Court Opinion

ID: 9782423
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-30 18:31:07.206974+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:34:59.652771
License: Public Domain

ROBINSON, Judge (concurring in part and dissenting in part). {37} I concur in part and dissent in part. I agree with the Majority that the officers’ search of the car was proper and that Defendant’s conviction for possession of an open container of alcohol in a motor vehicle should be affirmed. I also consider Defendant’s chain of custody claim to be without merit. However, I cannot concur in the Majority’s reversal, on the basis of insufficient evidence, of Defendant’s conviction for possession of a firearm by a felon. Because I believe the Majority has inappropriately reweighed the evidence and then substituted its judgment for that of the trial court, I must respectfully dissent. {38} An appellate court reviews the sufficiency of the evidence under a substantial evidence standard. State v. Sutphin, 107 N.M. 126, 130-31, 753 P.2d 1314, 1318-19 (1988). In making this determination, a reviewing court “does not weigh the evidence and may not substitute its judgment for that of the fact finder so long as there is sufficient evidence to support the verdict.” Id. at 131, 753 P.2d at 1319. Rather, we must determine whether, after reviewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the verdict, resolving all conflicts and indulging all permissible inferences to uphold the verdict, any rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime established beyond a reasonable doubt. State v. Sanders, 117 N.M. 452, 456, 872 P.2d 870, 874 (1994) (relying upon Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 318-19, 99 S.Ct. 2781, 61 L.Ed.2d 560 (1979)). Furthermore, “[a]n appellate court does not evaluate the evidence to determine whether some hypothesis could be designed which is consistent with a finding of innocence.” Sutphin, 107 N.M. at 130-31, 753 P.2d 1314, 1318-19. “The fact that another district court could have drawn different inferences on the same facts does not mean this district court’s findings were not supported by substantial evidence.” State v. Jason L., 2000-NMSC-018, ¶ 10, 129 N.M. 119, 2 P.3d 856. {39} To establish the essential elements of the crime, the State was required to prove that Defendant possessed a firearm and that he was a felon. Section 30-7-16(A); see State v. Haddenham, 110 N.M. 149, 155-56, 793 P.2d 279, 285-86 (Ct.App.1990). Defendant stipulated that he was a convicted felon, so the only element before the trial court was whether Defendant was in constructive possession of the gun found in the car. In New Mexico, constructive possession is defined by UJI 14-130 in the following manner: “[e]ven if the object is not in [a person’s] physical presence, he [or she] is in possession if he [or she] knows what it is and where it is and he [or she] exercises control over it.” The jury instruction also provides that “[t]wo or more people can have possession of an object at the same time.” UJI 14-130; accord State v. Muniz, 110 N.M. 799, 802, 800 P.2d 734, 737 (Ct.App.1990) (“Even if someone else had knowledge of [the object] and exercised some control over it, defendant could also have had sufficient knowledge and control to be in constructive possession.”). {40} The direct evidence before the trial court, presented by the undisputed testimony of the police officers, was that upon being stopped, Defendant jumped out of the passenger side of the car and slouched down at the side of the car, concealing his right side and hand from the officers; did not readily obey the officer’s instructions to get back in the car; and initially gave the officers a false name. The gun and its holster were protruding from under the back of Defendant’s seat in the car, and Defendant had been sitting upon a magazine clip containing ammunition for the gun in question. The clip was in plain view on Defendant’s seat after he was removed from the car for reasons of officer safety. After an officer found the loaded gun and an open bottle of beer under Defendant’s seat, Defendant admitted to the officer that he had been drinking in the car. The officer testified that the bottle of beer was directly next to the gun under Defendant’s seat. At the close of testimony, the trial court concluded beyond a reasonable doubt that Defendant had constructive possession of the gun, based on inferences drawn from the circumstances of Defendant’s sitting on the magazine and the location of the gun under Defendant’s seat. The trial court found Defendant guilty of possession of a firearm by a felon and also guilty of possession of an alcoholic beverage in a motor vehicle. {41} Notwithstanding these facts, however, the Majority has arrived at a different conclusion, deciding that it was “sufficiently likely” the driver may have placed the gun under the passenger seat. Majority Op. ¶ 14. The Majority also appears to fault the State for offering no evidence to explain the ownership of the car, the relationship of its occupants to one another, or how they came to be in the car, id. ¶ 6, although these facts are not elements of the crime of felon in possession of a firearm. The Majority reversed Defendant’s conviction because it has persuaded itself that “the State’s evidence and the inferences from that evidence were insufficient to eliminate a reasonable doubt that the driver placed the gun behind Defendant’s seat.” Id. ¶ 15. {42} In so holding the Majority has abandoned our appellate standard of review. Instead, it has created a conflicting supposition, weighed this newly created supposition against the facts and inferences drawn by the proper factfinder-the trial court-and then concluded that this supposition created reasonable doubt. However, the issue for this Court to resolve upon review is not whether it was “sufficiently likely” that the driver put the gun under Defendant’s seat, but whether, viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution and considering the reasonable inferences to be drawn from the undisputed facts, any rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime established beyond a reasonable doubt. See Sanders, 117 N.M. at 456, 872 P.2d at 874. Because it was rational for the trial court to have found beyond a reasonable doubt that Defendant had constructive possession of the gun, I cannot concur with the contrary holding of the Majority. Thus, I respectfully dissent.