{
  "id": 1664742,
  "name": "Albert LEWIS and Larry HIGGINBOTHAM v. STATE of Arkansas",
  "name_abbreviation": "Lewis v. State",
  "decision_date": "1979-02-26",
  "docket_number": "CR 78-41",
  "first_page": "132",
  "last_page": "134",
  "citations": [
    {
      "type": "official",
      "cite": "265 Ark. 132"
    },
    {
      "type": "parallel",
      "cite": "577 S.W.2d 415"
    }
  ],
  "court": {
    "name_abbreviation": "Ark.",
    "id": 8808,
    "name": "Arkansas Supreme Court"
  },
  "jurisdiction": {
    "id": 34,
    "name_long": "Arkansas",
    "name": "Ark."
  },
  "cites_to": [
    {
      "cite": "257 Ark. 644",
      "category": "reporters:state",
      "reporter": "Ark.",
      "case_ids": [
        8722553
      ],
      "weight": 2,
      "year": 1975,
      "opinion_index": 0,
      "case_paths": [
        "/ark/257/0644-01"
      ]
    }
  ],
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  "last_updated": "2023-07-14T18:31:48.026206+00:00",
  "provenance": {
    "date_added": "2019-08-29",
    "source": "Harvard",
    "batch": "2018"
  },
  "casebody": {
    "judges": [
      "Byrd, J., dissents."
    ],
    "parties": [
      "Albert LEWIS and Larry HIGGINBOTHAM v. STATE of Arkansas"
    ],
    "opinions": [
      {
        "text": "George Rose Smith, Justice.\nThis is a petition in this court for a writ of error coram nobis to permit the trial court to investigate the existence of a fact that would assertedly have prevented the rendition of the judgment if the fact had been known. Cf. Troglin v. State, 257 Ark. 644, 519 S.W. 2d 740 (1975). We treat the petition as an application for permission to seek postconviction relief in the trial court under Criminal Procedure Rule 37.2 (a) and grant permission.\nThe appellants were charged with first degree murder. Their first trial resulted in a mistrial because the jury was unable to reach a verdict, but a second trial ended in a conviction and a 30-year sentence. That judgment was affirmed in Lewis and Higginbotham v. State, an unpublished opinion delivered on September 5, 1978. At that trial the State proved that the murder weapon was a pistol that had been recovered by the police from a grease pit at a service station that was formerly owned by the petitioner Lewis and was formerly the place of employment of petitioner Higginbotham.\nThe present petition alleges that within a few days after the trial ended in a mistrial \u201cthe retained attorney, who represented both petitioners in both trials and/or an employee hired by said attorney and working for said attorney as an investigator\u201d communicated confidential and privileged information to various members of the local bar and to others. The information reached the prosecuting attorney\u2019s office and resulted in the discovery by the police of the murder weapon. The petition asserts that the attorney\u2019s or investigator\u2019s unauthorized release of confidential information violated the petitioners\u2019 constitutional right to counsel and other rights that we need not enumerate.\nUntil the facts have been completely developed in the trial court, it would be idle for us to speculate about what rights of the petitioners may have been violated or about what relief might eventually prove to be appropriate if a violation is shown. It is enough to say that the right to counsel includes the contemporaneous necessity for making a full disclosure of all pertinent information to counsel and that such disclosures, as they relate to a past offense as distinguished from a crime that is planned for the future, are privileged. Rule 502, Uniform Rules of Evidence, Ark. Stat. Ann. \u00a7 28-1001 (Supp. 1977); see also Chamberlain, \u201cLegal Ethics: Confidentiality and the Case of Robert Garrow\u2019s Lawyers,\u201d 25 Buffalo L. Rev. 211 (1975-76).\nThe petition is treated as one for postconviction relief under Rule 37.2 (a), and the petitioners are granted permission to seek relief in the trial court on the ground that the facts asserted in the petition allege a ground for relief based upon ineffective assistance of counsel.\nByrd, J., dissents.",
        "type": "majority",
        "author": "George Rose Smith, Justice."
      }
    ],
    "attorneys": [
      "John R. Henry, for petitioners.",
      "Bill Clinton, Atty. Gen., by: Joseph H. Purvis, Deputy Atty. Gen., for respondent."
    ],
    "corrections": "",
    "head_matter": "Albert LEWIS and Larry HIGGINBOTHAM v. STATE of Arkansas\nCR 78-41\n577 S.W. 2d 415\nOpinion delivered February 26, 1979\n(In Banc)\nJohn R. Henry, for petitioners.\nBill Clinton, Atty. Gen., by: Joseph H. Purvis, Deputy Atty. Gen., for respondent."
  },
  "file_name": "0132-01",
  "first_page_order": 154,
  "last_page_order": 156
}