Opinion ID: 4158229
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Sufficiency of the Trial Evidence

Text: We next consider whether the Court of Criminal Appeals erred in concluding that the evidence was legally insufficient to support the defendant‟s convictions for conspiracy to possess over 300 pounds of marijuana with intent to sell it and conspiracy to commit money laundering.
At trial, Trooper Boyd testified consistently with his April 23, 2012 affidavit and his testimony at the pretrial suppression hearing, as previously set forth. He further explained that, in addition to the search warrant for the 4571 Dugger Road property, he also had obtained warrants for two other places Son frequented: an apartment in Antioch and the Remuda Circle address in Smyrna. All three search warrants were executed at approximately the same time on April 24, 2012. During the search of the Antioch apartment officers recovered less than a pound of marijuana and approximately $11,000. At the Remuda Circle address officers seized approximately eighty-five pounds of marijuana, packaged in gallon-sized plastic bags, that were stored inside plastic storage bins. Other items seized included more than $100,000 cash, Son‟s white Nissan Titan truck, a drug ledger, and a suitcase, because suitcases were used to transport the marijuana from Alabama to Tennessee on March 16, 2012, and April 2, 2012. Four or - 29 - five cell phones also were seized from the Remuda Circle address, but no text messages or voice mails were discovered between the defendant and Son regarding drug trafficking. Trooper Boyd also knew of no communications between the defendant and Mr. Medina or any other Hispanic drug dealers. Additionally Son‟s drug ledger, located at the Remuda Circle address, did not mention the defendant. Trooper Boyd noted that it would have been unnecessary for the defendant to talk with anyone except Son if their agreement entailed the defendant keeping Son‟s money at the 4571 Dugger Road property and allowing Son to receive shipments of marijuana on that property. Trooper Boyd pointed out that they could have agreed to communicate about their illegal activities in person, which would explain why officers found no incriminating text messages or cell phone calls between them. Furthermore, Trooper Boyd testified that the marijuana discovered at the Remuda Circle address had the same packaging, the same compressed texture, and was of the same Mexican type as that found at the 4571 Dugger Road property. Trooper Boyd admitted that, while the plastic bags, material used to package the marijuana, and even the suitcases at the Remuda Circle address smelled of axle grease, which drug traffickers often use to conceal the scent of the marijuana, no axle grease was found on the packaging or marijuana discovered at the 4571 Dugger Road property. Trooper Boyd also conceded that no law enforcement officer had actually seen any drugs during the investigation and had only seen suitcases being unloaded and loaded. He explained, however, that it was not unusual for officers not to see drugs during an investigation because drugs are ordinarily concealed. Adrian Breedlove, a Brentwood police officer assigned to Nashville DEA, testified that, on March 16, 2012, he conducted surveillance on a maroon Ford Expedition and relayed information to other officers and agents conducting surveillance. He observed the Expedition leave Interstate 65 at exit 37 and stop at a nearby gas station, and he noticed that the driver of the vehicle was a Hispanic male, later identified as Mr. Jaramillo. Officer Breedlove discontinued surveillance and left the gas station when another member of the surveillance team arrived. Not long after leaving the gas station, Officer Breedlove drove past the 4571 Dugger Road property and saw a white Nissan Titan truck parked in the driveway of residence. He entered the tag number of the vehicle into a computer database and learned that the truck was registered to Son. Officer Breedlove admitted that he had not seen Son or the defendant on March 16, 2012, only Son‟s vehicle. Officer Breedlove also participated in the search of the 4571 Dugger Road property on April 24, 2012, along with about a dozen other officers from various agencies. He testified as follows about statements the defendant made on the day the warrant was executed and about items that were discovered during the search. The defendant told officers that he had guns in the house, and officers discovered a loaded .45 semiautomatic pistol under the couch cushions in the den and an unloaded nine millimeter pistol under the couch. They also found a