Court Opinion

ID: 9588227
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 23:31:34.473548+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:00:57.813238
License: Public Domain

BRYANT, Judge
concurring in part and dissenting in part.
Because I believe the trial court did exactly as the law requires by denying defendant’s motion to dismiss the first-degree burglary charge and allowing the case to go to a jury, and because I believe defendant received a fair trial free from error, prejudicial or otherwise, I respectfully dissent from the majority opinion. However, as to that portion of the opinion holding no error in defendant’s conviction for possession of implements of housebreaking, I concur.
The majority reverses defendant’s conviction for first-degree burglary, holding the trial court erred in not dismissing the charge due to insufficient evidence. The majority argues that “viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the State — and giving the State every reasonable inference — the direct and circumstantial evidence at trial showed only that Defendant was near the Coleman house on the night in question and had left his thumbprint on the exterior front door of the house at some point in time.” The majority reasons this “gives rise to mere speculation ... ‘[as to] the identity of the defendant as the perpetratorf,]’ ” citing Malloy, 309 N.C. at 179, 305 S.E.2d at 720, and on this ground holds defendant’s motion to dismiss should have been allowed. I disagree.
“Circumstantial evidence may withstand a motion to dismiss and support a conviction even when the evidence does not rule out every hypothesis of innocence. If the evidence presented is circumstantial, the court must consider whether a reasonable inference of defendant’s guilt may be drawn from the circumstances.” Fritsch, 351 N.C. at 379, 526 S.E.2d at 455 (internal citation omitted) (emphasis added). “If so, it is for the jury to decide whether the facts, taken singly or in combination, satisfy them beyond a reasonable doubt that the de*132fendant is actually guilty....” State v. Thomas, 296 N.C. 236, 244, 250 S.E.2d 204, 209 (1978) (citations omitted) (emphasis omitted).
Here, the evidence presented tended to show that the victim awoke at 4:00 a.m. to the sound of breaking glass coming from the front entrance of her home. She immediately called 911. Within two minutes, police officers responding to the announcement of a “burglary in progress,” observed defendant, at the rear of the victim’s house, running up an embankment. Upon seizure, police noticed defendant’s hand was bleeding from a cut, and incident to his arrest, police searched defendant to find a screwdriver-like object, a seven-inch metal rod, and a lighter pen. Later, during the investigation, police recovered defendant’s fingerprint from the exterior side of the front door below the broken glass pane.
I believe the evidence gives rise to more than “mere speculation.” And, though circumstantial, I believe the evidence presented, given the benefit of every reasonable inference, is such that “a reasonable person might accept as adequate ... to support . . . [the] particular conclusion^]” Garcia, 358 N.C. at 412, 597 S.E.2d at 746, defendant was the perpetrator.
For these reasons I would hold no error in the denial of defendant’s motion to dismiss the charge of first-degree burglary.