Court Opinion

ID: 9567208
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 19:50:36.369387+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T10:00:25.112495
License: Public Domain

Eberhardt, Presiding Judge, concurring.
I fully agree that the recent full bench case of Stephens v. State, 127 Ga. App. 416 (193 SE2d 870), with all judges concurring, is a sufficient basis for affirming here. In it we held that a DUI conviction might rest upon circumstantial evidence, and we disapproved a number of cases wherein the ruling was, or substantially indicated, that direct evidence would have to be produced showing that the defendant was under the influence of intoxicants at the time of his driving the vehicle on the highway.
A careful reading of Stephens will reveal that we did not go as far as my brother Deen suggests. We did not "shift the burden of proof to the defendant.” We simply said that where there was circumstantial evidence indicating that the defendant had been under the influence of intoxicants when driving the vehicle, it was for the jury to say whether the evidence was sufficient to exclude all other reasonable hypotheses and justify a conviction, and that if the jury so found we should not disturb it.
We made no new law in Stephens; we simply applied the long recognized and well-settled principle that conviction on a criminal charge (even DUI) may rest upon circumstantial evidence, and disapproved dicta in some cases which had brought confusion to the bench and the bar. We cited a number of cases in which the true rule had been recognized and applied, some of which were *638older than those in which dicta were disapproved and some of later vintage. See citations at p. 425. And see Townsend v. State, 127 Ga. App. 797 (195 SE2d 474).
In the case here the defendant struck an "object” (conceded in appellant’s brief to have been a man, who was mortally wounded) on the highway. The state patrol received information as to the matter at 9:43 p.m. and Trooper Walker went immediately to the scene, arriving at 9:50 p.m. He found the defendant at the scene, intoxicated. He admitted to the trooper that he had driven the car involved in the accident. His eyes were glassy, he walked on unsteady feet, his speech was slurred and there was an odor of alcohol on his breath. He was given the alcolyzer test, as authorized under Ga. L. 1953, Nov. Sess., pp. 556, 575; 1966, pp. 70, 71; 1968, pp. 448, 449, 452 (Code Ann. §§ 68-1625, 68-1625.1), and the result showed that he had in excess of .10 percent of alcohol in his blood. The test was not given until 10:45 p.m., and thus, as the patrolman testified, the alcoholic content had been at a higher level when he first arrived at the scene than when he later administered the test. The defendant had had nothing to drink from the time the patrolman first saw him. The content as indicated by the test disclosed that defendant was intoxicated. Ga. L. 1968, pp. 448, 449 (Code Ann. § 68-1625).
The trooper did not know exactly when the accident had occurred, but testified that it was his opinion that it had been at 9:30 p.m. He was not asked what facts he based his opinion on, and there was no objection to the testimony. He had qualified as an expert in the investigation of motor vehicle accidents on the highway, and was testifying as such, and under Code § 38-1710 the evidence was admissible. He did say that the accident could have occurred an hour or more prior to his arriving at the scene, but that was not his opinion. It was a mere possibility.
The defendant made an unsworn statement as follows:
*639"Well, all I have to say is that I’m sorry about the accident, but I wasn’t drunk.”
The jury was authorized to conclude from all of this evidence, including the defendant’s unsworn statement, that the defendant had been under the influence when he was driving the vehicle. As Judge Evans asserted in Vinson v. State, 120 Ga. App. 425 (170 SE2d 749), "While the circumstantial evidence connecting the accused with the crime, in order to support a conviction, must exclude every reasonable hypothesis except the guilt of the accused, yet it need not remove every possibility of his innocence John v. State, 33 Ga. 257, 268, Graves v. State, 71 Ga. App. 96, 99 (30 SE2d 212); Eason v. State, 217 Ga. 831 (125 SE2d 488).” See also Norman v. State, 121 Ga. App. 753, 757 (175 SE2d 119) and cits.
The evidence here is perfectly consistent with the defendant’s guilt. The accident occurred out in the country, and the defendant remained at the scene until the patrol arrived. While there may be a possibility that he could have consumed enough alcoholic beverage between the time of the accident and the arrival of the patrol to become intoxicated, that does not appear to be a reasonable inference from this evidence. It does not appear that any alcoholic beverage was available, and the defendant certainly makes no claim of it.
I agree that the verdict is amply supported by the evidence.