rifle inside a case in a bathroom and a bolt-action rifle underneath a bed. In the master bedroom, officers found four more - 30 - rifles, rifle magazines, three shotguns, a .50 caliber muzzle loader, and a revolver. On the top shelf of the closet in the master bedroom officers also found a large electronic scale, capable of weighing items up to thirteen pounds, and, on top of this scale, officers discovered a bag containing marijuana. A second plastic bag containing smaller Ziploc bags of marijuana was also found in this closet. In this same closet, near the marijuana and scales, officers found between $20,000 and $22,000 cash inside a jacket pocket. Officers discovered a smaller scale capable of weighing items up to two pounds inside a drawer and a small plastic bag of marijuana. In the master bedroom dresser drawer, officers discovered a plastic bag containing cocaine and $75,000 in cash, comprised of $100 and $50 dollar bills. A second small bag of cocaine was found inside a roll top desk in the den. A third bag of cocaine was discovered on a kitchen shelf above the refrigerator. Based on the amount of cocaine in the bags, Officer Breedlove opined that it was likely for personal use. Officers also found a money counting machine, other small bags of marijuana, a metal grinder commonly used to grind marijuana into a powder, several butts of marijuana cigarettes, and two pipes that smelled strongly of marijuana. Officer Breedlove testified that some of the marijuana found at the defendant‟s residence was still “bricked up”—meaning tightly compressed for easier transport—and had not been processed for sale. No intact bricks of the marijuana were discovered at Son‟s Remuda Circle Smyrna address. Nevertheless, Officer Breedlove asserted that the marijuana found at both places had “similar packaging and pressing techniques.” He also noted that the marijuana found at Son‟s Remuda Circle address and that found at the defendant‟s residence had the same stems and seeds present. Officer Breedlove explained that the more marijuana is “bricked up,” the closer it is to the initial source. He also stated that when prepared for retail dealers and end users, marijuana is divided into smaller quantities. According to Officer Breedlove, the defendant told officers that the marijuana and drugs inside his home belonged to him and had come “from Mexicans.” The defendant denied that Son had anything to do with the marijuana found inside his residence when Officer Breedlove pointed out that the marijuana found at the defendant‟s residence was very similar to the marijuana found at Son‟s Remuda Circle address. Outside the defendant‟s residence, officers found an Igloo cooler containing several marijuana plants in black trash bags. Inside the trunk of a Honda Civic parked directly in front of the defendant‟s residence, officers located a large ammunition can, eleven firearms—some of them semiautomatic—and ammunition for these weapons. Inside the ammunition can, officers found $1,000,300 cash, all in one hundred dollar bills. Officers also located numerous other items of personal property, including vehicles and farming equipment. When the defendant saw the officers discover the items in the Civic‟s trunk, he remarked, “They found my money.” The defendant told officers the ammunition can - 31 - contained about a million dollars and said that he had earned the money cutting hay. As for the weapons, the defendant claimed that he had them for protection because rumors had circulated for years that he had $1,000,000 buried on his property, and numerous trespassers had attempted to steal his money. The defendant denied that the ammunition can containing the money had ever been buried and said that he had placed it in the trunk of the Civic a year earlier, in 2011, when he purchased the vehicle. The defendant said that he had stored the money in the Civic near his residence so he could more easily watch it. The defendant insisted that the money belonged to him, not to Son. When asked about Son‟s truck being seen at his home on March 16, 2012, the defendant replied that he had not seen Son or any Hispanics near his home that day but conceded that he could have been at work. Officer Breedlove acknowledged that no drug ledgers or other documents connecting the defendant to the drug trade were found at the defendantʼs residence. Jimmy Mann, an officer with the Dickson police department assigned to DEA Nashville, testified that he had assisted with surveillance in this case. On April 2, 2012, Officer Mann drove to exit 32, the Culleoka exit, and waited at a Citgo gas station. At the time, he knew that he was looking