Court Opinion

ID: 9452885
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 17:55:12.455867+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:33:23.939410
License: Public Domain

BAZELON, Chief Judge
(concurring) :
In Borum v. United States, No. 19960, decided today, 127 U.S.App.D.C. -, 380 F.2d 595, we reversed defendant’s conviction because the only evidence linking him to the crime was his fingerprints on one or two ordinary glass jars found at the scene of the crime. The Government introduced no evidence indicating that the jars were inaccessible to the defendant. For example, “[t]he jury had no way to determine where the complainant purchased the jars, or how long he had them before [the date of the crime], or whether complainant ever removed them from his home”.1 Since the prints might have been ' on the jars “indefinitely” or at least “for a period of * * * years,” the jury would have had to speculate in order to find that the defendant “never had any opportunity to touch the jars outside the house either before or after complainant bought them.” 2 In short, there was no way for the jury to find that the defendant touched the jars during the commission of the crime.
In the instant case the Government introduced fingerprint evidence which proved that Borum touched a metal cash box and a glass table top found at the scene of the crime.3 However, the Government went further. The owner of these objects testified that he purchased them five and twelve years ago respectively and that they had never left his house.4 The evidence indicated that Stevenson touched a tin tea canister found at the scene of the crime.5 The owner of the canister testified that she received it three years ago, and the owner of the house testified that it had not left the house since then.6 The Government’s fingerprint expert testified that under ideal conditions these fingerprints could last up to two years.7 Complainant testified that neither defendant had ever been given permission to enter the house.8
*595Thus, unlike the first Borum, case, the evidence here shows that neither of the defendants could have touched the objects outside the house either before or after complainant bought them. The ease, then, is distinguishable from Borum v. United States, supra, Hiet v. United States, 124 U.S.App.D.C. 313, 365 F.2d 504 (1966), Cephus v. United States, 117 U.S.App.D.C. 15, 324 F.2d 893 (1963), Campbell v. United States, 115 U.S.App.D.C. 30, 316 F.2d 681 (1963), and Cooper v. United States, 94 U.S.App.D.C. 343, 218 F.2d 39 (1954), in which the Government failed to prove that the objects touched were generally inaccessible to the defendants. Although the evidence in this case does not prove to a mathematical certainty that the defendants touched the objects during the commission of a crime, at least the Government negated some of the most reasonable explanations for the prints consistent with innocence.

. 127 U.S.App.D.C. at -, 380 F.2d at 597.

. 127 U.S.App.D.C. at -, 380 F.2d at 597.

. Tr. 140-41.

. Tr. 21, 22.

. Tr. 99.

. Tr. 80, 23.

. Tr. 169.

. Tr. 25.