Opinion ID: 1990001
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: sufficiency of the evidence

Text: Pilot challenges the sufficiency of the evidence as to the first-degree criminal sexual conduct conviction but not as to the attempted first-degree murder and attempted first-degree murder while committing criminal sexual conduct charges. Even though Pilot did not contest the sufficiency of the evidence on appeal to the court of appeals, we will address the issue in order to lay it to rest. In reviewing sufficiency of the evidence we carefully examine the evidence presented in the record, along with legitimate inferences from that evidence, to determine whether the jury could have concluded that the state met its burden of proving beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant was guilty of each of the charged offenses. State v. Moore, 481 N.W.2d 355, 360 (Minn.1992). Our review is in the light most favorable to the jury's verdict and we assume that the jury believed the state's witnesses and disbelieved evidence contradicting those witnesses. Dale v. State, 535 N.W.2d 619, 623 (Minn.1995); see also State v. Merrill, 274 N.W.2d 99, 111 (Minn.1978). Pilot was convicted of first-degree criminal sexual conduct defined as engaging in sexual penetration with another person by force or coercion causing personal injury. See Minn.Stat. § 609.342, subd. 1(e)(i) (1998). The evidence of Pilot's guilt was substantial: Pilot's early efforts to engage H.T. in sexual conduct and his effort on the night of the assault to persuade Rabago to let him come over surely identify him as a strong suspect. H.T. positively identified him as her assailant upon waking from her coma and at trial and she had no motive to lie about her best friend's boyfriend. DNA matching that of H.T. was found on the jeans and jacket Pilot had been wearing on the night of the assault and Pilot's alibi as to his whereabouts during the assault clearly left room for a jury to believe that he did in fact have time to attack H.T. The jury could reasonably have reached a verdict of guilty on the basis of this evidence and therefore we hold that the evidence was sufficient to support the jury's guilty verdict on the first-degree criminal sexual conduct charge.