Dailey v. State

Sybert, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. On March 24, 1963, the appellant, Joseph Dailey, was arrested in connection with the burglary of the American Express Company office in Baltimore. At the time of his arrest he made certain statements to the police and the police seized certain objects from his room. After he was taken to Central police station, he admitted having committed several statutory burglaries and attempted burglaries.

Thereafter the State obtained fifteen indictments against him. Eleven of these were prosecuted to convictions in the Criminal Court of Baltimore. The remaining four were stetted by the State apparently because the prosecuting witnesses were misnamed. .Dailey appealed the convictions under the eleven indictments to this Court. We reversed three and affirmed the other eight convictions.

Dailey v. State, 234 Md. 325 , 199 A. 2d 211 , cert. den. 379 U. S. 975 (1964). The State elected not to re-prosecute the appellant in the three cases reversed. Instead, it obtained the re-indictment of Dailey ⁵⁹⁸ in the four cases which had been stetted earlier. These four cases were tried before Judge Prendergast in the Criminal Court of Baltimore without a jury.

Judge Prendergast granted motions for judgments of acquittal in two of the cases for reasons not pertinent here, and found Dailey guilty in the other two, sentencing him to two consecutive five-year terms in the penitentiary, and Dailey appealed. In the two cases now before us, the appellant was convicted of breaking the storehouse of Clark’s Howard Street, Inc., and of breaking the warehouse of the Heart Association of Maryland, Inc. On this appeal the appellant makes only one contention: that “the statements given by the appellant following the illegal search of his apartment and during a period of continuous illegal detention was ‘tainted’ by the illegal search and should not have been admitted into evidence.” Since no question is raised in regard to the sufficiency of the evidence, we need not discuss the circumstances of the two breakings. The circumstances of the arrest and the search and seizures are virtually undisputed. The facts, where pertinent here, were recited as follows in Dailey v. State, supra (at p. 328 of 234 Md.) : “On March 23, 1963, at about 11 P.M. a burglar alarm installed in the premises of the American Express Company at 213 North Charles Street was set off.

A special officer of the company that installed the alarm, together with officers of the Baltimore police force, went immediately to the premises and entered the front door. * * * The police found a window broken in the rear. One of the bars across the window had been sawed through. * * * Outside the window in an areaway, they found a man’s coat in the pocket of which was a case containing two keys. They also found a kit of tools * * *. “The police concluded that the owner of the keys resided in a rooming house in the vicinity. * * * [T]he police proceeded diligently to try the large key in the outer doors of the various rooming houses and at about 12:30 A.M. found that it fitted the door of 115 ⁵⁹⁹ W. Mulberry Street, about two or three blocks from the scene of the crime. They went to room 5 [one of the keys was stamped with that numeral] and knocked but received no answer.

They tried the key numbered 5 and it opened the door.” Inside the police found the appellant who (according to the police lieutenant who testified in the cases before us) asked, “How did you find me so fast?” The police then searched the appellant’s apartment, with his consent they stated, and seized several objects. The appellant and the goods were then taken to Central