the physical features of the individuals pictured mislead witnesses in making their identifications, e.g. where the witness describes a criminal as wearing a hat, and the defendant is the only one wearing a hat, or where dates are written on the photographs, and the defendant’s photograph is the only one with a date close to the time [505]*505when the crime of which he is accused occurred. Brown v. Commonwealth, Ky. App., 564 S.W.2d 24 (1978), Jones v. Commonwealth, Ky.App., 556 S.W.2d 918 (1977).

In the case at bar, the detective who prepared the photographic line-up did so on the basis of a description of appellant given him by Noblitt eight days after the theft occurred. The men in the photographs do not closely resemble one another, but all loosely fit the description Noblitt gave the detective. Nothing distinguishes one photograph from another except the differing facial features of the individuals photographed. Noblitt had an opportunity to observe appellant in good light and unhesitatingly selected his photograph from those shown to him. In a situation such as this, the accuracy of the witness’s identification must be assessed by a jury, Beecham, supra. The photographic line-up was not made im-permissibly suggestive merely because the individuals whose photographs appear in the line-up did not closely resemble each other. Because we have determined that the photographic line-up during which Nob-litt identified appellant was not impermissi-bly suggestive, there is no need to determine whether the trial court erred in refusing to suppress Noblitt’s in-court identification evidence.

Next, appellant contends that certain testimony was prejudicial because it gave the jury the impression that appellant had originally been charged with a more serious crime, and therefore the court should have granted his motion for a mistrial. We disagree. The testimony complained of occurred when the detective who investigated the theft testified that Noblitt had been “robbed”. After appellant objected to this statement and moved for a mistrial, the detective explained that the crime “would have been ran (sic) as a Robbery II,” but “through the court process” it had instead been processed as a Theft by Unlawful Taking.

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Bluebook (online)
647 S.W.2d 502, 1982 Ky. App. LEXIS 286, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/adkins-v-commonwealth-kyctapp-1982.