State v. Cooper

403 S.W.2d 619, 1966 Mo. LEXIS 738
CourtSupreme Court of Missouri
DecidedJune 13, 1966
DocketNo. 50623
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 403 S.W.2d 619 (State v. Cooper) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Missouri primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
State v. Cooper, 403 S.W.2d 619, 1966 Mo. LEXIS 738 (Mo. 1966).

Opinion

BARRETT, Commissioner.

While set forth in a long, single-count petition, commingled with extensive argument and brief, this is in fact a two-pronged proceeding by a prisoner under life sentence to (1) withdraw a plea of guilty under Criminal Rule 27.25, V.A.M.R., and (2) a motion to vacate sentence and judgment under Criminal Rule 27.26. The court in which the appellant, Gordon Lee Cooper, was originally sentenced examined the combined motions and “all of the records of this cause” and found that the motions (a) did not state “facts sufficient to constitute a cause for relief,” and (b) that “substantially the same issues involved in both of these motions” had been previously decided against the petitioner in another 27.26 proceeding (State v. Cooper, Mo., 344 S.W.2d 72, certiorari denied 368 U.S. 855, 82 S.Ct. 91, 7 L.Ed.2d 52) and therefore summarily denied relief. He has been furnished a transcript of this proceeding and again has been permitted to appeal to this court.

And before considering this appeal it is necessary to note the original charge and the circumstances in which it was filed. The appellant was charged with and entered a plea of guilty to robbery in the first degree. In brief the circumstances were these: On June 16, 1953, Cooper, then 32 years of age, was being held in the Butler County jail “for safe keeping for Stoddard County.” On that date when the jailer Landreth went to the jail to feed the prisoners, Cooper and another prisoner “jumped on Deputy Sheriff Landreth and beat him up severely,” took the jail keys and $160 in cash from his person, and escaped. On July 6, 1953, Cooper, after the appointment of two lawyers to represent him, entered a plea of guilty in the circumstances set forth in the former opinion, 344 S.W.2d 72, and was sentenced to life imprisonment. These facts appear from the former appeal and upon this appeal in complaining of the prosecutor’s failure to give the court certain information the appellant supplies these additional facts; “He failed to inform the Court as to the facts concerning the escape from jail. He failed to inform the Court that Mr. Landreth’s wallet was picked up from the floor after the terrible struggle and fight between Mr. Landreth and the defendant that took place at the time of the escape and that said wallet was picked up by the defendant, after defendant had Mr. Landreth locked into a cell and was on his way to the elevator shaft to leave the jail. He failed to inform the Court or describe the ‘so-called’ blunt instrument in some small way or to introduce such weapon into Court as evidence in the cause.”

In this background all the parties, the state as well as the appellant, are proceeding under a number of misapprehensions as to the force and effect of what has gone on before and what is open to consideration upon this appeal in this particular proceeding. The state has cited and relied upon cases, as State v. Howard, Mo., 383 S.W.2d 701, in which the appellant had first been tried before a jury and appealed [621]*621his conviction to this court and thereafter instituted a 27.26 proceeding collaterally attacking the judgment. In those cases there was of course available to the court and the parties a full transcript and matters were or might have been presented which could not arise where as here there was a plea of guilty in the first instance. Then too upon his prior appeal in a 27.26 proceeding Cooper raised four specific matters against the judgment and sentence. They were in substance (1) that he was charged by information rather than by an indictment, (2) that he was denied the right to appear and prove certain allegations, (3) that he was denied a preliminary hearing and (4) that jurisdiction of his cause was in the magistrate court, not the circuit court. This court carefully considered each of these matters, found that they were without merit and of course affirmed the trial court’s denial not only of a hearing on the petition but of its summary dismissal of the proceeding. But the four matters raised in that appeal are not again raised in this proceeding and obviously the opinion in that case is not conclusive as to the entirely different matters sought to be raised in this proceeding, particularly as to the motion to withdraw the plea of guilty under rule 27.25. On the other hand, while apparently recognizing the necessity of invalidating and setting aside his plea of guilty, the appellant nevertheless attempts to raise certain matters that could only have occurred upon a jury trial of the robbery charge on its merits, eviden-tiary matters and other questions that necessarily would have been in a motion for a new trial or considered only in an appeal on its merits and this he may not do upon this particular appeal. State v. Worley, Mo., 371 S.W.2d 221; State v. Cerny, 365 Mo. 732, 286 S.W.2d 804; Richardson v. United States, (Eighth Circuit) 217 F.2d 696. And these matters, such as failure of the state to produce the “blunt instrument” with which Cooper struck Mr. Landreth, will neither be set forth nor considered upon this appeal, it is sufficient to say that his own statement of the facts demonstrates his guilt of robbery in the first degree and in the circumstances a punishment within the statutory limits. RSMo 1959, § 560.135, V.A.M.S.; State v. Churchill, Mo., 299 S.W.2d 475.

In his petition the appellant sets forth nine of these “allegations raised in point and authorities cited” all of which he claims in one way or another infringe his constitutional rights or constitute reasons why he should, thirteen years after the event, be permitted to withdraw his plea of guilty. Mere conclusions aside, five of these points are related and attempt to present the question that arises when both court and counsel, often when there is a lack of defense counsel, are misinformed as to a prisoner’s prior felony record resulting in a “careless or designed pronouncement of sentence on a foundation so extensively and materially false, which the prisoner had no opportunity to correct by the services which counsel would provide, that renders the proceedings lacking in due process.” Townsend v. Burke, 334 U.S. 736, 741, 68 S.Ct. 1252, 1255, 92 L.Ed. 1690, 1693; Ex parte Hoopsick, 172 Pa.Super. 12, 91 A.2d 241. Needless to say due process does impose some restraint “to assure the essential fairness of the procedure by which a judge shall exercise discretion in fixing punishment within permissible limits” (Annotation 3 L.Ed.2d 516) but upon this record there is no allegation of fact and no circumstance making a fact issue as to any material matter entering into the appellant’s plea of guilty and sentence.

Going only to the withdrawal of his plea of guilty his claim of “false information” does not relate to his prior felony record, which, incidentally is not denied, it relates only to an assertion that the court was misinformed as to any “detainers or ‘hold orders’ that he (the prosecuting attorney) claimed was issued by Federal authorities and State authorities from Stoddard County, and placed against this defendant, in the hands of the Sheriff, to be delivered to [622]

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Bluebook (online)
403 S.W.2d 619, 1966 Mo. LEXIS 738, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-cooper-mo-1966.