State v. Goebel

240 P.2d 251, 40 Wash. 2d 18, 1952 Wash. LEXIS 275
CourtWashington Supreme Court
DecidedJanuary 24, 1952
Docket31630
StatusPublished
Cited by128 cases

This text of 240 P.2d 251 (State v. Goebel) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Washington Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
State v. Goebel, 240 P.2d 251, 40 Wash. 2d 18, 1952 Wash. LEXIS 275 (Wash. 1952).

Opinions

[20]*20Hamley, J.

This appeal follows the second trial of Lee Raymond Goebel on charges of committing rape and sodomy on a woman on February 8, 1949 (counts I and II), and of committing rape and sodomy on another woman on March 29, 1949 (counts III and IV). At the first trial, Goebel was convicted on all four counts. We reversed and remanded for a new trial. State v. Goebel, 36 Wn. (2d) 367, 218 P. (2d) 300. At the new trial, Goebel was acquitted on the two rape counts, but convicted on the sodomy counts. Judgment was entered accordingly, and defendant appeals.

Appellant first assigns as error the admission of a signed confession (exhibit 19) relating the details of an assault committed by appellant upon a third woman on March 29, 1949, just prior to the assault charged in counts III and IV.

This is the same exhibit the admission of which, in the first Goebel trial (as exhibit 17), led to the reversal and remand. In the first trial, the confession of the other offense was admitted for the purpose of impeachment upon a collateral issue—appellant’s route on the night in question. We held the evidence inadmissible on that basis. On that appeal, the state argued that the evidence was also admissible (1) to rebut the defensive theory, and (2) to show the plan, scheme, or bent of mind of defendant. We did not pass on the merits of that contention, but held that the admission of evidence, received by the trial court on an erroneous theory, may not be justified on a proper theory advanced for the first time on appeal.

At the second trial,. exhibit 19 was not offered for the purpose of impeachment or to affect appellant’s credibility as a witness, as he did not testify in his own defense. Instead, the state offered the exhibit on its case in chief to show intent, motive, modus operandi, and plan, scheme, or design. Over appellant’s objection, the trial court admitted the exhibit as tending to show plan, scheme, or design.

At the time the exhibit was received, the court instructed the jury that exhibit 19 was admitted for a strictly limited purpose and should be considered only for whatever bearing it might have upon the question of a common scheme or plan in connection with the rape charges contained in counts [21]*211 and III. The jury were told that if they found that the exhibit contained evidence of the commission of any crime by appellant, “you will totally disregard that fact.” The substance of this instruction was repeated in the court’s instruction 10, given at the close of the trial.

The rule, amply documented in our previous opinion involving this appellant, is that a defendant must be tried for the offenses charged in the indictment or information, and that evidence of unrelated crimes may not be admitted. As also indicated in State v. Goebel, supra, certain exceptions to this rule of exclusion have developed. These exceptions are to show (1) motive, (2) intent, (3) the absence of accident or mistake, (4) a common scheme or plan, or (5) identity. This list of exceptions is not necessarily exclusive, the true test being whether the evidence as to other offenses is relevant and necessary to prove an essential ingredient of the crime charged. State v. Lew, 26 Wn. (2d) 394, 174 P. (2d) 291.

The only purpose of showing a common scheme or plan is to establish, circumstantially, the commission of the act charged and the intent with which it was committed. 2 Wigmore on Evidence (3d ed.) 192, § 300. Strictly speaking, the scope of this exception is limited to evidence which shows some causal connection between the two offenses, so that proof of the other offense could be said to evidence a pre-existing design, system, plan, or scheme directed toward the doing of the very act charged. Wigmore, supra, p. 202, § 304. The exception has been so construed and applied in such cases as State v. Pittam, 32 Wash. 137, 72 Pac. 1042, involving a prosecution for embezzling funds of an employer, and State v. Craddick, 61 Wash. 425, 112 Pac. 491, which was a prosecution for obtaining money under false pretenses, through a conspiracy with a swindling clairvoyant.

