Court Opinion

ID: 9610910
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 03:48:46.024474+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:03:06.412341
License: Public Domain

Harshbarger, Justice:
In the early afternoon of Sunday, November 4, 1974, Alfred Stewart was in his office at the May Company in Fairmont, West Virginia. His wife telephoned him at about 1:00 p.m. and he exclaimed that he was being robbed, whereupon she called the police, and friends who owned a sandwich shop near the office. They found Stewart dead with a bullet wound in his chest.
On January 27, 1975 at 1:00 a.m. two Clarksburg patrolmen noticed Joseph Dobbs driving an automobile with unique markings that attracted their attention, and watched him park it and enter a hotel. An hour later they were called to police headquarters because a young man had reported that he was molested by Dobbs. He said Dobbs offered him marijuana and had a revolver in his car. When the officers accompanied the young man to the hotel Dobbs attempted to hide, but the policemen stopped and searched him. They found a bag protruding from his pocket and smelled marijuana. Dobbs gave them the bag and was arrested for possession of a controlled substance.
As the police were taking Dobbs to headquarters, they passed the parked car and one patrolman saw a similar bag on the car floor.
*632At the police station Dobbs telephoned his niece in Fairmont, who owned the car, advising her to come for it, and by 3:00 a.m. two men arrived to get it. In the meantime, a narcotics agent has been summoned and while the two men were sent to the county jail for the auto’s keys, the agent and a patrolman searched the car. The bag they had seen was empty; but they found a pistol under the front seat. The weapon was later identified by a ballistics expert as the weapon used to kill Alfred Stewart.
Joseph Dobbs was indicted for Stewart’s murder and was found guilty of first degree murder with recommendation of mercy by a Marion County jury. He was sentenced to life in prison and we granted his motion for a writ of error and supersedeas.
The evidence essentially was this: the deceased’s sister testified that, based upon her familiarity with May Company records through employment there as a bookkeeper, $464.00 was missing from the daily balance. Police photographs of the scene showed Stewart’s body, and papers strewn about the office. However, the only two identifiable fingerprints obtained were Stewart’s.
The State also presented three witnesses who were waiting for a bus in front of the office building when Stewart was killed. They had seen two black men enter and leave the building, and described articles of the men’s clothing with particularity. One said the taller man was clean-shaven with an African hair style, and the shorter had a thin mustache. None of the three could positively identify Dobbs.
Several defense witnesses testified that they saw defendant on various occasions during 1974 and early 1975, and that during that time he was bearded. The defense introduced a photograph of the bearded defendant taken in August, 1974 by his niece who testified that the photograph represented his general appearance during that year. On rebuttal the State called a witness who testified to having seen Dobbs at 5:00 a.m. on November 5, *6331974, without a beard, and a photograph which the witness had taken at that time and which portrayed defendant as beardless, was introduced.
The niece, owner of the car, testified that she loaned it to Dobbs around January 27, 1975; that she loaned it to various relatives and friends from time to time; that she did not consistently lock her car; and, that she had not cleaned it nor looked under the seats since July, 1974. Her husband testified that he had never placed nor seen anyone else place a gun in the car.
Three young men testified they were involved in an incident with defendant in July of 1974, wherein one of the men who lived and worked with him took his pistol. The other two saw it before it was returned to Dobbs. The witness who had taken it testified that it was the murder weapon, but recanted on cross-examination, stating that it “looked like” the murder weapon but that defendant’s piece had less rust on it. One of the other witnesses testified that the guns were the same, the third testified that it “looked like” the same one but qualified his testimony by advising that it was dark when he saw it.
Another prosecution witness testified that he had seen the “butt part” of a pistol that defendant had told him was “my .38” in January of 1975, and that it “looked like” the murder weapon.
The evidence about the weapon and about defendant’s race and beard is that upon which the State relied for conviction.
The burden is always on the state to establish by sufficient evidence, guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. State v. Scurlock, 99 W. Va. 629, 130 S.E. 263 (1925). As this Court wrote in Pinkerton v. Farr, __ W. Va. _, 220 S.E.2d 682, 688 (1975), “A lesser standard does not afford an accused due process of law under the Fourteenth Amendment.”
In West Virginia, the standard guiding review of sufficiency of evidence is:
*634In a criminal case, a verdict of guilt will not be set aside on the ground that it is contrary to the evidence, where the state’s evidence is sufficient to convince impartial minds of the guilt of the defendant beyond a reasonable doubt. The evidence is to be viewed in the light most favorable to the prosecution. To warrant interference with a verdict of guilt on the ground of insufficiency of evidence, the court must be convinced that the evidence was manifestly inadequate and that consequent injustice has been done. Syllabus Point 1, State v. Starkey, _ W. Va. _, 244 S.E.2d 219 (1978).
This standard applies to trial courts’ consideration of motions for directed verdicts and to this Court. See Addair v. Majestic Petroleum Co., Inc.,_W. Va._, 232 S.E.2d 821, 824 (1977).
Moreover, in cases involving sufficiency of circumstantial evidence, there is an additional standard set in State v. Noe, _W. Va._, 230 S.E.2d 826 at 829 (1976):
