Johnson v. State

510 S.W.2d 944, 1974 Tex. Crim. App. LEXIS 1794
Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas·Decided June 26, 1974·No. 48555·Published·Cited by 28 cases

Opinion

OPINION

ONION, Presiding Judge.

This appeal is taken from a conviction for rape wherein the jury assessed punishment at one hundred (100) years’ confinement in the Department of Corrections.

Appellant does not challenge the sufficiency of the evidence. Suffice it to say the State’s evidence reflects that after ar *946 riving home from a concert about midnight on January 20, 1973, the 14 year old prose-cutrix between 12:30 and 1 a. m. walked four blocks to a Seven-Eleven convenience store located in Tyler which she believed to be open 24 hours. Just as she approached the store, she observed a man coming from the opposite direction. She then discovered the store was closed and turned to leave when she was grabbed from behind and forced to an adjacent driveway where she was threatened with a gun and raped. Immediately after the assault, the prosecutrix started running home, climbing fences and going through back yards. She observed a police car, but it was gone before she “got over the fence.” Upon arriving home, she called a friend of her mother’s whose husband and child came to the house just as the prose-cutrix’s sister arrived. She made an immediate outcry and was taken to the hospital. The State’s evidence further reveals that at about the same time the assault was committed two Tyler police officers, who had received a suspicious person’s call, drove by the store in question and observed a man running from the vicinity of the business. While pursuing the individual, gunfire was exchanged and the officers finally apprehended the individual hiding under a porch with a pistol in his front pocket. He was identified as the appellant.

Immediately after his arrest, appellant was taken before the Honorable Glenn S. Phillips, Judge of the Municipal Court of the City of Tyler, who apprised the appellant of the charges of rape and assault with intent to murder a police officer and warned him of his rights in accordance with Article 15.17, Vernon’s Ann.C.C.P. Appellant signed a statement that he had been so warned. Immediately thereafter, appellant was taken to the detective’s office where he was again warned pursuant to Article 38.22, Vernon’s Ann.C.C.P., and Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966), by Officer Gerald Hayden. Hayden related that appellant stated he understood his rights, did not want a lawyer, and wanted to make a statement, which he did in his own handwriting and then signed after reading the same aloud, which contained on its face the Miranda warnings and a waiver of the right to counsel and the privilege against self-incrimination.

Testifying at the motion to suppress, which constituted the Jackson v. Denno 1 or Article 38.22, Vernon’s Ann.C.C.P., hearing, the appellant asserted that he was coerced in making the statement since one of the officers stated that if he didn’t the officers “would make it hard for the appellant.”

At the conclusion of the hearing the careful trial judge filed his detailed findings of fact and conclusions of law, deciding “beyond a reasonable doubt that the said statement or confession was freely and voluntarily made without any kind of persuasion or compulsion or threats of any kind, and without any promises of any kind have been made to him.” He further found that the proper warnings had been given and that appellant had affirmatively waived his rights.

Thereafter, substantially the same evidence on the admissibility and voluntariness of the confession was admitted before the jury and the issue thereon was submitted to the jury during the guilt-innocence stage of the appellant’s trial.

In his first ground of error appellant complains the “prosecution in closing argument improperly informed the jury of the trial judge’s findings that the appellant’s purported confession was voluntary and properly admissible contrary” to Article 38.22, Vernon’s Ann.C.C.P.

During the State’s jury argument at the guilt stage, the following is shown:

“MR. TATUM (Prosecutor): . . . Confessions, there’s not a thing in the world wrong with confessions. I guess *947 one of our largest religions has as its very foundation the idea that people ought to confess and clear their conscience of what they have done, and it’s not unclean, it’s not unlawful, if there is anything wrong at all with the confession, Judge Power wouldn’t have let it into evidence, and that goes to show — .
“MR. LONG: Objection, Your Honor, that is an unwarranted comment also. Your Honor, may we approach the Bench on that, please?
“THE COURT: Yes, sir.
“(Discussion held at the Bench and the following objection made out of hearing of the Jury.)
“MR. LONG: We object to Counsel’s last remark that the Court would not have allowed the confession unless he thought that it was voluntary and good, we object to that because it tells the Jury that the Judge has passed on its voluntariness, it removes any freedom from the Jury to determine voluntariness on their own, it lends the added weight and prestige of the Court in sanctioning the validity of the confession. We respectfully object to that and request that the Jury be instructed to disregard it and Counsel instructed not to make any further comments along that line.
“THE COURT: Okay. I’m going to sustain the objection. Ladies and Gentlemen, you will not consider the statement of Counsel with reference to the Court permitting the confession in evidence for any reason or any purpose. Go ahead.
“MR. TATUM: Certainly, I’m not suggesting to this Jury nor would I suggest to a Jury that Judge Power by admitting something vouches for its truth, he doesn’t, he leaves that up to a Jury to decide whether or not something is true, but as to points of law, whether or not certain things are material to a case, those are objections of the law that the Court rules on . . . . ”

Section 2 of Article 38.22, Vernon’s Ann.C.C.P., provides in part:

“. . . If the confession or statement has been found to have been voluntarily made and held admissible as a matter of law and fact by the court in a hearing in the absence of the jury, the court must enter an order stating its findings, which order shall be filed among the papers of the cause. Such order shall mot be exhibited to the jury nor the finding thereof made known to the jury in any manner . . . .” (Emphasis supplied)

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Johnson v. State, 510 S.W.2d 944, 1974 Tex. Crim. App. LEXIS 1794 (Tex. 1974).

510 S.W.2d 944 (Johnson v. State) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.

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