COURT OF APPEALS OF VIRGINIA
Present: Judges Frank, Kelsey and Haley Argued by teleconference

WILLIAM BOYD SWINSON MEMORANDUM OPINION * BY v. Record No. 2411-09-2 JUDGE ROBERT P. FRANK AUGUST 3, 2010 COMMONWEALTH OF VIRGINIA

FROM THE CIRCUIT COURT OF CHESTERFIELD COUNTY Timothy J. Hauler, Judge 1 Sharon A. Fitzgerald (Sharon A. Fitzgerald, LLC, on brief), for appellant. Erin M. Kulpa, Assi stant Attorney General (K enneth T. Cuccinelli, II, Attorney General, on brief), for appellee.
William Boyd Swinson, appellant, was convicted, in a bench trial, of two counts of robbery, in violation of Code § 18.2-58; on e count of statutory burglary, in violation of Code § 18.2-90; and three counts of use of a firearm in the commis sion of the above fel onies, in violation of Code § 18.2-53.1. On appeal, he challenges the sufficiency of the evidence. For the reasons stated, we affirm the trial court.
BACKGROUND Applying well-established princi ples of appellate review, we will state the evidence in the light most favorable to the Commonwealth, th e prevailing party in the circuit court. McMillan v. Commonwealth , 277 Va. 11, 15, 671 S.E. 2d 396, 399 (2009).

* Pursuant to Code § 17.1-413, this opin ion is not designated for publication.

1 The Honorable Timothy J. Hauler presided over the sentencing he aring and entered the final sentencing order. The Honorable Willia m R. Shelton, Judge Designate, entered the conviction order and presided over the proceedings addressed in this opinion.- 2 - On April 8, 2008, at approximately 11:00 a.m., appellant’s sister arrived at the home of her landlords, the victims, C.W. and R. W., to pay her monthly rent in cas h. When the sister left the victims’ home, she stopped at appe llant’s home, a duplex at 6144 St rathmore Road, a short distance from the victims’ home. The sister told appellant ’s wife that she had just paid her rent to the victims. During this co nversation, appellant was somewhere in the house. The sister r outinely paid in cash and placed the money on the victims’ kitchen table. About ten to fifteen minutes af ter the sister left the victims’ house, C.W. was sitting in the kitchen with his wallet, se veral credit cards, and a portable phon e on the kitchen table. Suddenly, a man burst through the back screen door into the kitc hen. C.W. described th e man as a “[s]hort and stumpy” white male, in his forties, and wearing a hooded sweatshirt with the hood pulled up. His face was not covered. Neither victim ever identi fied appellant as the in truder. Later, R.W. identified another indivi dual as the gunman but he was later dismissed as a suspect. R.W., in a subsequent television interview, described the intruder as “a man in hi s 20’s with a hooded sweatshirt.” The victims had never se en the intruder before. At tria l, C.W. testified that only those people familiar with the couple would know that they did not us e the front door and that they normally asked visitors to come to the back door. The intruder pointed a black pist ol at R.W.’s chest, telling her that he wanted their “money.” The gunman first looked at the kitc hen table. When the victims to ld the gunman that they did not have any money, he de manded R.W.’s purse. The intruder, pointing his gun at C.W., took C.W.’s wallet, credit cards, and a phone from the table. He then followed R. W. through the ho use as she looked for he r purse. After finding R.W.’s black purse, and taking a cell phone and a camera, the gunman walked into the yard with the stolen items. He stopped to look through the purse and then walked to wards Strathmore Road. R.W. called 911, then followed the intruder in her automobile.- 3 - Police Officer Encinas arrived at the victims’ home less than one minu te after receiving the report of the robbery. C.W. point ed him in the directio n that the gunman and his wife had gone. Officer Encinas located R.W., who directed the of ficer’s attention to a white male, approximately three hundred feet away, wearing a blue hooded sweatshirt and bl ue sweatpants. The suspect was climbing an embankment to scale a fence behind the Strathmore residences. The gunman was less than one-tenth of a mile from the victims’ home. The officer made no facial identification. The suspect scaled the fence, carrying a gun in his right hand. After he cleared the fence, the gunman bent over an d did “something in the leaves with his hands.” Officer Encinas noticed that when the gunman st ood up he no longer had a gun in his hand but he was st ill carrying a black purse. The gunman walked away towards the brick duplexes on St rathmore Road. Officer Encinas described the man he saw jumping over the fence as a “heavyset” “white male,” we aring a hooded sweatshirt with the hood up. 2 Officer Encinas lost sight of the gunman. A K-9 unit arrived and tracked the scent from the point where the gunman jumped over the fence. The tracking dog led police to an area less than two feet from where Officer Encinas ha d seen the gunman crou ched down. There, in the backyard of the brick duplex house at 6144 Strathmore Road, ap pellant’s residence, officers recovered C.W.’s credit cards, his home phone, and a black BB gun. The tracking do g continued to follow the scent for another fifty yards. The last location wher e the dog was able to follow the scent was in appellant’s backyard. C.W. identified the black BB gun recovered from appellant’s backyard as “similar” to the weapon displayed during the robbery. He also id entified the recovered credit cards, camera, and cell phone as those taken during the robbery. Appellant’s DNA was found on the BB gun.

