State v. Ester

436 So. 2d 543
Supreme Court of Louisiana·Decided September 1, 1983·No. 82-KA-1309·Published·Cited by 14 cases

Opinion

436 So.2d 543 (1983)

STATE of Louisiana
v.
George G. ESTER.

No. 82-KA-1309.

Supreme Court of Louisiana.

June 27, 1983.
Concurring Opinion September 1, 1983.
Rehearings Denied September 1, 1983.

*544 William J. Guste, Atty. Gen., Barbara Rutledge, Asst. Atty. Gen., Paul J. Carmouche, Dist. Atty., Sonia D. Peters, Catherine M. Estopinal, Dale Cox, Asst. Dist. Attys., for plaintiff-appellee.

William T. Giddens, Jeanette Garrett, Shreveport, for defendant-appellant.

WATSON, Justice.

Defendant, George G. Ester, was convicted by a jury of distribution of a Schedule II controlled dangerous substance, Phenmetrazine (Preludin), on July 11, 1981. (LSA-R.S. 40:967; 40:964). Defendant was sentenced to five and a half years at hard labor and has appealed his conviction and sentence, relying on six assignments of error.[1]

FACTS

William Hall, a former security officer at the L.S.U. Medical School and corrections officer at Angola, was doing undercover narcotics work for the Shreveport Police Department while awaiting training at the Shreveport Police Academy. During the course of his six week investigation, approximately twenty-two people were arrested, including defendant Ester.

On July 11, 1981, Hall was at the corner of Sprague and Mary Streets in the "Bottoms" area of Shreveport. He was approached and asked if he wanted to buy pills. Hall replied that he wanted two and paid $30; the street price for Preludin being $15 per tablet. The seller said he was called George. This transaction took place around 8:30 P.M. in the summertime when it was still light. Three surveillance officers, Burns, Gahagan and Bonnette, were listening to Hall's conversation but could not see him. After defendant left, Hall described his size, clothes and hair style to the listening officers. Immediately afterward, Officers Burns and Gahagan observed a man fitting the description standing on the corner in front of the Sprague Street Hotel. Officer Joe Gahagan testified that he recognized George: "I knew him as George Ester, but I couldn't recall his last name at that time." (Tr. 320) George was described as a regular on the corner.

Hall and the officers returned to the police station where a confidential informant who had been at the scene told them George's last name. Gahagan testified:

"The informant was telling me that the guy's name was George, and I couldn't understand the last name he was saying. I was thinking he was saying Ethridge or something like that. Then he told me *545 that the George was Susie Mae Kirkendorf's ex-old man or Susie Mae George she's also known, ex-old man. I knew who he was then. I knew him from that. I knew he was George Ester." (Tr. 163)

Because of prostitution investigations, Gahagan was familiar with Susie Mae and George. Hall then picked out Ester's photograph, the seventh in a large group. Hall was not prompted to select Ester's photograph and it was not identified for him. Less than thirty minutes elapsed between the purchase and the identification.

Defendant contended at trial that his cut-offs, white shirt and braids were common to many young men in the area that night and the officers may have confused him with someone else whose first or second name was George, one possibility being a Frank George from whom Hall also bought drugs. However, both Hall and Burns negated this possibility; they knew Frank George.

ASSIGNMENT OF ERROR NUMBER ONE

Defendant contends that the trial court erred in refusing to order the state to reveal the name of the confidential informant who aided the officers' identification.

Roviaro v. United States, 353 U.S. 53, 77 S.Ct. 623, 1 L.Ed.2d 639 (1957) discussed the problem involved in balancing the government's interest in encouraging anonymous information against the defendant's right to a fair trial. In Roviaro, because the informant had helped set up the criminal occurrence and played a prominent part in it, the trial court committed prejudicial error in allowing the government to withhold his identity. Here, the informant was not a participant in the crime and merely aided the police in identifying the defendant. State v. Dobson, 260 La. 471, 256 So.2d 594 (1971), cert. denied 409 U.S. 913, 93 S.Ct. 242, 34 L.Ed.2d 173 (1972); State v. Oliver, 430 So.2d 650 (La.1983).

From the officers' testimony, the informant merely prompted their memory and Ester undoubtedly would have been identified without his aid. The trial court did not err in ruling that Ester was not entitled to disclosure of the name of the confidential informant.

This assignment lacks merit.

ASSIGNMENT OF ERROR NUMBER TWO

Defendant was originally charged with two counts of distribution, one on July 11 and the other on July 17. The two charges were severed for trial. After defendant gave notice of an alibi defense, the state gave notice of its intention to introduce rebuttal evidence of the second offense to prove identity. The trial court ruled that this was permissible. After this ruling, defendant did not present his alibi defense and contends that the ruling deprived him of a fair trial.[2]

LSA-R.S. 15:446 provides as follows:

"When knowledge or intent forms an essential part of the inquiry, testimony may be offered of such acts, conduct or declarations of the accused as tend to establish such knowledge or intent and where the offense is one of a system, evidence is admissible to prove the continuity of the offense, and the commission of similar offenses for the purpose of showing guilty knowledge and intent, but not to prove the offense charged."

These two offenses involved the same parties, the same illegal substance and the same location. Both occurred within a week's time. Thus, it would logically appear that the crimes were the work of the same person. See State v. James, 396 So.2d 1281 (La.1981). However, since drug sales were endemic in the "Bottoms" area of Shreveport, the two offenses are not "signature crimes". James, 396 So.2d at 1287. *546 Nonetheless, when the pattern of two offenses is so identical, the system exception applies if identity of the defendant as the perpetrator is a crucial issue. State v. Banks, 307 So.2d 594 (La.1975). Identity of George Ester was conceded to be the only real issue. Compare State v. James, supra. Where identity is genuinely at issue, system evidence has relevance independent of defendant's criminal propensity and should be admitted if it meets the other tests of admissibility. State v. Hatcher, 372 So.2d 1024 (La.1979). Thus, with clear and convincing evidence that Ester committed the other crime and a similarity logically indicating that he committed both, evidence of that other crime would have been so relevant to the critical issue of his identity as the perpetrator of this crime that the probative value of the other crime would outweigh its prejudicial effect. State v. Humphrey, 412 So.2d 507 (La.1982); State v. Hatcher, supra; State v. Banks, supra. There is no Prieur[3] problem because defendant was given notice of the state's intention to introduce evidence of the other crime in rebuttal. As in Banks, evidence of the identical later act of misconduct would have been highly probative. The trial court did not err in its ruling.

This assignment lacks merit.

ASSIG

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