State v. Lopez

508 P.2d 1292, 84 N.M. 805
CourtNew Mexico Supreme Court
DecidedApril 13, 1973
Docket9512
StatusPublished
Cited by60 cases

This text of 508 P.2d 1292 (State v. Lopez) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering New Mexico 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. Lopez, 508 P.2d 1292, 84 N.M. 805 (N.M. 1973).

Opinion

OPINION

OMAN, Justice.

Defendant was convicted of first degree murder and sentenced to life imprisonment. He has appealed. We affirm.

Pie first contends the trial court was without jurisdiction of the subject matter of the case and, therefore, the judgment and sentence are void. I-Iis contention is predicated upon the failure of the State to establish that the killing occurred in Bernalillo County where the case was tried. He contends it is uncontradicted that the killing occurred in Sandoval County, which adjoins Bernalillo County on the north. Certainly his contention is not controverted on this appeal. However, the testimony upon which he relies was the testimony of a detective in the Albuquerque Police Department given before the grand jury. This testimony was not presented to the petit jury at trial, and a search of the entire record fails to establish with certainty in which county the murder was committed.

Defendant, decedent and their respective families all resided in Albuquerque, the county seat of Bernalillo County. On the night of the murder, according to defendant’s confession, he and the decedent drove northward from Albuquerque to the town of Bernalillo, which is the county seat of Sandoval County. After crossing the Rio Grande at the town of Bernalillo, they turned south on a dirt road toward Bernalillo County. According to the official New Mexico road map the north boundary of Bernalillo County was about six or seven miles distant from the point where they turned south. According to defendant they drove “fast but not very long in time” on this road before he stopped the car. The murder was committed near the place where they stopped.

Defendant, after almost eight years, voluntarily walked into the Albuquerque police station and confessed to the murder. Pie had been investigated the day following the disappearance of the victim, and again about six months later when her body was discovered in the shallow grave in which he had placed it after killing her. The killing and the burial occurred in an extensive hilly area to the west of the Rio Grande, the City of Albuquerque and the town of Bernalillo. This area is commonly and repeatedly throughout the transcript referred to as the West Mesa.

As already stated, no evidence was presented at trial which definitely established that the murder occurred in either Bernalillo or Sandoval County, but, unquestionably, it occurred in one of them. Defendant was indicted in Bernalillo County and at all times the case was treated as a Bernalillo County case by the police officers, the district attorney’s office, and by the defendant and his counsel, until the question was raised for the first time on this appeal. Defendant’s attorney on this appeal is not the same attorney who represented him in the trial below.

Art. II, § 14, N.M. Constitution provides in part:

“In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall have the right to * * * a speedy public trial by an impartial jury of the county or district in which the offense is alleged to have been committed.”

Here the offense was alleged to have been committed in Bernalillo County, and this allegation was never expressly challenged until now.

In the early case of State v. Balles, 24 N.M. 16, 172 P. 196 (1918), we held this right to be tried in the county or district to be a right or privilege to a particular venue which “ * * * may be waived by an accused person in a number of ways, and that, when he goes to trial in another judicial district, without objection on his part, he has waived the privilege, and cannot be heard to say that the court trying him was without jurisdiction. * * * ” Also to the effect that this provision of our constitution confers a personal privilege of venue upon an accused, and that this privilege may be waived, see Smith v. State, 79 N. M. 450, 444 P.2d 961 (1968); State v. Shroyer, 49 N.M. 196, 160 P.2d 444 (1945); State v. Bogart, 41 N.M. 1, 62 P. 2d 1149 (1936).

To the extent that the language in State v. Glasscock, 76 N.M. 367, 415 P.2d 56 (1966), may suggest or be construed as holding that venue may not be waived, the opinion in that case is hereby overruled.

In addition to the constitutional right of venue conferred upon an accused, defendant relies upon a similar venue provision in § 40A-1-15, N.M.S.A.1953 (2d Repl. Vol. 6, 1972). This provision, insofar as here pertinent, is: “Venue. — All trials of crime shall be had in the county in which they were committed. * * * ”

This language of our statute is merely a reiteration of the constitutional right of venue.

We agree with defendant that some jurisdictions view the matter of venue in criminal cases as jurisdictional, but, as already stated, and as reflected by the earlier decisions of this Court, our constitutional and statutory provisions above quoted have been construed and are considered as conferring a personal right or privilege of venue on the accused. This right may be waived by the accused. Defendant recognizes this, but urges that if this be a right which can be waived, certain safeguards should have been followed to assure the genuineness of his waiver. He contends the minimum safeguards to which he was entitled were (1) being advised of his right to have the case tried in the county where the offense was committed, (2) being advised that he could waive this right and have the case tried in another county, and (3) having the trial court convinced that the waiver was genuine. He relies upon State v. Chacon, 62 N.M. 291, 309 P.2d 230 (1957). There is language in the opinion in the Chacon case which gives general support to defendant’s contentions, but that language was dictum in that case and it does not specifically concern itself with waiver of the right or privilege with which we are here concerned.

We assume defendant is urging that the record should have affirmatively shown that the trial court fully informed defendant of his right of venue and of his privilege to waive this right, or at least was advised that defendant had been so fully informed; that defendant then affirmatively waived this right; and that the trial court then announced its satisfaction as to the genuineness of this waiver. We cannot agree.

The State assumed its obligation of furnishing defendant with counsel, and it was not the duty of the trial' court to detail to the defendant all rights he had under the law, or to make certain that counsel had so fully informed defendant and that defendant had fully understood them.

He obviously had no objections to being tried in the county where he resided at the time of the commission of the offense and at the time of trial. He makes no claim that he did not get a fair or impartial jury or a fair and impartial judge to preside over the trial, and he does not suggest that he was in any way prejudiced by being tried in Bernalillo County rather than in Sandoval County.

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

Related

State v. Monarco
New Mexico Court of Appeals, 2025
State v. Beard
New Mexico Court of Appeals, 2023
State v. Grubb
2020 NMCA 047 (New Mexico Court of Appeals, 2020)
State v. Gallegos
New Mexico Court of Appeals, 2018
State v. Maestas
New Mexico Court of Appeals, 2015
State v. Bell
2015 NMCA 028 (New Mexico Court of Appeals, 2014)
State v. Allen
2014 NMCA 111 (New Mexico Court of Appeals, 2014)
State v. Rael-Gallegos
2013 NMCA 092 (New Mexico Supreme Court, 2013)
State v. Rael-Gallegos
New Mexico Court of Appeals, 2013
State v. Rivera
New Mexico Court of Appeals, 2011
State v. Robinson
New Mexico Court of Appeals, 2010
State v. Dominguez
New Mexico Court of Appeals, 2010
State v. Johnson
2010 NMSC 016 (New Mexico Supreme Court, 2010)
State v. Cruz
228 P.3d 1173 (New Mexico Court of Appeals, 2010)
State v. Riley
2010 NMSC 005 (New Mexico Supreme Court, 2010)
State v. Quintana
New Mexico Supreme Court, 2009
State v. Clements
2009 NMCA 085 (New Mexico Court of Appeals, 2009)
In RE STATE (STATE v. Johanson
932 A.2d 848 (Supreme Court of New Hampshire, 2007)
State v. Roybal
2006 NMCA 43 (New Mexico Court of Appeals, 2006)
State v. Balderama
2004 NMSC 8 (New Mexico Supreme Court, 2004)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
508 P.2d 1292, 84 N.M. 805, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-lopez-nm-1973.