for a white Nissan Titan truck and a Lincoln Navigator. Neither of these vehicles was present when he arrived, so Officer Mann parked next to the building and waited. Five minutes later, a white Nissan Titan truck pulled next to the gas pumps, and Son exited the vehicle and began pumping gas. Approximately fifteen minutes later, a Navigator pulled into the gas station and parked in front of him. Officer Mann identified the driver of the Navigator as Mr. Medina. Son and Mr. Medina went inside the store together, came back out, and got into their vehicles. They left the store at the same time, travelling in the direction of the 4571 Dugger Road property, with Son‟s truck in the lead. Other officers picked up surveillance on the vehicles when they left the gas station. Officer Mann acknowledged that the defendant was not in either of the vehicles that he observed on April 2, 2012. Joel Rowney, a detective with the Nashville Police Department assigned to the 20th Judicial District Drug Task Force, testified that he arrived at 4571 Dugger Road on April 24, 2012, while the search warrant was being executed, but after the defendant‟s residence had been searched. The defendant and his wife answered a few questions but then refused to speak with him further. Detective Rowney stated that most of the cash seized on the property was discovered in the ammunition can found in the trunk of the Civic. Detective Rowney said the can was covered in dirt, which suggested it had been buried. The cash in the ammunition can consisted entirely of $100 bills, which had been issued before the year 2000. Rubber bands used to bundle the cash had adhered to money. Based on the condition of the ammunition can, the rubber bands, and the issuance dates of the bills, Detective Rowney concluded that the money had been buried or concealed for over twelve years. - 32 - Detective Rowney stated that he did not issue a written notice of seizure to the defendant on the date the cash was seized. Instead, his secretary sent the notice of seizure to the defendant by certified mail at a later date that Detective Rowney could not recall. Detective Rowney explained that it had been his practice for eleven years to list the date of delivery of the notice of seizure as the date the property was seized, regardless of the date the notice of seizure was actually delivered. Detective Rowney explained that when a large amount of cash is seized, the standard procedure is for officers to deliver the cash to a bank, so that it can be counted and the total verified. Thereafter, officers send the owner a notice of seizure via certified mail, listing the accurate and verified total of the cash seized. The bank had closed by the time officers finished executing the search warrant on April 24, 2012. Therefore, Detective Rowney informed the defendant that he would receive a notice later via certified mail. Detective Rowney acknowledged that, although the currency had been issued before the year 2000, someone could have removed and used cash from the stockpile without replacing it with newer bills. Lieutenant Doelle testified that officers seized approximately eight pounds of marijuana and nearly a half ounce of cocaine from the 4571 Dugger Road property. Officers seized approximately eighty-five pounds of marijuana from Son‟s Remuda Circle Smyrna address. Several other items of personal property believed to have been derived from the sale of illegal drugs were also seized from the 4571 Dugger Road property, including vehicles and farming equipment. He testified that when the warrant was executed on April 24, 2012, the defendant already had a felony conviction. Proof showed that Tammy A. Tuttle worked in a non-skilled position at a medical laboratory preparing specimens and earned between $15,000 and $17,000 annually from 2007 to 2012. Additionally, tax records indicated that Ms. Tuttle had income of $15,075 in 2007 and $15,427 in 2008. Income tax records indicated the defendant, a farmer, had a net loss of $194 in 2007 and income of only $1613 in 2008. In 2011, the defendant had received Social Security benefits of $5,928. The defendant and his wife had approximately $20,000 in savings and checking accounts. Lieutenant Doelle acknowledged that the defendant had earned some income from cutting hay, but Lieutenant Doelle found no evidence of earned income, checks, or lottery winnings sufficient to explain how the defendant had accumulated the more than one million dollars found on the 4571 Dugger Road property. Chris Hill, an employee with the Board of Probation and Parole, testified that Son was continuously incarcerated from August 5, 