In later decisions of this and other courts, however, the plan, scheme, or design exception has frequently been held to be applicable even though the evidence of the other offense did not tend to show a design or plan to commit the specific act charged. See State v. Schuman, 89 Wash. 9, 153 [22]*22Pac. 1084 (prosecution for accepting the earnings of a prostitute, in which testimony of other prostitutes as to identical arrangements was admitted); State v. Clamp, 164 Wash. 653, 3 P. (2d) 1096, 80 A. L. R. 1302 (prosecution for obtaining money by false pretenses, in which evidence of a similar crime committed in another city was admitted); State v. Brown, 31 Wn. (2d) 475, 197 P. (2d) 590, 202 P. (2d) 461 (prosecution for murder in connection with a robbery, in which evidence of another robbery and assualt of similar nature committed later on the same day was admitted); and People v. Cosby, 137 Cal. App. 332, 31 P. (2d) .218 (prosecution for assault to commit rape, in which evidence that the defendant had similarly lured other women to his apartment was admitted).

In cases of the kind just referred to, it would seem that the reference to plan, scheme, or design has been merely a means of characterizing the similarities between the other offense and the acts charged. In each of these cases, the evidence admitted actually fell under one of the other recognized exceptions—motive in the Cosby case, and intent in the other cases.

It seems to us that, in the instant case, the trial court likewise employed the term “plan, scheme, or design” to indicate the general similarity of the offenses and hence the relevancy of this evidence in proving an essential ingredient of the crime charged. The fact that appellant may have committed a similar offense on March 29,1949, certainly did not tend to establish a design or plan to commit the offense charged, perpetrated later that day. Much less did it tend to prove a design or plan to commit the offense charged to have occurred on February 8, 1949. However, because of the marked similarity between these offenses, this evidence may nevertheless have been relevant and necessary to prove some essential point which the state was required to establish.

We turn, then, to this further question of relevancy and necessity. The points of similarity between the facts testified to under the rape counts, and the facts related in appellant’s confession of a third rape, are these: (a) appel[23]*23lant met the woman in downtown Seattle late at night and struck up a conversation by identifying himself as a bus driver and claiming to know the woman accosted; (b) appellant offered to take the woman to her home in his truck; (c) when the invitation had been accepted, he drove, instead, to a secluded spot and parked the truck; and (d) he then, through the use of force by placing his hand on the woman’s neck, committed one or more acts of rape in the cab of the truck.

These points of similarity do not tend to prove that the complaining witnesses involved in counts I and III did not consent to the assaults; nor does such similarity make the exhibit admissible for the purpose of showing a lustful disposition.

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

Related

State v. Vazquez
494 P.3d 424 (Washington Supreme Court, 2021)
State v. Martinez
476 P.3d 189 (Washington Supreme Court, 2020)
State Of Washington v. George Edward Savanah
Court of Appeals of Washington, 2017
State Of Washington v. Chad Chenoweth
Court of Appeals of Washington, 2015
State v. Chenoweth
354 P.3d 13 (Court of Appeals of Washington, 2015)
State v. Hernandez
997 P.2d 923 (Court of Appeals of Washington, 1999)
State v. Brown
940 P.2d 546 (Washington Supreme Court, 1997)
State v. Lough
889 P.2d 487 (Washington Supreme Court, 1995)
State v. Lane
889 P.2d 929 (Washington Supreme Court, 1995)
State v. Lough
853 P.2d 920 (Court of Appeals of Washington, 1993)
State v. Schaffer
822 P.2d 292 (Court of Appeals of Washington, 1991)
State v. Bacotgarcia
801 P.2d 993 (Court of Appeals of Washington, 1990)
State v. Lynch
792 P.2d 167 (Court of Appeals of Washington, 1990)
City of Seattle v. Slack
784 P.2d 494 (Washington Supreme Court, 1989)
State v. Bowen
738 P.2d 316 (Court of Appeals of Washington, 1987)
State v. Ramirez
730 P.2d 98 (Court of Appeals of Washington, 1986)
State v. Evans
726 P.2d 1009 (Court of Appeals of Washington, 1986)
State v. Smith
725 P.2d 951 (Washington Supreme Court, 1986)
State v. Hieb
693 P.2d 145 (Court of Appeals of Washington, 1984)
State v. Robinson
691 P.2d 213 (Court of Appeals of Washington, 1984)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
240 P.2d 251, 40 Wash. 2d 18, 1952 Wash. LEXIS 275, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-goebel-wash-1952.