Opinion ID: 1512722
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: The Hall Thefts:

Text: Assuming that the evidence would justify an inference that there had been thefts of property from mail box 9-K belonging to Walter and Clara Hall (though we express no opinion as to whether the looting of a single mail box containing the separate property of two individuals constitutes one or two criminal offenses) the record is nonetheless devoid of any facts linking this appellant with those thefts. The only testimony shedding any light on when the Hall checks were taken is that of Mr. Hall when he testified that his Social Security checks usually arrived in his mail box anywhere between the 1st and 3rd of each month. But there is no evidence that Matthews was in the company of the codefendant Solomon (who was found to have the Hall checks in his possession on the morning of January 3rd) prior to his being observed by the witness Carrington when the Blumberg theft took place at 26 South Exeter Street. In fact, there is no evidence that they even knew each other prior to that time; nor that Matthews was in the vicinity of the apartment building where the Hall mail box was located at any time when the thefts of the Hall checks could have taken place. Guilt inferred only from the fact of the unexplained possession of recently stolen goods  Stapf v. State, 230 Md. 106, 108, 185 A.2d 496; Byrd v. State, 229 Md. 148, 150, 182 A.2d 47; Dyson v. State, 226 Md. 18, 21, 171 A.2d 505; Lewis v. State, 225 Md. 474, 475, 171 A.2d 244; Booker v. State, 225 Md. 183, 186, 170 A.2d 203  ordinarily cannot be imputed to a companion of the possessor without other supporting evidence; even though both may be observed committing a similar crime at a different time or place. Appellant's motions for judgment of acquittal on the grounds that there was no legally sufficient evidence to sustain the two convictions should have been granted.