People v. Gonaway
People v. Gonaway
Opinion of the Court
Defendant was charged by information with the crime of burglary. A jury trial having been waived, the trial court found him guilty of burglary of the second degree. This appeal is prosecuted from the judgment of conviction on the ground that the evidence is insufficient to support the same.
The prosecution’s case was submitted on the transcript of the preliminary examination; the defendant took the stand and several witnesses testified on his behalf. An examination of such evidence discloses that Mr. Earl Lovett, owner of the Lovett Service Station at 990 East Slauson, closed and locked his station at 6 on Christmas Eve of 1946, leaving $130 in the safe which was set in cement in the floor of a building, “eight by ten” with a ceiling between 7 and 9 feet in height,
Mr. George L. Snow, foreman or superintendent for Cook Brothers Equipment Company, manufacturers of trucks, testified that defendant worked for said company as a janitor, and that they used “all kinds of iron and steel and copper and brass and a lot of aluminum” in their construction work; that he saw defendant the day before Christmas but not in the evening.
Defendant took the stand in his own defense and testified that he had two pairs of shoes and that the shoes taken from him by the officers were shoes which he wore on the job in rainy weather; that he was wearing them that day because it was raining or drizzling on Christmas "Eve; that when he was arrested he had approximately $29.50 on his person; that he lived on 22d Street between Wall and Trinity Streets, about 2 or 3 miles from the filling station he was accused of entering; and that he had just left the Zombie Cafe at 5433 Central Avenue, where he had been for two hours, when the officers picked him up.
It is here urged that “A careful study of the entire record fails to disclose such evidence as the law requires to prove appellant’s guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.” And that “appellant’s guilt or innocence turns on the sufficiency of his identification by Pruitt, one of the People’s witnesses.” In this connection appellant points out that The short space of approximately ten (10) seconds within which time the witness Pruitt claims he saw the features of the defendant and the articles of clothing which said defendant was then supposedly wearing raises a question of serious doubt as to this witness’ ability to have- reliably catalogued defendant’s features so as to make the latter’s identification positive.”
On cross-examination, Officer Pruitt testified that when he entered the service station he saw appellant in a stooped position inside; that appellant “was facing north, facing the door when I opened the door”; that the glass in the door was broken, as was the lock, and that he “opened it and stuck my head in there, and threw my light around and I threw my light on the defendant”; that about' 10 seconds elapsed be^
Officer Pruitt by the foregoing testimony positively identified appellant as the man whom he found in the service station stooped over the safe. However, appellant cites several cases wherein the identity of the accused was held sufficient, and he points out that in those cases the period of observation was either more extensive, or part of the stolen property was found in the possession of the accused, or his connection with the crime was shown by other convincing evidence. This argument is directed at the weight of the identifying evidence and not at its sufficiency.
As stated in People v. Newland, 15 Cal.2d 678, 681 [104 P.2d 778]: “The rule applicable where there is evidence, circumstantial or otherwise, that a crime has been committed and that the defendant was the perpetrator thereof, has been many times reiterated by the reviewing courts of this state as follows: The court on appeal ‘will not attempt to determine the weight of the evidence, but will decide only whether upon the face of the evidence it can be held that sufficient facts could not have been found by the jury to warrant the inference of guilt. For it is the function of the jury in the first instance, and of the trial court after verdict, to determine what facts are established by the evidence, and before the verdict of the jury, which has been approved by the trial court, can be set aside on appeal upon the ground’ of insufficiency of the evidence, ‘it must be made clearly to appear that upon no hypothesis whatever is there sufficient substantial evidence to support the conclusion reached in the court below.’ ”
The evidence adduced at the trial herein sufficiently identified appellant as the person who burglarized Lovett’s Service Station.
No error appearing in the record, the judgment of conviction is affirmed.
Doran, J., and White, J., concurred.
Case-law data current through December 31, 2025. Source: CourtListener bulk data.