Dyer v. State

1975 OK CR 122, 536 P.2d 1317
CourtCourt of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma
DecidedJune 20, 1975
DocketNo. F-75-216
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 1975 OK CR 122 (Dyer v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Dyer v. State, 1975 OK CR 122, 536 P.2d 1317 (Okla. Ct. App. 1975).

Opinion

OPINION

BLISS, Judge:

Appellant, Cephus Donald Dyer, hereinafter referred to as defendant, was charged in the District Court, Okmulgee County, Case No. CRF-74-130, for the crime of Kidnapping, After Former Conviction of a Felony. Defendant was convicted of said crime and sentenced to serve fifty (50) years in the State penitentiary. From said judgment and sentence, the defendant files this timely appeal.

Billie Jean Gray, the State’s first witness, testified that she was staying with her daughter at the Carriage Inn Motel on the 24th of August, 1974, in Okmulgee, Oklahoma. Shortly after 12:00 noon she and her daughter stopped to use a telephone at the Warehouse Market in Okmul-gee in an attempt to locate the city’s post office. After her daughter had returned from the telephone booth, and just as they were preparing to leave, a man pulled opened her car door and stuck a gun in her side. She stated she was forced to drive and identified the man who suggested that she drive as being the defendant. The witness related that she began to drive but became so upset that she was told to stop the car. The defendant began to drive while she was seated in the back seat next to a man with a gun. There were two men and herself in the back seat and her daughter at this time was in the front seat with another girl. The defendant drove north on the Beeline toward Tulsa. The witness asked many times during the escapade to be released but her pleas were ignored and the defendant finally told her daughter to tell her, Mrs. Gray, to shut up. The witness identified State’s Exhibit No. 1 as being a handgun which looked like the one the man in the back seat had put in her side during the trip. While traveling at a fast rate of speed on the Beeline, they passed a highway patrolman who began following their car. She related that the defendant told the men in the back seat with her to keep down out of sight because it would look funny if there were too many people in the car. After the highway patrolman had followed them for a while, they came to a roadblock. Upon seeing the roadblock the defendant turned off the highway onto a dirt road and then onto a cross-over heading back toward Okmulgee. [1319]*1319The defendant, after an exchange of gunfire from the car she was in and a policeman, lost control of the car and went across a ditch into a dirt bank alongside the road. She ran to the highway patrolman after the car had stopped and told them that she and her daughter were hostages and not to shoot at the car. At this time the defendant and two other men and one woman were in the custody of the officers. The witness further testified that at no time had she willingly gone with the defendant or other escapees and that during the course of the trip she recalled a conversation between the defendant and the man with the gun, whom she later learned to be named Fite, that they had escaped from jail and that Fite had asked to drive and the defendant had refused to let him drive.

On cross-examination the witness reiterated her statement that the defendant had been driving the car and that she had asked him about two times to let herself and her daughter go, but he refused.

During the State’s re-direct examination of the witness she testified that she was afraid of the defendant during the incident and at the present time.

The State next called Clyde Gardenhire who testified that he had been the Chief of Security at Oklahoma State Tech for the past eight years. The witness testified that he was at a service station west of the courthouse in Okmulgee on the 24th of August and that he noticed four people running down the street, two white men, a black man and a white girl. The four people were at the south end of the Warehouse Market when he saw a tall white man jerk the car door open and appeared to put a gun to the side of the head of the lady who was driving the car. Thinking it was a robbery, he went inside the service station to call the police and asked a Mr. Haddox to get the tag number of the car. He further testified that he could not personally identify any of the four persons, but that the car was a white over green 1970 or 1971 Pontiac.

The State’s next witness was Charles Haddox who testified he was at the Cono-co station with Mr. Gardenhire on the 24th of August, 1974, where he observed four people running down the street to the Warehouse Market. He .testified that there were two white males, a black male, and a white girl and that one of the white males opened the car door and put what he thought was a gun to the lady driver’s head. He observed the car’s tag number and gave it to Mr. Gardenhire who relayed the tag number to the police. He further testified that he could not identify any of the people.

The State next called Larry Sallee, a trooper with the Highway Patrol. The trooper testified that at 12:47 p. m. he was advised of a jailbreak and set up a roadblock on U. S. 75, known as the Beeline. Approximately two minutes after arriving at the location he saw a car fitting the description and the tag number given pass him. He followed the vehicle north towards Tulsa and toward a roadblock which had been set up. He was able to identify the defendant as the driver of the car he was following. During the evasive action taken by the suspect’s car, Trooper Sallee fired one shot at the left rear tire and after firing the shot another shot was - fired from the car by the man named Fite. After the vehicle was wrecked he participated in the arrest of the four people in the car and noticed that of the two hostages, the older lady was in the back seat of the car and the younger lady was in the front seat. He further testified on redirect that the defendant, after the car had been stopped, ran from the vehicle up a slight hill and that, after being ordered to do so, the defendant came back down the hill to the arresting officers.

The State next called Roy Clugston, a deputy sheriff for Tulsa County. He participated in the roadblock and described the events leading up to the capture of the defendant. He further testified that he had transported the defendant and another defendant to the Tulsa County jail.

[1320]*1320The State next called Bill O’Dell, a deputy sheriff for Tulsa County. He related that on August 24, 1974, he participated in the roadblock with Deputy Sheriff Clugs-ton and testified to the events of the arrest of the defendant in the same detail as did Officer Clugston.

Linda Gray was called as the State’s next witness, and testified that she was a 17-year-old senior at Okmulgee High School. The witness testified that on August 24, 1974, around 12:00 or 12:30 p. m., she and her mother stopped at a phone booth at the Warehouse Market and after she had returned to the car a white boy pulled open the car door on her mother’s side and stuck a gun in her side and told her to move over. Her mother was told to drive by a man who had gotten in the back seat and she started to drive. She related that she was being held by the girl in the front seat while her mother was driving and that her mother became so nervous that she could not go fast enough and that then a Negro man, identified as the defendant, took over the driving. Miss Gray testified that on several occasions her mother asked to be released and that the suspects said that they could not release them until they reached Tulsa. During the ride she was told to keep her head down by both the defendant and the girl in the front seat because they felt it would look strange with so many people in the car.

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Related

Johnson v. State
1976 OK CR 200 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma, 1976)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
1975 OK CR 122, 536 P.2d 1317, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/dyer-v-state-oklacrimapp-1975.