[Circumstantial evidence will not support a guilty verdict unless the fact of guilt is proved to the exclusion of every reasonable hypothesis of innocence; and circumstances which creates a mere suspicion of guilt but do not prove the actual commission of the crime charged, are not sufficient to sustain a conviction. See State v. Allen, 139 W. Va. 818, 82 S.E.2d 423 (1954); State v. Clay, 135 W. Va. 618, 64 S.E.2d 117 (1951); State v. Cut lip, 131 W. Va. 141, 46 S.E.2d 454 (1948); State v. Hudson, 128 W. Va. 655, 37 S.E.2d 553 (1946); State v. Kapp, 109 W. Va. 487, 155 S.E. 537 (1930); State v. Snider, 106 W. Va. 309, 145 S.E. 607 (1928); State v. Ison, 104 W. Va. 217, 139 S.E. 704 (1927); State v. Whitehead, 104 W. Va. 545, 140 S.E. 531 (1927); and State v. Hunter, 103 W. Va. 377, 137 S.E. 534 (1927).
In Noe, we emphasized the necessity for caution in circumstantial evidence cases.
The record here is long; there were many witnesses. But there is a paucity of relevant, probative evidence. *635Ten witnesses testifying to a fact that has little or no probative value, do not by their repetitions make it more important. Here defendant’s guilt pends upon proof of a material issue — his identification, or more particularly, his presence at the scene of the crime. An infinite number of witnesses testifying to having seen two black men near the scene at the time of the shooting could not improve the value of this evidence as identification of this particular defendant. And proof of his ownership/ possession of the murder instrument does not carry the State’s heavy burden.
The State must prove that a defendant was present at the place and time a crime was committed, if personal presence is essential to proof of the act. See State v. Pendry,_W. Va.-, 227 S.E.2d 210 (1976); State v. Withrow, 142 W. Va. 522, 96 S.E.2d 913 (1957). Evidence that black men (whether bearded or not) were at the scene was not enough. Evidence that a black owned the murder weapon is not enough to put him at the scene.
State v. Bailey, 151 W. Va. 796, 155 S.E.2d 850 (1967), provides another construct through which to view this evidence, holding in Syllabus Point One “If, on a trial for murder, the evidence is wholly circumstantial, but as to time, place, motive, means and conduct, it concurs in pointing to the accused as the perpetrator of the crime, he may properly be convicted.” When this standard is applied, the State’s evidence is again dismally deficient: there was no probative evidence of “time”, nor of “place”, nor of “conduct”; “motive” is to be inferred from testimony concerning missing money; and “means” was attempted to be proved by the discovery of the murder weapon in a car of which the defendant had nonexclusive possession months after the murder.
Proof of opportunity to commit a crime is not sufficient to establish guilt; the evidence must exclude all reasonable opportunity by others to have committed it. See 23 C.J.S. Criminal Law § 907 (1961) and cases collected therein.
*636A review of other jurisdictions reveals not a single case in which such circumstantial evidence has been held sufficient. For example, in Commonwealth v. Prado, _ Pa. _, 393 A.2d 8, 10 (1978), the supreme court found these facts insufficient to establish a prima facie case:
Appellee did emerge from an alley after the shooting, but no witnesses to the shooting were presented and no evidence of the murder weapon was presented. The prosecution did introduce testimony that the wound was “probably” caused by a high velocity weapon. The only link between this and the appellee is that he once owned such a weapon. The prosecution introduced testimony to establish a motive from an altercation between appellee and ... [victim]; however, such altercation occurred a year prior to the murder. The prosecution introduced remarks made by ap-pellee to a sporting goods salesman that “you didn’t sell any bullets to me.” ... and, to a detective that “you ain’t never going to find my rifle, Turkey,” ... and asks us to infer that appellee was “conscious of his guilt.”
The Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas held more substantial evidence than we have, insufficient in Flores v. State, Tex. Crim., 551 S.W.2d 364 (1977). Three “Latin Americans” were seen with the victim in the back seat of his car while he was being issued a speeding ticket. The defendant, a Latin American, was shown to have been in possession of the deceased’s car about twenty-four hours later. Six weeks later defendant still had the car, at which time it bore license plates and inspection stickers issued to other cars. Clothing and other items belonging to the victim were found in a suitcase in another car trunk where they had been left by defendant and a companion to be retrieved later. Human blood stains that could not be typed were on the seat of victim’s car and on defendant’s shirt. An expert testified that the deceased was killed with a gun of the same caliber as one which the deceased owned and had with him (although it was never found).
*637The court held that because (1) the three Latin Americans observed in the car with the victim were not further identified; (2) the record was silent as to time of death, (although Flores and another were seen with the victim’s car, but without the victim in it, the day after the speeding ticket was issued); (3) only an inference could be drawn that the victim was killed with his own gun because it was never found; (4) it was not shown when human bloodstains were made on the victim’s car seat and appellant’s shirt; and (5) the stains could not be typed, there was therefore .. no showing that the appellant was at or near the scene of the crime and no showing as to actual time of the deceased’s death.” 551 S.W. 2d at 369. The court concluded that the evidence amounted to a strong suspicion only and did not “... exclude to a moral certainty every other reasonable hypothesis except the appellant’s guilt.” Id. at 369.
We conclude that the trial court should have directed a verdict of acquittal due to insufficient evidence at the close of the State’s case in chief because the circumstantial evidence presented did not prove guilt to the exclusion of every reasonable hypothesis of innocence, creating only a suspicion of guilt. The judgment is reversed and defendant unconditionally discharged from custody. Greene v. Massey, 437 U.S. 19, 57 L.Ed.2d 15, 98 S.Ct. 2151 (1978).

Reversed.