Court Opinion

ID: 9566373
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 19:38:32.76942+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:37:23.963869
License: Public Domain

Benton, J.,
dissenting.
Code § 46.2-352 states in pertinent part:
The transcript or abstract shall be prima facie evidence that the person named therein was duly convicted ... by the court wherein the conviction . . . was made, of each offense shown by the transcript or abstract. If the person denies any of the facts as stated therein, he shall have the burden of proving that the fact is untrue.
“Prima facie evidence is evidence which on its first appearance is sufficient to . . . establish the fact in question unless rebutted. It imports that the evidence produces for the timé being a certain result, but that the result may be repelled.” Babbitt v. Miller, 192 Va. 372, 379-80, 64 S.E.2d 718, 722 (1951).
The Commonwealth’s evidence before the trial judge established that on September 11, 1986, a West Virginia police officer issued a traffic ticket for driving on a suspended license to Harold R. Moffitt, who resided at Lot 21 in Shanks, West Virginia. At trial, Harold Rollins Moffitt contested that he was the same “Harold R. Moffitt” who was charged and convicted in West Virginia for “driving while suspended.”
*990Moffitt testified at trial and denied that he had received the ticket and that the signature on the ticket was his. The evidence proved that Moffitt resided on Route 2 in Winchester, Virginia. No evidence proved that Moffitt ever lived at Lot 21, Shanks, West Virginia. No evidence proved that the signature on the summons was Moffitt’s. Moreover, Moffitt produced as evidence at trial a letter from the West Virginia Division of Motor Vehicles stating that the division had “reviewed [its] records and cannot find any evidence of a suspension or revocation against your driving privilege in West Virginia.” The Virginia Division of Motor Vehicles records in evidence before the trial judge also established that on September 11, 1986, the date the West Virginia ticket was issued, Moffitt’s license had not been suspended or revoked in Virginia.
The majority asserts that Moffitt may have had his license suspended by a trial court in Virginia pursuant to Code § 46.2-392. The record, however, contains no proof that any such suspension had occurred. Moreover, if Moffitt’s license had been so suspended, presumably it would have been in the possession of the court that suspended it or the Division of Motor Vehicles. See Code § 46.2-392.
The evidence before the trial judge was sufficient to negate the truth of the assertion that the conviction of “Harold R. Moffitt” in West Virginia was of the same Moffitt being tried. Following Moffitt’s evidence, the record before the trial judge did not prove by a preponderance of the evidence that the person who was stopped and given a summons for driving on a suspended license was the same Harold Rollins Moffitt who was before the trial judge. Accordingly, I would hold that the evidence proved at trial rebutted the Commonwealth’s prima facie evidence.