Court Opinion

ID: 9589282
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 23:43:18.661735+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:35:22.915148
License: Public Domain

RUSSELL, J.,
dissenting.
The majority opinion correctly states the law governing our review of a criminal conviction based on alleged insufficiency of the evidence. We must view the evidence in the light most favorable to the Commonwealth and disturb the verdict only if we find that it is plainly wrong or without evidence to support it. Code § 8.01-680. If we depart from that standard of review, we take over the function of the fact-finder who actually saw and heard the witnesses, substituting our own judgment as to the weight to be given their testimony. See Ware v. Commonwealth, 214 Va. 520, 523, 201 S.E.2d 791, 793 (1974).
The evidence in this case seems to me to give adequate support to the trial court’s finding. The victim was attacked from behind and hit in the face with fists four or five times with such force that his nose was broken and both eyes blackened. After he fell to the ground he was kicked several times and his wallet was taken. The victim testified that his attacker was “blond-headed” and that he looked like the defendant; but that he wasn’t absolutely sure the defendant was his attacker because of the suddenness and violence of the attack, and because the attacker had approached him from behind. There is no requisite that testimony of this kind reach absolute certainty. It is entitled to such weight as the fact-finder may give it in the light of the surrounding circumstances, as shown by all evidence in the case. Hammer v. Commonwealth, 207 Va. 159, 163, 148 S.E.2d 892, 895 (1966).
The defendant was seen by Johnson and Murphy a few minutes after the attack. He was standing “in the briars” at the bank of the river near the victim’s wallet, which had evidently just been emptied of money and thrown into the water. Johnson testified on direct examination:
Q. “Where was the wallet when you first observed him in relation to where he was?”
*321A. “He was on the edge of the bank and the wallet was in the river.”
Q. “Who else was there?”
A. “Nobody but Grayson Murphy.”
On cross-examination, defense counsel asked Johnson:
Q. “ — you saw Mr. Burrows on the river bank; is that correct?”
A. “Yes.”
Q. “There were a lot of people around at that time?”
A. “Very few.”
Q. “Some people?”
A. “Four or five.”
The majority opinion interprets this testimony as meaning that Johnson saw the defendant “with four or five people.” In our position on appellate review, I do not believe it should be so interpreted. It seems to me to support the trial judge’s conclusion that the defendant was alone “on the edge of the bank” near the wallet, and that the four or five others were in the vicinity, but not in his company. The distinction is crucial because it permits the fact-finder to draw an inference of guilt from the defendant’s possession of property recently stolen by a lone robber. The majority opinion seems to me to view the testimony in the light most favorable to the defendant.
At Johnson’s orders, the defendant retrieved the wallet. All the money had been removed from it. Johnson and Murphy, knowing the police had been called, attempted to hold him. After the defendant broke away from them, he fled through the woods. He testified that he was afraid of Johnson and Murphy and didn’t know why he had been restrained. However, he evidently slowed to a normal pace as he passed within ten feet of a state trooper who was entering the area, and asked him for no help. In fact, he said nothing. The trooper testified that the defendant was shirtless, had blood on his right hand, and looked as if he had been in a fight. At trial, the defendant explained his appearance by saying that he had fallen down “many times” while running through the woods to escape Johnson and Murphy, and that he had suffered cuts in so doing.
The defendant had been brought to the party as a passenger in a car driven by his brother. However, instead of seeking out the brother for aid or for a ride home, he ran out of the woods on a dirt road, after passing the trooper, and hitch-hiked a ride back to *322Richmond with a stranger. He said nothing to his host about being pursued by Johnson and Murphy, or being in fear, or falling down while running. Rather, he said that he had blood on his hands and his pants as a result of breaking up a fight. When he was arrested two days later, the defendant’s hands were badly swollen around the knuckles. After being warned of his rights, the defendant at first refused to say where he had been on the date in question, and later said he had no idea where King William County was. He never told the police that he was at the scene, but at trial purported to give a detailed account of his experiences at the party in King William County. The court was fully justified in rejecting his version.
If the evidence, is viewed in the light most favorable to the Commonwealth, it seems to me to give full circumstantial support to the trial court’s finding. Since we lack the trial judge’s opportunity to evaluate this testimony at first hand, I would affirm.
THOMPSON, J., joins in dissent.