2000, until his release on June 23, 2011. Cleto Medina, who had already entered guilty pleas to his participation in the activities giving rise to this case, testified that he had never seen the defendant nor conducted any drug deals with the defendant. Nevertheless, Mr. Medina confirmed that, in March and April 2012, marijuana had been transported from Alabama to Tennessee and delivered to a man known as “Red” or “Rojo,” whom Mr. Medina identified as Son. - 33 - Mr. Medina stated that two deliveries were made to other locations in middle Tennessee prior to March 16, 2012, Mr. Medina stated that his brother delivered marijuana to Son in a maroon Ford Expedition on March 16, 2012, and that he had delivered marijuana to Son on April 2, 2012, in his Lincoln Navigator to the 4571 Dugger Road property. Mr. Medina stated that the marijuana was packaged in blocks, covered in axle grease, and placed in suitcases for the deliveries. Each of the pre-March 16, 2012 deliveries consisted of 100 pounds of marijuana, as did the delivery on March 16, 2012. However, the April 2, 2012 delivery was supposed to consist of 170 pounds of marijuana, although Son later informed him that the marijuana had weighed only 157 pounds. Mr. Medina described the transaction on April 2, 2012, in which he had participated, stating that Son had instructed him to call when he reached exit 32 off Interstate 65. When Mr. Medina did so, Son gave him directions to a gas station ten to fifteen minutes away. They met at the gas station, and Mr. Medina followed Son to a wooded area on the 4571 Dugger Road property, where he delivered the marijuana to Son. According to Mr. Medina, the marijuana was priced at $675 per pound, and Son paid cash for the delivery, mostly in $100 bills. Following the drug transaction, Mr. Medina returned to the Interstate via the route he had previously taken. Mr. Medina never met with Son again, because he was arrested two or three weeks after the April 2, 2012 drug transaction. After his arrest, Mr. Medina viewed an aerial photograph of the 4571 Dugger Road property and marked on it the narrow dirt road location where the transaction occurred. Mr. Medina stated that the defendant‟s mobile home was not visible from that location. Mr. Medina also directed Officer David Stanfield along the route Son had driven from the gas station to the wooded area of the 4571 Dugger Road property. B. Standards for Evaluating the Sufficiency of the Evidence “Appellate courts evaluating the sufficiency of the convicting evidence must determine „whether, after viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution, any rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt.‟” State v. Wagner, 382 S.W.3d 289, 297 (Tenn. 2012) (quoting Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 319 (1979)). A guilty verdict removes the presumption of innocence and replaces it with a presumption of guilt; thus, on appeal a defendant bears the burden of demonstrating why the evidence is insufficient to support the conviction. Id. (citing State v. Parker, 350 S.W.3d 883, 903 (Tenn. 2011)). On appeal, the State is afforded the strongest legitimate view of the evidence presented at trial and any reasonable and legitimate inferences that may be drawn from the evidence. Id. (citing State v. Bland, 958 S.W.2d 651, 659 (Tenn. 1997)). “The credibility of the witnesses, the weight to be given their testimony, and the reconciliation of conflicts in the proof are matters entrusted to the jury as the trier of fact.” State v. Campbell, 245 S.W.3d - 34 - 331, 335 (Tenn. 2008) (citing Byrge v. State, 575 S.W.2d 292, 295 (Tenn. Crim. App. 1978)). “This Court neither re-weighs the evidence nor substitutes its inferences for those drawn by the jury.” Wagner, 382 S.W.3d at 297 (citing Bland, 958 S.W.2d at 659)). Circumstantial and direct evidence are reviewed under the same standards. Id. (citing State v. Dorantes, 331 S.W.3d 370, 379 (Tenn. 2011)). Circumstantial evidence is alone a sufficient basis to support a conviction, and circumstantial evidence need not exclude every reasonable hypothesis except that of guilt. Id. (citing Dorantes, 331 S.W.3d at 381). C. Application of the Legal Standards We agree with the State that the evidence presented at trial is sufficient to support the defendant‟s conviction of conspiracy to possess over 300 pounds of marijuana with the intent to sell it. The offense of conspiracy is committed if two (2) or more people, each having the culpable mental state required for the offense that is the object of the conspiracy, and each acting for the purpose of promoting or facilitating commission of an offense, agree