# FILED
July 8, 1999 Cecil Crowson, Jr. Appellate Cou rt Clerk IN THE COURT OF CRIMI NAL APPEALS OF TENNESSEE

AT JACKSON APRIL 1999 SESSIO N
STATE OF TENNESSEE, ) ) Appellee, ) No. 02C01-9803-CC-00072

) ) Fayette County v. ) ) Honorable Jon Kerry Bl ackwood, Judge ) ROBIN WATKINS, ) (Escape, theft of property v alued between ) $1,000 and $10,000, and violation of a ) Habitual Motor Vehicle Offender order) Appellant. ) For the Appellant : For the Appellee : Andrew S. Johnston John Knox Walkup 108 E. Court Square Attorney General of Tennessee Somerville, TN 38068 and Georgia Blythe Felner Assistant Attorney Gener al of Tennessee 425 Fifth Avenue North Nashville, TN 37243-0493 Elizabeth T. Rice District Attorney General 302 E. Market Street Somerville, TN 38068

OPINION FILED:____________________

AFFIRMED Joseph M. Tipton Judge2 O P I N I O N
The defendant, Robin Watkins, appeals as of right from hi s conviction by a jury in the Fayett

e County Circuit Co urt for theft of property val ued between one thousand and ten thousand dollars, a Class D felony; escape, a Class E felony, and violation of a Habitual M otor Vehicle Offender (HMVO) order, a Class E felony. The defendant was sentenced as a Rang e II, multiple offender to five y ears for the theft and two years for the HM VO violation, to be serv ed concurrently, and to tw o years for the escape, to run consecutively, in the custody of the Department of Correctio n. These sentences are also consecuti ve to the defendant’s prior s entence for an HMVO violation. The defendant contends that th e evidence is insufficient to support his conviction for theft of property valued between one thousand and ten thousand dollars. Althoug h the rec

ord does not specify that

the defen dant only appeal ed the th eft conviction, the fact that the defendant has not raised an issue r egarding his escape and HMVO convictions r

esults in their affirmance. We also affirm the theft conv iction.

Jack McNabb testified that on Sunday, December 15, 1996, he w as working as the jai ler at the Fayette County Jail. He said that the defendant impersonated a weekend pris oner who was to be rel eased that evening and that he released the

defendant just

before 6:00 p. m. He said th at he immediat ely became suspicious when the defendant left without requesting his personal prope rty. He said that some people outside of the jail told him that the defendant had gone in the directio n of an Exxo n station one block away.

Kenneth Williams testified that at about 6:00 p.m. on D ecember 15, 1996, he went into the Exxon station across the street from the jail to buy cigarettes. He said that he left his car in front of the s tation, and when he came out, it was gone. He stated that he did not know the defendant and that he had not given anyon e permission to3

take his car. He said th at he found the car about ten minutes lat er, and it had been wrecked.

Mr. Williams testified that the car w as a 1977 Oldsmobile Cutlass and that it had rust-colored pri mer on it because he was pl anning to get it painted. He said that he bought the car one and one-half y ears earlier and that it was worth one thousand one hundred dollars. He sai d that he bought the body of the car for two hundred dollars, and he installed a five-hundred-thirty

-five-dollar motor hims

elf. He estimated the value of his labor at tw o hundred fifty to three hundred dol lars. He said that he had paid three hundred twenty-four dollars for a new set of tires for the car.

Jerry Jones testified th at he was outside his home on December 15, 1996, when he heard a car coming around the curve at a hig h rate of speed. He said that the car hit a light pole and flipped over several t imes. He said that he wal ked up to the car because he recognized that it belonged to Mr. Williams but that he found the defendant in the car. He said that t he defendant told him that someone was a fter him and asked Mr. Jones to take him to Mos cow, Tennessee. He stated that the defendant was bleeding and that he did not want to move the defendan t, fearing that he might make the defendant’s injuries wo rse. He said that the defendant le ft the accident scene on foot and that he was not wearing shoes.

Trooper Philip Perkins of the Tennessee Highway Patr ol testified that he observed the accident scene . He said that indivi duals at the scene told him that the defendant was the driver, but the defendant was already gone when he arriv ed. The defendant

was co nvicte

d upon th e forego ing pro of.
Although the state asserts, and our review of the r ecord reveals, that the defendant filed his notice of app eal untimely, we will review the defendant’s sufficiency4

issue on its merits in t he interest of justice. See T.R.A.P. 4(a). Our standar d of review when the sufficiency of the ev idence is questioned on appeal is “whether, after v

iewing the evidence in the lig ht most favorable to the prosecution, any rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt.” Jackson v. Virginia , 443 U.S. 307, 319, 99 S. Ct. 2781, 2789 (1979). This means that we do not reweigh the evidence but presume that the jury has resolved all conflicts in the testimony and drawn al l reasonable inferences from the ev idence in favor of the state. See State v. Sheffield , 676 S.W.2d 542, 547 (Tenn. 1984); State v. Cabbage , 571 S.W.2d 832, 835 (Tenn. 1978).

Tenn. Code Ann. § 39-14-103 defines th eft of property as follows: A person c

ommits t heft of pr

operty if, with intent to deprive the owner of pr operty , the person knowing l yobtains or exercises control over the property without the owner’s effective consent. The defendant contends that the record is devoid of evidence that he i ntended to deprive the victim o

f his car and that the facts instead support a finding of joyri ding as opposed to theft. The law is w ell settled that the jury

may infer a defendant’s intent from the surrounding facts and ci rcumstances. State v. Lowery , 667 S.W.2d 52, 57 (Tenn. 1984); Hall v. State , 490 S.W.2d 495, 49 6 (Tenn. 1973). In most cases, circumstantial evidence is the only evidence available for discerning the defendant’s
mens rea . See Hall , 490 S.W.2d at 496. Viewed in the light most favorable to the state, the evidence rev eals that the defendant escaped from jail , took Mr. Williams’ car from a nearby gas station, drove the car at a hig h rate of speed, wrecked the c ar, and then continued to flee on foot. Mr. J ones, who witnessed th e accident, testified that the defendant said someone was after him. Base d upon this evidence, the jury could reasonably conclude that th e defendant intended to take the car as h is own rather than merely to borrow it.5 The defendant contends that the evidence i s also insufficient to prov e that the value of the car was greater than one thousand doll ars. The defendant argues that the evide nce inste ad suppo rts a find ing that t he car was wo rth seven h undred t hirty-five dollars, which represents the purchase price plus the cost of the engine, and th at this amount does not reflect the depreciation of the car over the year and one-half that Mr. Williams owned it. “A witnes s may testify to the v

alue of the witness’s ow n property or services.” Tenn. R. E vid. 701(b); see Reaves v. State , 523 S.W.2d 218, 220 (Tenn. Crim. App. 1975). Viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the state, Mr. Williams testified that his car was worth one thousand one hundred do llars. The evidence is sufficient to supp ort the conviction.
In consideration of the foregoing and the record as a whole , we affirm the judgments of conviction enter ed by the trial court.

______________________________ Joseph M. Tipto n, Judge CONCUR:

____________________________ David G. Hayes, Judge

____________________________ L.T. Lafferty, Senior Judge