Watts v. State

305 N.W.2d 860, 1981 Minn. LEXIS 1301
CourtSupreme Court of Minnesota
DecidedMay 22, 1981
Docket51278
StatusPublished
Cited by16 cases

This text of 305 N.W.2d 860 (Watts v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Minnesota primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Watts v. State, 305 N.W.2d 860, 1981 Minn. LEXIS 1301 (Mich. 1981).

Opinion

*861 OPINION

OTIS, Justice.

This is an appeal from an order of the district court denying a petition for post-conviction relief from a 1976 judgment of conviction for assault with a dangerous weapon and attempted aggravated robbery. Minn-Stat. §§ 609.225(2), 609.245, 609.17 (1976). Petitioner is serving consecutive prison terms of 3 to 15 years for the two offenses. He contends (1) that he should be given a new trial because of the admission of a handgun seized from his apartment; or (2) that he should be granted sentencing relief. We affirm.

Late on the evening of February 19,1976, police received a report from Melvin and Marjorie Eubanks, that petitioner, accompanied by an unidentified man, had come to their residence, used a large revolver in an attempt to rob Mr. Eubanks, and hit Mrs. Eubanks on the head with the gun, causing it to be fired into a wall.

Shortly before noon on February 25, Minneapolis police officers, acting without a warrant, went to petitioner’s apartment, knocked on the door and when petitioner answered, arrested him. After frisking him, handcuffing him, giving him a Miranda warning, the officers asked petitioner if he owned a gun. He denied owning but admitted possessing a gun, and stated that it was hidden in a chair in his living room, gesturing with his head toward the apartment as he spoke. Without objection by petitioner, but without his express consent, three of the officers entered the apartment, and found and seized the gun. After further discussion with petitioner at the police station, the officers obtained a search warrant, returned to the apartment, and seized five bullets.

At trial Eubanks testified that he had met petitioner a number of years earlier when they lived in the same apartment building. He stated that although he had not seen petitioner in a long time, he immediately recognized him when he appeared at the Eubanks’ apartment. Petitioner also refreshed his memory by introducing himself as “Claude Watts, Jr.” Petitioner then displayed a gun and demanded money, guns and liquor. It was when Mrs. Eubanks entered the room in response to the commotion that petitioner struck her with the gun causing it to discharge. Mrs. Eubanks, who had not met petitioner before, later identified his picture.

Other evidence relied upon by the prosecution at trial included: (a) testimony by police concerning the contents of the victims’ initial complaint against petitioner; (b) testimony by the police that the victims were obviously “shook up” and that Mrs. Eubanks was bleeding and had a bump and laceration where she had been struck; (c) testimony by police that they observed the damages and the hole left by the discharged bullet; (d) testimony by Eubanks that he later found the bullet and gave it to the police; (e) testimony by the police concerning the arrest of the petitioner and the seizure of the gun and the bullets; and (f) testimony by a firearms expert that her comparison of the discharged bullet with a bullet test fired from the gun revealed no significant observable differences.

Petitioner took the stand in his own defense knowing that his credibility would be impeached by disclosure of several prior felony convictions. He testified that while he knew Eubanks, he had not gone to the Eubanks’ apartment on the night in question but had been in his apartment alone studying. He claimed, as he had to the police, that an unidentified person had given him the gun and two bullets as security for a $35 loan, and that this same person had appeared minutes before the police came to arrest him and had given him three more bullets as security for an additional loan of one dollar.

1. Petitioner argues that the admission of the gun requires a new trial for two reasons. The recent decision of the United States Supreme Court in Payton v. New York, 445 U.S. 573, 100 S.Ct. 1371, 63 L.Ed.2d 639 (1980), must be applied retroactively; and (b) the trial court and postcon-viction court erred in holding that petitioner voluntarily consented to the police entering his residence to seize the gun.

*862 (a) In Payton v. New York, the United States Supreme Court held that absent consent or exigent circumstances, the Fourth Amendment bars police from entering a suspect’s residence without a warrant to make a felony arrest. As we hold in State v. Smith, 305 N.W.2d 798 (Minn.1981), filed herewith, Payton is not to be given retroactive application. 1

(b) The district court, while conceding that the issue was a difficult one, determined that petitioner had consented to the police entry to seize the gun and that this consent was voluntary.

While it is true that consent to search may be implied by the circumstances —as, for example, when a defendant, warned of a probable search, states that he does not object, Canal Zone v. Sierra, 594 F.2d 60 (5th Cir. 1979), this consent may not be lightly inferred, lest the exception to the warrant requirement emasculate the general rule. 2 Here we are not entirely free from doubt on the question of whether petitioner gave voluntary implied consent to enter. However, it is not necessary to decide that issue, since we are satisfied that the error, if any, was harmless.

The United States Supreme Court in Chapman v. California, 386 U.S. 18, 87 S.Ct. 824, 17 L.Ed.2d 705 (1967), stated that the test is “whether there is a reasonable possibility that the evidence complained of might have contributed to the conviction.” Id. at 23, 87 S.Ct. at 827 quoting Fahy v. Connecticut, 375 U.S. 85, 86-87, 84 S.Ct. 229, 230, 11 L.Ed.2d 171 (1963). If read literally, the test would be an extremely difficult one to meet, and might well render that harmless error rule illusory. But as Professor LaFave points out in his treatise, the United States Supreme Court in Harrington v. California, 395 U.S. 250, 89 S.Ct. 1726, 23 L.Ed.2d 284 (1969); Brown v. United States, 411 U.S. 223, 93 S.Ct. 1565, 36 L.Ed.2d 208 (1973), and Milton v. Wainwright, 407 U.S. 371, 92 S.Ct. 2174, 33 L.Ed.2d 1 (1972)—appears to have endorsed a practical, less-than-literal application of the rule. 3 W. LaFave, Search and Seizure, § 11.7 (1978). In the context of this case, comparing the tainted evidence with the untainted, we conclude that any error, in admitting the gun was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. The evidence was merely cumulative with respect to other strong evidence pointing to guilt.

2.

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Bluebook (online)
305 N.W.2d 860, 1981 Minn. LEXIS 1301, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/watts-v-state-minn-1981.