Patzka v. State

481 So. 2d 438, 1985 Ala. Crim. App. LEXIS 5881
CourtCourt of Criminal Appeals of Alabama
DecidedNovember 12, 1985
Docket3 Div. 707
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 481 So. 2d 438 (Patzka v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Criminal Appeals of Alabama primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Patzka v. State, 481 So. 2d 438, 1985 Ala. Crim. App. LEXIS 5881 (Ala. Ct. App. 1985).

Opinion

LEIGH M. CLARK, Retired Circuit Judge.

A jury found this appellant guilty on a trial on an indictment that charged that he “did engage in deviate sexual intercourse with Daniel K. Thanum by forcible compulsion, in violation of § 13A-6-63 of the Code of Alabama,” which by subsection (b) is classified as a Class A felony. After due notice by the State of its invocation of the law as to habitual felony offenders, a sentencing hearing was conducted, at the conclusion of which the trial court sentenced the defendant to life imprisonment without parole.

Six issues are presented in brief of counsel for appellant; the first three pertain to the question of the validity of the judgment of conviction and the last three pertain to some or all of the terms of the sentence imposed by the trial court. We discuss first the issues that pertain to the correctness of the judgment of conviction in the order presented in appellant’s brief. By the first of such issues, it is stated, “THE TRIAL COURT ERRED IN DENYING APPELLANT’S MOTION FOR FUNDS TO HIRE AN INVESTIGATOR.” Appellant’s attorney relies upon the following grounds of said motion:

“1. The Defendant is an indigent incarcerated and awaiting trial in Kilby Correctional Center.
“2. The Defendant is charged with sodomy in the 1st degree.
“3. Defendant’s attorney does not have the expertise in criminal investigation work to investigate the facts and wit[440]*440nesses surrounding the alleged crime with which the Defendant is charged. “Defendant’s attorney has no formal training in criminal investigation. Because of the large number of legal issues that must be researched and briefed, Defendant’s attorney does not physically have the time to interview all the potential witnesses that will be essential to providing the Defendant with an adequate defense. If the Defendant were not an indigent and could afford to hire a private criminal investigator, his attorney would advise the hiring of such an expert. Only with the use of an expert criminal investigator can the Defendant obtain an adequate defense and a fair trial.
“4. The State of Alabama has had trained criminal investigators investigating the alleged crime. The State of Alabama’s attorneys prosecuting the case against the Defendant have relied and will rely in the future on the evidence gathered by the State Investigator, whereas, because of his indigency, the Defendant’s attorney will not have this advantage nor will he have any way to meet or to counteract this advantage.”

Appellant’s attorney further argues that it was a “serious error of constitutional proportions to refuse to allow an indigent Defendant to present as complete and adequate a defense as a more prosperous defendant solely because of his inability to hire an expert investigator.” The same contention has been repeatedly rejected in opinions by the appellate courts of this State, which include the recent opinions by Judge Tyson in Willis v. State, 441 So.2d 1030, 1034 (Ala.Cr.App.1983) and Wiggins v. State, 440 So.2d 1164, 1167 (Ala.Cr.App.1983).

The only eyewitnesses to the crime alleged in the indictment were the alleged victim and the defendant, who gave conflicting versions as to what took place at the scene of the crime, which was in Kilby Prison in Montgomery County, where the alleged victim and defendant were inmates at the time. The alleged victim testified in detail that he was forced by the defendant to submit to the act of sodomy. There was no denial by defendant of his guilt of consensual “deviate sexual intercourse,” which constitutes a Class A misdemeanor. Alabama Criminal Code, § 13A-6-65. During the presentation of the evidence offered by the State, the State called Investigator Thomas G. Totty, an employee of the Alabama Board of Corrections, who testified as to a conversation between him and the defendant, in which defendant made some incriminating statements that are correctly characterized in the brief of counsel for appellant as “his alleged confession,” which constituted a typed copy that had been reproduced from a tape of the conversation. In arguing that the “purported confession should have been suppressed or excluded as involuntary under the ‘totality of the circumstances,’ ” the following are stated as the reasons for the position taken by appellant’s attorney:

“First, Appellant was relatively young (21 years of age) at the time his statement was made. Secondly, he had been confined within the penal system continuously since his sixteenth year of life and thereby deprived of a full opportunity to gain the kind of knowledge and experience necessary to fully comprehend his situation and evaluate his alternatives. Third, Appellant’s academic background raises additional questions concerning Appellant’s intellectual ability to rationally handle the situation in which he found himself on February 18th through the 23d of 1981. Appellant testified to the events which occurred during his formative years indicate an educational and intellectual deficiency, i.e., attending four years of elementary school in a foreign country where English was not taught, receiving failing grades in English thereafter, dropping out of school entirely in the ninth grade, and commitment to an institution for disturbed youth. While Appellant did testify that he had received a ‘diploma’ from Holman (a State correctional facility operated by the Department of Corrections) it is submitted that this is not a true indication of Appellant’s [441]*441ability to understand and comprehend on a level with other individuals who have not spent their entire adult life behind prison bars.”

The quoted argument has a persuasive tendency, but we are not convinced that the trial court was in error in overruling defendant’s motion to suppress the confession. The trial judge was in a better position than we to determine the voluntariness of the statement made by the defendant. We see no more reason to hold that defendant was no more “incapable of knowingly and intelligently waiving his rights against self-incrimination,” than was the appellant Myers, in Myers v. State, 431 So.2d 1342 (Ala.Cr.App.1982), cert, quashed, 431 So.2d 1346 (1983, wherein this Court per Judge CeCarlo stated:

“Appellant also argues that he was without the medication that he normally took for epilepsy and, as a result, was suffering from withdrawal at the time he made the statement. He asserts that the with- . drawal side effects rendered him incapable of knowingly and intelligently waiving his rights against self-incrimination.” “The voluntariness of a confession or incriminating statement is to be determined by the trial court from evidence presented at a hearing outside the presence of the jury. Jackson v. Denno, 378 U.S. 368, 84 S.Ct. 1774, 12 L.Ed.2d 908 (1964). The judge may hear evidence from both the prosecution and defense. Stewart v. State, 49 Ala.App. 681, 275 So.2d 360 (1973), and he is to make his determination upon a consideration of the ‘totality of the circumstances,’ Blackbum v. Alabama, 361 U.S. 199, 80 S.Ct. 274, 4 L.Ed.2d 242 (1960). Even when the evidence presented is in conflict, his finding will not be disturbed on appeal unless it is palpably contrary to the weight of the evidence or is manifestly wrong. Hewitt v. State, 389 So.2d 157 (Ala.Cr.App.1980); Kuczenska v. State,

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

Williams v. State
624 So. 2d 661 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Alabama, 1993)
Parker v. State
581 So. 2d 1211 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Alabama, 1990)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
481 So. 2d 438, 1985 Ala. Crim. App. LEXIS 5881, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/patzka-v-state-alacrimapp-1985.