Roach v. Moore

550 S.W.2d 256, 1977 Tenn. Crim. App. LEXIS 262
CourtCourt of Criminal Appeals of Tennessee
DecidedJanuary 12, 1977
StatusPublished
Cited by5 cases

This text of 550 S.W.2d 256 (Roach v. Moore) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Criminal Appeals of Tennessee primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Roach v. Moore, 550 S.W.2d 256, 1977 Tenn. Crim. App. LEXIS 262 (Tenn. Ct. App. 1977).

Opinion

OPINION

TATUM, Judge.

This is an appeal from the dismissal, after an evidentiary- he.aring, of the petition .for post-conviction relief (T.C.A. § 40-3801 et seq.) by the Circuit Court of Madison County-

The appellant and a co-defendant were convicted of burglary in the first degree and rape. The appellant was sentenced to imprisonment for not less than 5 nor more than 10 years for burglary and 21 years for rape. The appellant appealed to this Court where the burglary conviction was reversed and dismissed, and the rape conviction was affirmed.

The appellant then filed a petition for Writ of Error Coram Nobis, based on the discovery of a report of investigating police officers who arrived on the scene right after the crime was committed. The Trial Court dismissed this petition and this Court affirmed in Johnny Ray Roach v. State, (Tenn.Crim.App., filed at Jackson, June 30, 1976).

The appellant then filed his petition for post-conviction relief in the Circuit Court of Madison County and after an evidentiary hearing, the Trial Judge reduced the appellant’s sentence from 21 years to 10 years (the minimum allowable for rape) because in the principal trial, the jury was not instructed as to the allowable sentences for rape. The petition was otherwise overruled and the case is now before us for review.

The appellant first complains that the prosecution suppressed evidence favorable to him, thereby depriving him of due process, citing Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 883, 83 S.Ct. 1194, 10 L.Ed.2d 215 (1963), and Giles v. Maryland, 386 U.S. 66, 87 S.Ct. 793, 17 L.Ed.2d 737 (1967), and other cases of like import.

The appellant’s trial attorney requested information from the Madison County Sheriff’s Department and was told that there were no written statements or reports in the file. After the appellant’s conviction, it was determined that there was a report written by one of the investigating officers that had been misplaced in another file, stating among other things, that the victim had told the officers that the two men “attempted to rape her” and that “she succeeded in fighting them off”. The report also stated that the victim could “identify the subject with the long black hair”, and that she checked both doors before going to bed prior to the rape and that both were locked, “then unknown subjects had a key. . . ” [258]*258(Emphasis supplied). The appellant says that this report was vital to his defense for the purpose of impeaching the testimony of the prosecutrix.

The statement that the two persons attempted to rape her and that, “she succeeded in fighting them off”, is not contradictory to the evidence in the case. The victim testified that she went to a neighbor’s house where she talked to the neighbor and his wife. She admitted that she did not tell them that she had been raped until some time later. Another witness, Mrs. Knight, testified that she talked with the victim after they had seen the officers and that the victim did not admit that the rape had been successful until they had talked for some time. The two neighbors of the victim, to whom she fled immediately after this episode, likewise testified that it was some time later before she admitted that she had been raped. Both neighbors and Mrs. Knight testified that the victim did not then identify her assailants by name.

The Trial Judge found that since “certain other evidence was presented to cast doubt upon the testimony of the prosecutrix, the officers report would not have changed the facts as testified to by Mrs. Harrell Cough-lin, neighbor of the prosecutrix.”

In Brady v. Maryland, supra, it was held that “the suppression by the prosecution of evidence favorable to an accused upon request violates due process where the evidence is material either to guilt or to punishment irrespective of the good or bad faith of the prosecution”. (Emphasis supplied).

We agree with the learned Trial Judge that this deputy sheriff’s report would not have been material to the defense. All of the matters contained in the report were clearly established upon the trial by disinterested witnesses (prosecutrix’s two neighbors and Mrs. Knight), and the great bulk of the material in the report was admitted by the prosecutrix. The material in the report would have been indirect circumstantial evidence of already established facts. It was only cumulative evidence of facts already overwhelmingly established. The loss of such evidence, even if suppressed, could not be said to constitute a denial of due process. The suppression was not deliberate.

In Cason v. State, 503 S.W.2d 206, 209 (Tenn.Cr.App.1973), Judge Russell of this Court, discussed the Brady case and other decisions of the United States Supreme Court at length and held in part:

“The general rule is that in order to overturn a conviction on suppression-of-evidence grounds, the evidence suppressed must have been material or probative. . 34 A.L.R.3d 16, at 38. While suppression of some impeaching evidence can be grounds for a new trial, if merely impeaching, cumulative or corroborating it will not ordinarily invalidate a verdict. To do that, the evidence must be of a character to raise a substantial likelihood that it would have affected the result if known at the trial. Ingram v. Peyton, (C.A. 4, 1966), 367 F.2d 933.
The case of United States v. Keogh, (C.A. 2,1968), 391 F.2d 138,34 A.L.R.3d 1, holds that relief might be given where the suppression was not deliberate and no request made and where hindsight disclosed that the defense could have put the evidence to not insignificant use, but in such a case the ‘standard of materiality must be considerably higher’.”

In Giglio v. United States, 405 U.S. 150, 92 S.Ct. 763, 31 L.Ed.2d 104 (1972), the Court stated that a new trial is not required when the suppressed evidence is “possibly useful to the defense but not likely to have changed the verdict”, citing United States v. Keogh, 391 F.2d 138 (2nd Cir. 1968). We are convinced beyond a reasonable doubt that the Deputy Sheriff’s report would not have affected the verdict had it been in the hands of the appellant during the trial of the case. , Assignment I is overruled.

In Assignment II, the appellant says that his “warrantless arrest was illegal and violative of his Fourth and Fourteenth Amendment rights and therefore the fruits from the illegal arrest should have been excluded.” The appellant is specifically re[259]*259ferring to photographs taken of him during a line-up after arrest. He says that these photographs were shown to the prosecutrix for identification purposes.

The facts are erroneously stated by the appellant in his brief.

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Bluebook (online)
550 S.W.2d 256, 1977 Tenn. Crim. App. LEXIS 262, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/roach-v-moore-tenncrimapp-1977.