Odom v. State

403 So. 2d 936
CourtSupreme Court of Florida
DecidedJuly 23, 1981
Docket50575
StatusPublished
Cited by96 cases

This text of 403 So. 2d 936 (Odom v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Florida primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Odom v. State, 403 So. 2d 936 (Fla. 1981).

Opinion

403 So.2d 936 (1981)

Eddie ODOM, Appellant,
v.
STATE of Florida, Appellee.

No. 50575.

Supreme Court of Florida.

July 23, 1981.
Rehearing Denied October 15, 1981.

*938 J. Craig Williams and James O. Brecher of Taylor & Brecher, Jacksonville, for appellant.

Jim Smith, Atty. Gen., and Raymond L. Marky, Asst. Atty. Gen., Tallahassee, for appellee.

PER CURIAM.

This cause is before the Court on appeal from a judgment of the Circuit Court of the Fourth Judicial Circuit, Duval County. In a jury trial, appellant was convicted of murder in the first degree. The court imposed a sentence of death. This Court has jurisdiction of the appeal. Art. V, § 3(b)(1), Fla. Const.

Appellant presents several contentions of reversible trial error. For reasons to be discussed below, we find them to be without merit. Furthermore, the verdict is supported by the evidence. There being no reversible error going to the conviction of murder in the first degree, we affirm it. Finding that the state failed to establish any statutory aggravating circumstances, however, we hold that the sentencing court should have adopted the jury's recommendation of life imprisonment. We vacate the sentence of death and order that appellant be sentenced to life imprisonment without eligibility for parole for twenty-five years.

I. FACTS

On January 27, 1976, Joe Richards went to Eddie Odom's home and made threats to Nira Gail Odom, appellant's wife. She called the police. Odom, who had been absent, came home and then police officers arrived. While the police were there, Richards telephoned Odom. The police officers listened on an extension phone as Richards claimed that appellant owed him money and threatened to kill him if he did not pay. That night, Odom, Robert Lewis, and Charles Jimmy Carter went to Richards' home. Carter waited in a van while Odom and Lewis went to a bedroom window of the house and shot Richards, instantly causing his death. Two women were in the room with Richards. One of them sustained a minor shotgun wound.

Charles Jimmy Carter, originally arrested on a charge of first-degree murder, was given immunity and testified that he drove the van to Richards' house with Odom and Lewis as his passengers. Odom and Lewis, he said, armed with a .30-.30 rifle and a shotgun respectively, went up to the house. Carter testified that he then heard gunshots, after which Odom and Lewis came running back to the van. They got in, and he drove to a bridge over the Trout River. He threw the rifle over the side of the bridge. Carter said that he participated in the killing because he, like Odom and Lewis, mortally feared Joe Richards.

Barbara Jones, sister of Nira Gail Odom, testified that she was at the Odom home on January 27 and heard Richards' threats. She testified that that afternoon, Odom borrowed a .30-.30 rifle from her nephew, Michael Hilliard. She was also there at 10:00 p.m. that night when appellant came in saying, "It's over. He's dead." Barbara Jones testified that Odom then talked in detail about the shooting.

Barbara Jones' husband Gerald Jones testified that he, too, was present and heard appellant admit his participation in the murder. Gerald and Barbara Jones contacted the authorities, they said, because they felt they were in danger from Lewis and Carter on account of their knowledge *939 of the crime. Subsequently Gerald Jones, in cooperation with police, wore a hidden transmitter and engaged Odom in a conversation in which he made incriminating statements which the police recorded. The recording was admitted in evidence and Jones testified about the contents of the recorded conversation.

Police recovered a .30-.30 rifle from the Trout River. Michael Hilliard identified it as the one he gave to Odom. Several months before the crime, the rifle had been fired in a wooded area. Police recovered a spent .30-.30 casing from the place where the rifle had been fired. Three casings were found at the scene of the murder One casing was found in the rifle recovered from the river. A ballistics expert testified that all five were fired by the same weapon. The expert stated further that because of corrosion he was unable to determine whether the rifle recovered from the river was that weapon.

We conclude from our review of the record that the verdict of guilt was supported by competent, substantial evidence.

II. ISSUES ON APPEAL OF THE JUDGMENT OF CONVICTION

A.

Odom argues that the court should not have admitted into evidence the tape recording of his conversations with Gerald Jones. Although we rule that the tape was improper evidence, we do not reach this conclusion on any of the grounds argued by appellant. In support of his motion to suppress the tape, he argued that admission would violate his rights under the Fourth and Fifth Amendments to the United States Constitution. These contentions are without merit. When Jones visited Odom and engaged him in conversation, there was no compulsion used. Odom's statements were purely voluntary. In order for the right against self-incrimination to be involved when statements are made, there must at least be some kind of compulsion. In Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966), cited by appellant, it was held that there is compulsion inherent in custodial interrogation. Here there was no compulsion, so appellant's Fifth Amendment rights were not violated. See Hoffa v. United States, 385 U.S. 293, 87 S.Ct. 408, 17 L.Ed.2d 374 (1966).

Having heard the appellant voluntarily make statements of an incriminating nature concerning his participation in the crime, Jones clearly could have testified from memory about the content of the statements. The Fourth Amendment does not protect a person from the possibility that one in whom he confides will violate the confidence. Hoffa v. United States, 385 U.S. 293, 87 S.Ct. 408, 17 L.Ed.2d 374 (1966). If this is so, then there is no bar under the United States Constitution to the introduction of more reliable and perhaps more credible evidence — recordings made by the informer or agent to whom the statements are made. United States v. Caceres, 440 U.S. 741, 99 S.Ct. 1465, 59 L.Ed.2d 733 (1979); United States v. White, 401 U.S. 745, 91 S.Ct. 1122, 28 L.Ed.2d 453 (1971); Lopez v. United States, 373 U.S. 427, 83 S.Ct. 1381, 10 L.Ed.2d 462 (1963).

Appellant also argues that the admission of the tape into evidence violated chapter 934, Florida Statutes (1975). Under the statute as written this argument is without merit. In enacting chapter 934, the legislature did not give article I, section 12, Florida Constitution, the interpretation we give it today. Thus the legislature did not intend to require a court order for the interception of wire or oral communications when one of the parties to the communication consents to the interception. § 934.01(4), Fla. Stat. (1975). Chapter 934 declares that it is lawful

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403 So. 2d 936, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/odom-v-state-fla-1981.