Offutt v. State

GETTY, Judge. Raymond Offutt, also known as Raymond Latour Williamson, appellant herein, was convicted by a jury in the Circuit Court for Montgomery County of housebreaking and theft. On May 10, 1982, he was sentenced to ten years for the housebreaking and fifteen years for theft. The sentences were to be served concurrently, but consecutively to any other existing sentence.

In this appeal, appellant raises three issues for our consideration. They are: 1. Did the trial court err in failing to suppress evidence which was the result of an unlawful search and seizure? 2. Did the trial court err in failing to suppress appellant’s statement? 8.

Did the trial court err in admitting a pawn ticket into evidence? HISTORY The Montgomery County Police obtained a search warrant for the premises occupied by appellant’s girl friend. The ¹⁴⁹ property recovered was linked to several burglaries that had occurred in Montgomery County. Appellant was subsequently charged with committing a number of the burglaries.

In each case appellant filed a motion to suppress the evidence and the various motions were consolidated for hearing. The motions were decided adversely to appellant and the trial process began. In the present case appellant was charged with housebreaking and theft involving the property of Charles M. Thrift. Appellant invoked his right to counsel immediately after his arrest.

He was not questioned at that time and efforts were made to contact the Public Defender on his behalf. On the following day appellant was removed from the Montgomery County Detention Center and taken to the Rockville Police Station for questioning concerning two additional burglaries. 1 Arrest warrants had been issued charging appellant with having committed the two burglaries. The detective who conducted the questioning at the police station was aware that appellant had previously refused to talk about his involvement in the case that triggered his initial arrest. Appellant was advised of his rights under Miranda for the second time since his arrest, and waived both his right to remain silent and his right to have an attorney present during questioning.

After being informed of the evidence implicating him in the thefts of property from the Hurd and Nigen residences, appellant gave a statement concerning how he came into possession of all of the seized property. It is this statement, obtained by the police after appellant had initially exercised his right to counsel, that appellant insists should have been suppressed by the trial court. We are compelled to agree. We affirmed appellant’s conviction of theft in Offutt v. State, 55 Md.App. 261, 463 A.2d 876 (1983).

We did so in reliance upon the opinion of the Supreme Court in Michigan v. Mosley, 423 U.S. 96 , 96 S.Ct. ¹⁵⁰ 321, 46 L.Ed.2d 313 (1975), that differentiated that class of cases where the resumption of interrogation involved separate investigations of separate crimes.