2 The police briefly detained a different suspec t, not appellant, in the general vicinity, who was later released.- 4 - Appellant denied any involvement in the robb ery. No fingerprint evidence implicated appellant in the offenses. A search of appellant’s residence si x months after the incident revealed no items stolen from the victims. Appellant was convicte d of two counts of ro bbery, statutory burglary, and three counts of use of a firearm in the commission of a felony. This appeal follows.
ANALYSIS Appellant’s challenge to the sufficiency of the evidence is limited to whether he was the perpetrator, not whether the offenses occurred. When considering a challenge that the eviden ce presented at trial is insufficient, we “presume the judgment of the trial court to be correct” and reve rse only if the trial court’s decision is “plainly wrong or without evidence to support it.” Davis v. Commonwealth , 39 Va. App. 96, 99, 570 S.E.2d 875, 876- 77 (2002). We do not “substitute our ju dgment for that of th e trier of fact.” Wactor v. Commonwealth , 38 Va. App. 375, 380, 564 S.E.2d 160, 162 (2002). “Instead, the relevant question is whether, after viewing th e evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution, any rationale trier of fact could have found th e essential elem ents of the cr ime beyond a reasonable doubt.” Jackson v. Virginia , 443 U.S. 307, 319 (1979) (emp hasis in original). “This familiar standard gi ves full play to the responsib ility of the trier of fact fair ly to resolve conflicts in the testimony, to weigh the evidence, and to draw reasonable inferenc es from basic fa cts to ultimate facts.” Id. The thrust of appellant’s sufficiency argument is that neither of the vi ctims identified him as the gunman. Appellant furt her points to R.W.’s misidentificatio n of a suspect, and the inaccurate description of the perpetra tor given by both victims.- 5 - We agree that there was no direct evidence identifying appellant as th e gunman, but appellant’s argument ignores the circumstantial evidence adduced by the Commonwealth. “Circumstantial evidence is as competent and is entitled to as much weight as direct evidence, provided it is su fficiently convincing to exclude ever y reasonable hypothesis except that of guilt.” Coleman v. Commonwealth , 226 Va. 31, 53, 307 S.E.2d 86 4, 876 (1983). However, “[t]he Commonwealth need only ex clude reasonable hypotheses of innocence that flow from the evidence, not those that spring from the imaginat ion of the defendant.” Hamilton v. Commonwealth , 16 Va. App. 751, 755, 43 3 S.E.2d 27, 29 (1993). Although, “a factfinder canno t arbitrarily disregard a reason able hypothesis of innocence,” Cooper v. Commonwealth , 54 Va. App. 558, 573, 680 S.E.2d 361, 368 (2009), “[w]hether the hypothesis of innocence is reasonable is itself a ‘question of fact,’” Clanton v. Commonwealth , 53 Va. App. 561, 572, 673 S. E.2d 904, 910 (2009) (c itations omitted). “Merely because defendant’s theory of the case differs from that taken by the Commonwealth does not mean that every reasonable hypothesis cons istent with his innocence has not been excluded.” Miles v. Commonwealth , 205 Va. 462, 467, 138 S.E. 2d 22, 27 (1964). Thus, th e factfinders in this case could only be overturned if “no rational factfind er would have come to that conclusion.” Haskins v. Commonwealth , 44 Va. App. 1, 9, 602 S. E.2d 402, 406 (2004). We first note that R.W.’s misidentifica tion of another suspect, and any inaccurate description of the intruder, con cerns the credibility of the witnes ses and the weight afforded the victim’s testimony. “The credibility of the witnes ses and the weight acco rded the evidence are matters solely for the fact finder who has the opportunity to see and hear that evidence as it is presented.” Sandoval v. Commonwealth , 20 Va. App. 133, 138, 455 S.E.2d 730, 732 (1995). See Peterson v. Commonwealth , 225 Va. 289, 295, 302 S.E.2d 52 0, 524 (1983) (s tating that the credibility of witnesse s and the weight to be gi ven identification te stimony is a matte r for the jury).