that one (1) or more of them will engage in conduct that constitutes the offense. Tenn. Code Ann. § 39-12-103. The relevant offense to this appeal is defined as “knowingly . . . [p]ossess[ing] a controlled substance with intent to . . . sell the controlled substance,” Tenn. Code Ann. § 39-17-417(a)(4), and the controlled substance is “[t]hree hundred pounds (300 lbs.) (136,050 grams) or more of any substance containing marijuana,” id. § 39-17-417(j)(13). In this case, the prosecution offered both direct and circumstantial evidence establishing that Son met with an agent of the DTO and then drove toward the 4571 Dugger Road property on which the defendant resided, with the DTO agent following him. After the first meeting on March 16, 2012, officers observed Son‟s vehicle parked in the defendant‟s driveway, and after the second meeting on April 2, 2012, officers obtained a GPS ping indicating that Mr. Medina‟s phone was located on the 4571 Dugger Road property. Mr. Medina testified at trial that he and Son had conducted the April 2, 2012 drug transaction on that property. The prosecution also presented circumstantial evidence establishing that the defendant was aware of Son‟s drug trafficking activity and aided him with it. For example, officers discovered eight pounds of marijuana in the defendant‟s residence, and it was packaged in a manner very similar to the marijuana discovered at Son‟s Remuda Circle Smyrna address. The defendant admitted that this marijuana belonged to him, although he denied Son had anything to do with it. Some of the marijuana had been processed while some of it remained compressed or “bricked up.” Some of the marijuana - 35 - had already been packaged into smaller Ziploc baggies in a manner that would facilitate resale, and between $20,000 to $22,000 cash was discovered next to this marijuana. Officers discovered scales and a grinder in defendant‟s residence—equipment used to prepare and process compressed marijuana for resale to end users. Officers also located a money-counting machine, which would have aided the defendant in keeping account of the proceeds of drug sales. Viewed in a light most favorable to the State, we conclude that this evidence was sufficient to support the defendant‟s conviction for conspiracy to possess over 300 pounds of marijuana with the intent to sell it. In concluding that the proof was insufficient to support the defendant‟s conviction, the Court of Criminal Appeals pointed out that no witnesses had observed Son and the defendant conspiring together and that the proof established only that Son and the defendant both were engaged in drug trafficking, not that they were working together in the illegal drug trade. This analysis might be appropriate were the Court of Criminal Appeals tasked with resolving factual issues and deciding the defendant‟s guilt or innocence in the first instance. However, those tasks are reserved for the jury, not reviewing appellate courts. Here, the evidence is sufficient to support the jury‟s determination that Son and the defendant were conspiring together in the marijuana drug trafficking operation. The proof also is sufficient to support the defendant‟s conviction for conspiracy to commit money laundering. Money laundering is defined in pertinent part as follows: It is an offense to knowingly use, conspire to use or attempt to use proceeds derived directly or indirectly from a specified unlawful activity to conduct or attempt to conduct a financial transaction or to make other disposition with the intent to conceal or disguise the nature, location, source, ownership or control of the criminally derived proceeds. Tenn. Code Ann. § 39-14-903(a)(1). Here, the State offered proof to show that the combined income of the defendant and his wife would not have accounted for the large amounts of cash found in the defendant‟s possession. Ms. Tuttle had income of $15,000 to 17,000 per year during the relevant time, and tax records indicated that the defendant had a loss in one year and income of $1,613 in another year. Yet, officers found $20,000 to $22,000 cash inside a jacket pocket in the master bedroom closet, next to the marijuana and one of the electronic scales. Officers found $75,000 more in cash inside a dresser drawer in the bedroom and located an ammunition can in the trunk of the Civic outside containing $1,000,300 cash. The ammunition can was surrounded by semiautomatic weapons. From this proof, the jury could have rationally concluded, beyond a reasonable doubt, that the money, in whole or in part, derived from the drug trafficking conspiracy in which the defendant and Son were engaged. - 36 -