State v. Wade

635 S.W.2d 51, 1982 Mo. App. LEXIS 3570
CourtMissouri Court of Appeals
DecidedApril 20, 1982
DocketNos. WD 32357, 32664
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 635 S.W.2d 51 (State v. Wade) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Missouri Court of Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
State v. Wade, 635 S.W.2d 51, 1982 Mo. App. LEXIS 3570 (Mo. Ct. App. 1982).

Opinion

SHANGLER, Presiding Judge.

The defendant Wade was convicted by jury of robbery in the first degree [§ 569.-020] and sentenced to a term of ten years, and of kidnapping [§ 565.110] and sentenced to a term of five years. The trial court denied the motion for new trial and sentenced the defendant according to the jury verdicts, but as consecutive terms. Thereafter, while appeal pended, the defendant moved anew for new trial on the basis of newly discovered evidence. The court denied relief and the defendant appeals separately from that order. The appeals are consolidated for our review.

In the early morning the victim parked his Mustang automobile in the underground garage adjacent to the place of employment. He ascended the stairs and was confronted by a black male [the defendant] who pointed a pistol at him and ordered “Let’s go.” The victim resisted but then submitted and they walked to the parked Mustang. The assailant demanded the keys but the victim refused to allow anyone else to drive his car, so they entered the car — he, still under the compulsion of a brandished weapon — and the victim drove as the assailant directed. After a half hour of random movement, the assailant directed the victim into a vacant lot. There he was ordered out of the car and into the car trunk. The victim transferred the tent, toolbox and other items, from the trunk into the back seat of the car, and the gunman then forced the victim into the trunk and shut the lid. The gunman then drove around the city for some time, in various directions with various turns. In the meanwhile, the victim removed the taillights and broke the trunk lock which left an aperture to see through. He also managed to undo the lock with a coat hanger. The car stopped and another person joined the driver. The sound of their movements indicated that they unloaded the back seat of the car. They drove off, then stopped and [apparently] walked off. After five minutes, the victim decided to risk escape, extricated himself, found the keys still in the ignition, and drove away. Almost four hours elapsed from the caption until the escape. In the course of that episode the assailant demanded and was given the money the victim had on his person.

The victim reported the crimes to the police. Investigation disclosed a .38 revolver between the front seats of the Mustang — which the victim identified as the [53]*53weapon used against him. The victim described the assailant to the police. Thereafter, the victim identified the assailant from displays of police photographs. The police did not disclose to the victim the name of the person identified from the array of photographs. Then about three weeks after the crimes the victim picked the defendant as the assailant from a lineup. The victim next confronted the defendant at the preliminary hearing when, without invitation, the defendant said to him: “Let me go.”

The defendant contends that the prosecution failure to disclose that the police displayed to the victim, not one array of photographs, but two or even three — from which the victim made contradictory identifications — was a concealment of material evidence from the defense and violated due process of law.

The defendant made request prior to trial for discovery under Rule 25.32 [now 25.-03(9) ] of any material or information within the possession or custody of the prosecution which tended to negate the guilt of the defendant. In response, the prosecution disclosed materials — a police report included, that in the process to establish identification the victim was shown one set of four photographs by Officer McKee, and that the victim identified the defendant from this single attempt. In the course of cross-examination, the victim recounted that the photographic identification process involved two separate displays. The prejudice the defendant contends from the nondisclosure of that event rests on the arguments that the identification from the first array was inconclusive, and that the second array was contradictory to the first. The victim responded on cross-examination that from a first display of six photographs, he identified the defendant to the police by: “Out of these, it would be this one,” without more certainty. The cross-examination continued:

Q. Did — then he showed you some other photographs; do you remember about how many?
A. It was at least nine. It could have been up to twelve.
Q. All right. As far as you know, no one else’s photograph was repeated in that second group, other than the photograph that you identified; is that right?
A. It was a different photograph, but I didn’t memorize each person’s face, so I couldn’t have told you. They could have repeated some faces.
Q. Or they may not have?
A. They may not have; they may have.
Q. You just don’t remember now?
A. I didn’t pay any attention to the faces that were not familiar to me.
[emphasis added]

This colloquy undermines altogether the contentions of the defendant that the testimony of an identification from a second array of photographs was a surprise and that the second identification contradicted the first. The tenor of the inquiry — on a subject not opened by the prosecutor on direct examination — manifests that defense counsel already harbored information that, in fact, a second series of photographs was shown by the police. That was the very premise of inquiry. [That there was no objection by the defense counsel to answers by the witness otherwise in ostensible violation of the discovery request sustains surmise.] Furthermore, both inquiry and response confirm that the identifications by the victim [however tentative] on the successive occasions was of the same person but in different depictions.

To prove the right to a new trial, the defendant advances the principle of Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83, 83 S.Ct. 1194, 10 L.Ed.2d 215 (1963) [adopted into our procedure through present Rule 25.03 iterated in our decisions]: that the suppression by the prosecution of evidence favorable to an accused upon request violates due process where the evidence is material to guilt or punishment. There was no intimation that the prosecution knew of the second display of the photographs. We assume knowledge and suppression by the prosecution and determine nevertheless that the second display was not material [54]*54either to guilt or punishment within the sense of the principle. A defendant is entitled to the sanction of a new trial when the undisclosed evidence bears decisively — and not only as corroboration — on the issue of guilt [State v. Allen, 530 S.W.2d 415, 418[1-3] (Mo.App.1975) ] or on the credibility of a witness [Napue v. People of the State of Illinois, 360 U.S. 264, 269, 79 S.Ct. 1173, 1177, 3 L.Ed.2d 1217 (1959); State v. Collett, 526 S.W.2d 920, 931[12] (Mo.App.1975)]. The test for prejudice is determined by the nature of the charge, the evidence presented by the prosecution, and the role the undisclosed testimony would likely have played on the return of guilt or punishment.

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Related

State v. Peterson
833 S.W.2d 395 (Missouri Court of Appeals, 1992)
State v. Ghan
721 S.W.2d 128 (Missouri Court of Appeals, 1986)
State v. Williams
708 S.W.2d 705 (Missouri Court of Appeals, 1986)

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Bluebook (online)
635 S.W.2d 51, 1982 Mo. App. LEXIS 3570, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-wade-moctapp-1982.