- 6 - We review the facts “in the light most favorable to the Co mmonwealth, giving it the benefit of any reasonable inferences.” Glenn v. Commonwealth , 49 Va. App. 413, 416, 642 S.E.2d 282, 283 (2007) ( en banc ) (citation omitted), aff’d , 275 Va. 123, 654 S.E.2d 91 0 (2008). This standard requires us to “give due weight to inferences drawn from those fact s by resident ju dges . . . .” Malbrough v. Commonwealth , 275 Va. 163, 169, 655 S.E.2d 1, 3 (20 08) (citation omitted). It was reasonable for the fact finder to conc lude the intruder knew the victims’ habits. He entered the back door, indi cating he was aware of the victims’ pa ttern of using the back door as the sole entry point. When the perp etrator entered and demanded money, he first looked at the kitchen table, where appellant’s sister routinely deposited he r rent money. It can further be inferred that appellant knew that the victims had recently received cas h from appellant’s si ster. The intruder broke into the victims’ home between ten and fiftee n minutes after appellant’s sister left the house and told appellant’s wife that she had just pa id her rent. Appellant wa s present some where in the house when that statement was made . The intruder did not look for jewelry or other valuables, only cash, indicating the intruder kn ew cash was on the premises. After the robbery, the intrude r ran towards appellant’s house and discarded some of the stolen items, including the gun used in the robb ery, in appellant’s backyard. Appellant’s DNA was found on the BB gun. While there was testimony appellant’s stepson owned a toy gun, there was no testimony the black BB gun was th e one owned by the stepson. It must be remembered that a “similar” gun was seen in the hands of the gunman just mome nts before the police recovered it on the ground. The fact finder rejected a ppellant’s explanation of why hi s DNA was found on the gun. DNA evidence clearly indicates at some point in time, appellant had touched the BB gun. Other evidence proved that the gunma n had a gun of like appearance in his possession just moments before the gun was discovered in appellant’s backyard. This additional evid ence tends to- 7 - reasonably exclude appellant’s hy pothesis that the DNA was deposited on the gun at a time other than that of the crime. See Avent v. Commonwealth , 209 Va. 474, 481, 164 S.E.2d 655, 659 (1968) (discussing that fingerprint evidence was suffici ent to convict when “coupled with evidence of other circumstances which tended to reasonabl y exclude the hypothesi s that the print was impressed at a time other than that of the crime”). From the intruder’s entr y into victims’ reside nce, until the gun and st olen items were found in appellant’s backyard, there had been an unbroken sequence pointing to appellant as the gunman. R.W. followed the intruder as he left the house. She pointed ou t the gunman to the officer who followed the gunman over the emba nkment and fence. He saw the gunman reach into a pile of leaves where the weapon and st olen items were recovered. We therefore conclude that the trial court di d not err in finding the circumstantial evidence sufficient to convict appella nt of the crimes charged. Affirmed.