Court Opinion

ID: 9752320
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 17:57:49.014658+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:27:13.967334
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Kelleher,
dissenting. It is fundamental law that the possession sufficient to sustain a conviction for the possession of narcotics, or narcotic paraphernalia may be constructive rather than actual, joint rather than exclusive, and the proscribed possession may be established by circumstantial rather than direct evidence. D. Bernheim, Defense of Narcotic Cases, §1.11 [3] (1975); Annot., 91 A.L.R.2d 810, §§3 and 4 (1963), and Annot., 56 A.L.R. 3d 948 (1974).
For purposes of the motion for a judgment of acquittal, the evidence and the reasonable inferences to be drawn therefrom must be viewed in the light most favorable to the prosecution. Two elements essential to proof of a joint constructive possession are the power of control and intent to exercise that control. Commonwealth v. Townsend, 428 Pa. 281, 237 A.2d 192 (1968). While presence in the vicinity of contraband does not by itself prove the crime of possession, knowledge of its presence and intent to exercise control can be inferred from the totality of the circumstances of which presence is a factor. With these principles in mind, let us review the evidentiary chain of circumstances forged by the prosecution.
The gist of one witness’ testimony bears repeating. He is Detective Victor E. Thatcher, a 7-year veteran of the Warwick Police Department’s Narcotic Unit. He has participated in around 70 narcotic raids. He spoke in the jargon of a narcotic user. The bottle caps he called *330“cookers.” The caps are of the “twist-off” variety. The witness told how a user would pull a piece of the cap away from the body of the cap. The torn piece would then serve as a handle for the cooker. Into the cooker are placed cotton, heroin, and spring water. The user holds the cooker by the handle with one hand and with the other hand he holds a match to the bottom of the cooker to heat up the solution. Once the solution reaches the right temperature, the hypodermic paraphernalia are used to draw off the solution through the cotton into the syringe. The solution is then injected into the user’s body. Officer Thatcher reported that the draw-off through the cotton and the use of spring water are employed to purify the product. He also explained that the Tuinal can be removed from its capsules, placed in the cooker where it is mixed with the water, and, once heated, it can be administered intravenously.
With Detective Thatcher’s narrative providing the background, picture the petitioners and five others gathered together in a secluded area which cannot be seen from the adjoining streets. In the area where the septet are assembled can be seen a glassine packet of heroin, 53 capsules of Tuinal, hypodermic needles and syringes, the cookers, a jug of spring water, and a blood-stained piece of tissue paper. When the police arrive, the seven try to escape.
Looking at all the evidence, one can reasonably infer that the hideaway selected by petitioners and their companions was a “shooting gallery,” i.e., a place where heroin users gather to take drugs by the needle.1 The bloodstained tissue paper indicates that the “shooting” was *331underway before the police arrived. At the approach of the police, the petitioners and their companions “took off”; flight is a well-recognized indication of guilt. The plain-view presence of the contraband, the group’s choice of a secluded assembly point, and their attempt to flee once they were aware that the police were on the way to join them, indicate that each person present had the right and the intent to use all of the contraband that was there spread out before them.
Julius C. Michaelson, Attorney General, William G. Brody, Special Asst. Attorney Geenral, for State of Rhode Island.
Bevilacqua & Cicilline, John F. Cidlline, for defendants.
When a realistic appraisal is made of all these factors, with consideration of Detective Thatcher’s testimony, there arises a reasonable inference that the petitioners and their companions were in the joint constructive possession of the contraband spelled out in each of the three indictments for which they were tried.
Since the weight to be given such an inference is not before the trial justice on a motion for acquittal, there was sufficient evidence to take the case to the jury.2

While the description of the bottle caps as “cookers” came from Detective Thatcher, the definition of “shooting gallery” comes from a glossary of terms found in D. Bernheim, Defense of Narcotic Cases, §7:34 (1975).

The motion for acquittal is the equivalent of what was in the years prior to the adoption of the Superior Court Rules of Criminal Procedure a motion for a directed verdict. State v. Moretti, 113 R. I. 213, 319 A.2d 342 (1974). In State v. Montella, 88 R. I. 469, 149 A.2d 919 (1959), this court upheld the denial of a motion for a directed verdict in a case charging a number of defendants with conspiring to violate the election laws, but then faulted the trial justice’s denial of their motion for a new trial, pointing out that since the defendants’ guilt rested entirely on circumstantial evidence, the evidence presented by the state failed to exclude any reasonable hypothesis but that of guilt.