Kilburn v. State

490 S.W.2d 551, 1973 Tex. Crim. App. LEXIS 2334
CourtCourt of Criminal Appeals of Texas
DecidedFebruary 21, 1973
Docket45760
StatusPublished
Cited by20 cases

This text of 490 S.W.2d 551 (Kilburn v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Kilburn v. State, 490 S.W.2d 551, 1973 Tex. Crim. App. LEXIS 2334 (Tex. 1973).

Opinion

OPINION

DALLY, Commissioner.

The conviction is for the sale of Lysergic Acid Diethylamide, a dangerous drug; the punishment ten years imprisonment.

In one ground of error the appellant asserts that “the trial court erred in failing to rule and find that the appellant was entrapped in the commission of the alleged offense, as a matter of law.”

Jimmy R. Mull testified that, while acting as an undercover agent for the Texas Department of Public Safety, he, accompanied by Eddie Dodson, an acquaintance of the appellant, was driving past the *553 house of the appellant’s parents in Lubbock when they saw the appellant in the yard and stopped to talk with him. The appellant came out to their car and got in the back seat. The appellant was introduced to the agent by Dodson, who told the appellant that the agent was “cool.” The appellant then told them that he had lost some “speed” in his car and had been looking for it. The appellant then produced a tin box of fifteen or twenty pills in it which he said were “speed” and asked Dodson and the agent if they wanted some. He was told they did not. The appellant was smoking a pipe which he said contained marihuana and opium. Mull and Dodson declined the appellant’s offer to let them smoke the pipe. After some discussion concerning the appellant just getting out of jail, he asked the agent and Dodson if they knew anyone who wanted to buy thirty or forty “hits” of LSD. The agent said that he would like to buy forty “hits” of LSD and the appellant said that he would sell that quantity for forty-five dollars. The agent agreed and was told to come back at 3 P.M. The agent did come back at 3 P.M. but was given a message by the appellant’s mother to come back later. The appellant then reported some difficulty in obtaining the LSD and arranged to meet the agent still later that evening in a parking lot. The agent and the appellant met at the appointed place and the appellant laid a field jacket on the car seat and poured out a number of orange tablets which he called “orange sunshine.” There were thirty-seven tablets which the agent replaced in the small plastic bag.

This evidence obviously does not show entrapment as a matter of law.

“It is the general rule that where the criminal intent originates in the mind of an accused, the fact that the officers furnish the opportunity for or aid the accused in the commission of a crime constitutes no defense to such a prosecution. However, if the criminal design originates in the mind of the officer and he induces a person to commit a crime which he would not otherwise have committed except for such inducement, such is entrapment and, in law, may constitute a defense.” Sutton v. State, 170 Tex.Cr.R. 617, 343 S.W.2d 452 (1961).

See also Jones v. State, 427 S.W.2d 616 (Tex.Cr.App.1968); Mistrot v. State, 471 S.W.2d 831 (Tex.Cr.App.1971) and Vera v. State, 473 S.W.2d 22 (Tex.Cr.App.1971).

The appellant’s own testimony raised the issue of entrapment and such a charge was submitted to and rejected by the jury. See Sutton v. State, supra; Jones v. State, supra.

The appellant next complains that “the trial court erred in admitting prosecution exhibit number one because the prosecution failed to prove an adequate chain of custody.”

The appellant concedes that the Department of Public Safety chemist, John R. McCutcheon’s testimony “authenticated” the tablet introduced as part of exhibit number one, as being “the same tablets upon which he performed his chemical analysis.” The chemist testified that one of the thirty-seven tablets, which he had selected at random from the group, had been consumed in his analysis to determine its chemical composition.

The appellant argues specifically that because of the “absent testimony by the mail clerk who received the envelope and the chemist who opened such envelope, the state has failed to establish an adequate chain of custody as to such exhibit.”

Mull, the undercover agent, identified state’s exhibit number one as being a brown manila envelope which he mailed to the Texas Department of Public Safety Chemistry Laboratory in Austin. Inside the brown envelope was a white envelope. The agent said he had placed on the white envelope the name Joe Kilburn — age approximately thirty — sale and possession of a dangerous drug — the date of the offense —the location, Lubbock — he noted that the *554 white envelope contained a plastic bag containing thirty-seven orange tablets — LSD. He had then signed the white envelope and placed thereon his Department of Public Safety identification number. Mull then placed the plastic bag with the thirty-seven tablets into the white envelope, sealed it, placed the white envelope in the brown envelope, sealed it, and mailed them to Austin. Upon viewing the tablets while he was testifying, he said they appeared to be the same as those sold to him by appellant and the ones he had sent to the laboratory for analysis.

Testimony showed that the sealed brown envelope was delivered to the Chemistry Laboratory of the Department of Public Safety in Austin by an unknown mail clerk. The chemist, McCutcheon, said of course he could not remember the specific delivery of this piece of evidence. He testified that when envelopes containing evidence arrived at the laboratory they were opened before all of the chemists present. The brown envelope would have been opened and the undercover agent’s notes would be used in order to get information to open a file folder which was made up for the use of the laboratory. A case number would then be assigned and placed on the envelope. The case number in this instance was L-108012, placed on the envelope on May 3, 1971. The brown envelope would then be resealed with the white envelope still within it and placed in the vault in the laboratory. When Mc-Cutcheon was assigned the file in this case he obtained the envelope from the vault, unsealed it, selected one of the tablets and performed the chemical tests and analysis necessary. He then placed his name and the date on the envelope, sealed it and returned it to the vault. He later obtained this envelope from the vault and brought it to Lubbock when he came to testify in this case.

McCutcheon further testified that during working hours the vault door remained open while the twelve chemists, or some of them, were at work in the laboratory. When they were not present the vault would be closed. The evidence shows a chain of custody sufficient for its admission into evidence. Witt v. State, 475 S.W.2d 259 (Tex.Cr.App.1971); Walker V. State, 470 S.W.2d 669 (Tex.Cr.App.1971) and Andrews v. State, 436 S.W.2d 546 (Tex.Cr.App.1968).

The appellant also urges that the failure of the trial court to grant a mistrial was error after the prosecuting attorney had offered into evidence a written report which the undercover agent had made.

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Bluebook (online)
490 S.W.2d 551, 1973 Tex. Crim. App. LEXIS 2334, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/kilburn-v-state-texcrimapp-1973.