Mitchell v. State

690 N.E.2d 1200, 1998 Ind. App. LEXIS 19, 1998 WL 24270
CourtIndiana Court of Appeals
DecidedJanuary 26, 1998
Docket92A03-9604-CR-121
StatusPublished
Cited by17 cases

This text of 690 N.E.2d 1200 (Mitchell v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Indiana Court of Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Mitchell v. State, 690 N.E.2d 1200, 1998 Ind. App. LEXIS 19, 1998 WL 24270 (Ind. Ct. App. 1998).

Opinion

OPINION

STATON, Judge.

James A. Mitchell appeals his convictions following a jury trial for Robbery with a Deadly Weapon, a class B felony, 1 and Theft, a class D felony. 2 He raises four issues on appeal, which we restate as five:

I. Whether the trial court abused its discretion by admitting the pre-trial and in-court identification of Mitchell by the victim.
II. Whether the trial court abused its discretion by admitting evidence of Mitchell’s prior convictions.
III. Whether Mitchell’s twenty year sentence for Robbery with a Deadly Weapon is manifestly unreasonable.
IV. Whether Mitchell received ineffective assistance of counsel at trial.
V. Whether the Double Jeopardy Clause is violated by the trial court’s failure to merge Mitchell’s convictions for Robbery and Theft.

We affirm in part and reverse in part.

On July 1, 1995 at approximately 11:45 p.m., A.L. was the sole employee working at a Columbia City convenience store. A.L. watched a man drive up to an air compressor outside the store and put air in his tires. The lot outside the store was illuminated by floodlights, and A.L. had an unobstructed view of the man. A few minutes later, the man entered the store, pulled out a gun and a bag, pointed the gun at A.L., and demanded that she give him all of the large bills. A.L. and the man were face-to-face for one or two minutes, and they were about two feet *1203 apart. After A.L. gave him the money, the man ordered her to leave the store and ran.

A.L. ran to a nearby house and called the police. Over the phone, A.L. described the man who robbed the store. She indicated that he was approximately sixty years old and overweight, with glasses and gray hair. She also described his clothing, indicating that he was wearing blue jeans and a white t-shirt. A.L. described the man’s car as a white, large, older model car, possibly a 1980 Cadillac.

At 11:51 p.m., a police dispatcher relayed the information given by A.L. to patrolling officers. At 11:58 p.m., the Indiana State Police dispatcher, having been notified of the robbery, relayed the same information over the state police radio. State Trooper Kent Roe heard the dispatch, and eventually saw a light-colored, older Ford LTD traveling eastbound on U.S. 30, away from Columbia City. At the time, Roe believed the LTD was white; however, the actual color of the car was tan. Roe pulled in behind the car and noticed that the driver of the car was an elderly white male. At 12:06 a.m., Roe pulled the car over, approximately fourteen miles east of Columbia City.

The driver of the LTD was Mitchell. As Roe approached the car, Mitchell exited the vehicle and walked towards his rear bumper and asked Roe if he had been speeding. Roe ordered him to put his hands on the trank. A second state trooper arrived, and Mitchell was asked whether he had a weapon, to which he responded that he did not. Upon further investigation, Roe saw a brown paper bag at the base of the ear’s driver’s seat which contained a hand gun holster. Roe found another bag shoved underneath the seat which contained a loaded hand gun. Roe then arrested Mitchell. Mitchell was wearing a blue jump suit. Mitchell’s car was inventoried, and twenty-eight dollars was found in a brown paper bag under the floor mat on the driver’s side. After a short delay, the troopers were advised to bring Mitchell to the Whitley County Jail.

Meanwhile, A.L. returned to the convenience store and gave a written statement to Columbia City police officer Doug Eber. In this statement, she described the robber as five feet, seven inches tall, and she described his gun as a black revolver. A.L. was then told that a suspect had been apprehended and was asked to go to the Whitley County Jail, for what she believed to be a line-up or other identification process.

While in the jail lobby with her employer at approximately 2:00 a.m., A.L. observed Mitchell being walked across the jail lobby by an officer. Her employer asked A.L. whether Mitchell was the man who robbed her, and she indicated that he was. A lineup was not conducted that night because no other inmates were Mitchell’s age.

I.

Identification Evidence

Mitchell contends that the trial court abused its discretion by admitting A.L.’s pretrial and in-court identification of him as the robber. Mitchell characterizes his confrontation with A.L., in the lobby of the Whitley County Jail, as one which was deliberately planned and executed by the police in an effort to improperly suggest to A.L. that Mitchell was the man who robbed the convenience store. Mitchell argues that the suggestiveness of the procedure employed by the police resulted in a misidentification and denied him due process.

The United States Supreme Court and the Indiana Supreme Court have both condemned the practice of conducting a one-on-one show-up because of its inherent suggestiveness. Wethington v. State, 560 N.E.2d 496, 501 (Ind.1990). In Stovall v. Denno, 388 U.S. 293, 87 S.Ct. 1967, 18 L.Ed.2d 1199 (1967), the United States Supreme Court held that a show-up confrontation between a criminal defendant and a witness may deny a defendant due process of law under the Fourteenth Amendment. 388 U.S. at 301-02, 87 S.Ct. at 1972-73. Nonetheless, identification evidence gathered via a show-up procedure is not subject to a per se rule of exclusion. Wethington, 560 N.E.2d at 501. “Rather, the admissibility of the evidence turns on an evaluation of whether, under the totality of the circumstances, the confrontation was conducted ‘in such a fashion as to lead the witness to make a mistaken identification.’ ” Id. (quoting Dillard v. *1204 State, 257 Ind. 282, 274 N.E.2d 387, 389 (1971)).

The Indiana Supreme Court has identified a number of factors to be "considered in determining whether a show-up is likely to lead to a misidentification. They include: (1) the opportunity of the witness to view the criminal at the time of the crime, (2) the length of initial observation of the criminal, (3) lighting conditions, (4) distance between the witness and the criminal, (5) the witness’s degree of attention, (6) the accuracy of the witness’s prior description of the criminal, (7) the level of certainty demonstrated by the witness, and (8) any identifications of another person. See James v. State, 613 N.E.2d 15, 27 (Ind.1993); Craig v. State, 515 N.E.2d 862, 864 (Ind.1987).

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
690 N.E.2d 1200, 1998 Ind. App. LEXIS 19, 1998 WL 24270, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/mitchell-v-state-indctapp-1998.