Poke v. State

1973 OK CR 422, 515 P.2d 252, 1973 Okla. Crim. App. LEXIS 661
CourtCourt of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma
DecidedOctober 18, 1973
DocketF-73-86
StatusPublished
Cited by17 cases

This text of 1973 OK CR 422 (Poke v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Poke v. State, 1973 OK CR 422, 515 P.2d 252, 1973 Okla. Crim. App. LEXIS 661 (Okla. Ct. App. 1973).

Opinion

OPINION

BRETT, Judge:

Appellant, David Wayne Poke, hereinafter referred to as defendant, was charged, tried and convicted in the District Court, Tulsa County, Case No. CRF-72-1884, for the offense of Grand Larceny, After Former Conviction of a Felony, in violation of 21 O.S.1971, § 1701. He was sentenced to serve a term of ten (10) years in the state penitentiary in accordance with the verdict of the jury, and a timely appeal has been perfected to this Court.

At the trial Wilbert Harrison, Jr., testifying on behalf of the State, stated that on the morning of July 11, 1972, while on his way to work, he had stopped at the Tulsa Quick-Trip Store to buy milk and a cupcake. As he sat in his car just outside the *253 store eating this improvised breakfast, a girl parked a delivery truck directly beside him and carried a box into the store. He thereafter observed her return to the truck momentarily and then go back into the store. During the entire time Mr. Harrison had been parked outside the Quick-Trip, he had observed a man wearing a black hat with a bill standing on the sidewalk directly in front of Harrison’s car. After the girl had entered the store for the second time, that man, having first peered through the window into the store, approached Mr. Harrison’s car. Standing in the space between that car and the truck, he greeted Mr. Harrison with “What’s going on, brother” or similar words. (Tr. 31) Having thus observed the social amenities, the man turned his attention to the delivery truck. Reaching inside, he withdrew a red and blue purse and tucking it under his arm, walked away, disappearing around a nearby corner. Mr. Harrison then entered the grocery store in search of the truck’s driver, and finding her, related the episode he had just observed. In the course of his testimony, Mr. Harrison identified the man whom he had seen take the purse as the defendant.

Maria Jane Riddle testified that on July 11, 1972, at approximately 7:30 a. m. she arrived, as she did regularly each morning, at the Quick-Trip Store at 720 North Main Street, the first stop on her delivery route. She stated that she parked her truck outside the store and carried a box of sandwiches inside. Once inside, she discovered that she had no pen and returned to her truck for money to buy one. At the truck, she took her purse from under the front seat, got the money she needed from an envelope inside the purse and returned to the store, leaving her purse on the seat of the truck covered with a sweater. As she walked back toward the store, she noticed a man standing on the sidewalk. She stated that after Mr. Harrison told her that her purse had been taken, she ran out of the store, greatly upset because the purse contained $250. Once outside, she asked which way the man had gone and was told that he went toward the alley. Meanwhile, the attendant from the Quick-Trip Store had offered the services of his motorcycle. Mrs. Riddle climbed on the motorcycle behind him and the two set off in pursuit of her purse, leaving Mr. Harrison behind to await the arrival of the police. As she rode along, Mrs. Riddle saw a man standing in an alley rummaging through her purse. She described him as black man, slender, of less .than medium height, wearing a black hat and a blue shirt. When he saw the motorcycle coming toward him, he dropped the purse and escaped between the buildings before Mrs. Riddle was close enough to see his face. She testified that the purse that she found laying in the alley where she had seen the man drop it was her own and that the envelope containing the money was gone from it.

Carl Wayne Westfall, the Quick-Trip attendant, testified to his part in the motorcycle chase. He stated that he had seen the man in the alley holding the purse and had observed that he was wearing a black hat, a blue shirt, and blue jeans, but had not gotten close enough to see the man’s face.

Fred Parks, a Tulsa Police Officer, testified that during the course of his investigation of the larceny of Mrs. Riddle’s purse, he had twice contacted Wilbert Harrison for the purpose of obtaining a complete description of the thief. The second time Mr. Harrison talked to the officer, on July 27, 1973, he told him that he had subsequently seen the man who had taken the purse sitting on the porch of an apartment house at a specified Tulsa address. On the basis of that information, Officer Parks went to the address given and placed the defendant under arrest.

Following the testimony of Officer Parks, the State rested its case.

For the defense, the defendant’s mother, Mrs. Henrietta Poke, testified that on July 11, 1972, her son was staying at her house. She stated that she arose at approximately 8:15 that morning and that she remem *254 bered seeing her son, the defendant, asleep on the studio couch.

Following the testimony of Mrs. Poke, the defense rested.

In the second stage of the trial the State offered into evidence the second page of the Information, the Judgment and Sentence of the defendant’s prior conviction of a felony for the crime of Larceny of Merchandise from a Retailer. That document was admitted into evidence upon the stipulation of the defense that the allegations contained therein are true and correct and to the identity of the defendant.

In his first proposition the defendant attempts to once more raise for this Court’s consideration the issue of the effect of Lamb v. Brown, 456 F.2d 18 (10th Cir. 1972) in a collateral attack upon a conviction which became a final judgment prior to the date of that decision. It is his contention that the trial court erred in the second stage of his trial by permitting the introduction into evidence of his sole prior conviction because that conviction was sustained when he was seventeen years of age.

The Tenth Circuit in Lamb v. Brown specifically held that its ruling which condemned Oklahoma’s statutory scheme allowing females under the age of eighteen years the benefits of juvenile court treatment while limiting those same benefits to males under sixteen years of age, was not to apply retroactively.

It is clear that the Federal constitution does not compel in every case the retroactivity of a “new” constitutional ruling such as that announced in Lamb v. Brown. See Linkletter v. Walker, 381 U. S. 618, 85 S.Ct. 1731, 14 L.Ed.2d 601 (1965). Rather, the extent of the retrospective effect of such a law-making opinion is to be determined by a balancing process which considers: (a) the purpose to be served by the new standards; (b) the expense of justifiable reliance by law enforcement authorities upon the old standards; and, (c) the effect on the administration of justice of a particular retroactive application of the new standards. See Desist v. United States, 394 U.S. 244, 249, 89 S.Ct. 1030, 1033, 22 L.Ed.2d 248 (1969).

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
1973 OK CR 422, 515 P.2d 252, 1973 Okla. Crim. App. LEXIS 661, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/poke-v-state-oklacrimapp-1973.