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State v. Krantz3/1/1990
Rehearing Denied March 27, 1990
Submitted December 12, 1989
Thomas Krantz appeals his criminal conviction and sentence for robbery and accountability for robbery following a jury trial in the Fourth Judicial District Court, Missoula County. We affirm
ISSUES
1. Did the District Court err in allowing repeated references to a series of similar crimes in the Missoula area after the State agreed at the omnibus hearing not to introduce other crimes evidence?
2. Did the District Court abuse its discretion by failing to provide adequate reasons to justify the sentence and the dangerous offender designation?
3. Did the District Court violate the appellant's due process rights in applying the weapon enhancement statute and the dangerous offender statute?
FACTS
Near midnight on May 24, 1987, a masked gunman using a rusted chrome or stainless steel pistol held up the Missoula Domino's Pizza. One week later at about 1:30 a.m. on June 2, an armed robber held up the Missoula Orange Street Inn. Near the Inn, responding sheriff's officers spotted a car matching the description of a vehicle seen at a prior robbery. The officers stopped the car and detained the passenger, Greg Jellison, and the driver, appellant Thomas Krantz. A search of the suspects and their car produced rolls of coins taken from the Orange Street Inn and a chrome-plated, .38 special handgun. Witnesses later identified the appellant as the Domino's Pizza robber
Between May 19 and June 2, 1987, five other robberies following a common pattern had occurred in the Missoula area. In addition to Domino's Pizza and the Orange Street Inn, Pickle-O-Pete's, the Snow King Restaurant, the Village II, the Campus Inn Motel, and the Executive Motor Inn were also robbed. The State charged Krantz with the Domino's Pizza, Pickle-O-Pete's, and the Snow King robberies and with accountability in the Orange Street Inn holdup
At the pretrial omnibus hearing, the State agreed not to introduce other crimes evidence. Prior to trial, the State informed the District Court that it would elicit testimony concerning the series of robberies to help explain the actions of police officers and victims. The court held that the testimony did not fall within the definition of other-crimes evidence and, therefore, did not trigger the procedures set out in State v. Just (1979), 184 Mont. 262, 269, 602 P.2d 957, 961. During trial, witnesses and state prosecutors referred repeatedly to the series of robberies without defense objection. The court admonished the jury on several occasions about the limited purposes of such evidence
The jury found the appellant guilty of accountability in the Orange Street Inn holdup and guilty of robbery in the Domino's Pizza holdup, but not guilty of the robbery of Pickle-O-Pete's and the Snow King Restaurant. The District Court sentenced the appellant to thirty years on each conviction and added ten years to each for use of a weapon. The court ordered the forty-year sentences to run concurrently and designated the appellant a dangerous offender. The defendant now appeals the conviction, sentence enhancement, and dangerous offender designation
OTHER CRIMES EVIDENCE
The appellant contends that the State's references during trial to the series of Missoula robberies violated both the substantive and procedural requirements of Just. We decline to reach this issue because the appellant failed to object to the controverted evidence at any time before or during trial. Failure to object to alleged other crimes evidence precludes consideration of the issue on appeal. S
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