Court Opinion

ID: 9537917
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 07:27:10.054165+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:57:10.964673
License: Public Domain

*259STEVENS, Judge
(dissenting).
I regret my inability to agree with my associates in the matter of their conclusion that the evidence was not sufficient to support proof of the essential elements of the offense. The following language is found in Hull which is cited by the majority:
“While it is true that guilty knowledge cannot rest on mere supposition and the evidence must show it beyond a reasonable doubt, nevertheless this fact may be established by circumstantial as well as by direct evidence, (citing cases)
“The mere possession of stolen goods by a defendant does not in and of itself establish guilty knowledge, but it is a circumstance to be considered with all the other evidence of the case as bearing upon that issue, and a finding of guilty knowledge and a conviction will be sustained when the evidence of possession is supplemented by other evidence
(Emphasis supplied)
The Supreme Court states that the supporting evidence may be false, evasive or contradictory statements by the defendant or his unusual manner of acquisition, either of which was presented to the jury in the case we now have under consideration. In my opinion the Supreme Court does not hold that these are the only ways of proving the necessary elements of guilt by circumstantial evidence. The jury had evidence that on 8 March at 11:30 a. m. the items found in the defendant’s car trunk were resting on the bed of a pickup truck at the business place of the owner of the items. These were discovered to be missing shortly after 5:30 the same day, the truck not having been moved in the meantime. The items were found in the trunk of the defendant’s car at 2:30 on the following morning at a point not far, geographically, from the place of business of the owner of the items. The items were of an unusual nature. In my opinion the theft a comparatively short period prior to the discovery of the items, the location of the items in the trunk of the defendant’s car, the reasonably close geographic location between the place of the theft and place of the discovery are all circumstances from which the jury could logically find that the defendant’s guilt was established beyond a reasonable doubt. I would affirm.