Adams v. State, A-134
| Decision Date | 08 April 1958 |
| Docket Number | No. A-134,A-134 |
| Citation | 102 So.2d 47 |
| Parties | Alfred Alphonso ADAMS, Appellant, v. STATE of Florida, Appellee. |
| Court | Florida District Court of Appeals |
Wayne E. Ripley, Jacksonville, for appellant.
Richard W. Ervin, Atty. Gen., David U. Tumin, Asst. Atty. Gen., and Edward S. Jaffry, Sp. Asst. Atty. Gen., for appellee.
Appellant was convicted of grand larceny of certain scrap iron, consisting of H-Beams, truss caps, tie plates and angle bars, that was stolen from a railroad company in Suwannee County and several days later found in the possession of a junk dealer in Duval County, many miles distant. The pertinent assignment of error challenges the denial of appellant's motion for a directed verdict of not guilty, made when the state rested its case in chief and based on the insufficiency of the evidence.
The conviction was based upon evidence consisting substantially of these facts. Dealers in scrap iron grade it into several classifications according to quality. On the morning following the theft the defendant sold a truckload of scrap iron to the junk dealer in Duval County; the records of the dealer indicate the scrap iron so purchased from appellant was of the quality forming the subject of the theft, that is, H-Beams, truss caps, tie plates and angle bars, but the dealer's employee who made the purchase could not, nor did any other witness, identify the stolen property that was found in the possession of the junk dealer as the property so sold by the appellant; when the stolen property was located and identified on the premises of the dealer, it formed part of a pile of other scrap iron of like quality.
There was no positive evidence tracing the stolen property into the hands of the appellant or establishing his participation, directly or indirectly, in the actual theft. The state's evidence did not negative the reasonable possibilities (a) that the stolen property was delivered to the premises of the junk dealer prior to the sale made by appellant of property of the quality of that which was stolen, (b) that the property sold by appellant was of a kind different from that which was stolen, or (c) that the sale of the stolen property to the junk dealer was made by some person other than the defendant. It is upon the tenuous thread of the inferences to be drawn from the mentioned circumstantial evidence and that alone that the case was submitted to the jury.
When circumstantial evidence is relied upon to convict a person charged with a crime, it must not only be consistent with guilt but inconsistent with any reasonable hypothesis of innocence. It is insufficient to sustain a conviction if it produces nothing stronger than a suspicion of guilt.
The evidence in this case does not close the gap to the reasonable hypotheses of innocence. The motion for directed verdict of not guilty should have been granted. See Mayo v. State, Fla., 71 So.2d 899, 904, and cases cited therein. In so holding we are cognizant of...
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Jones v. State
...a race track disseminated race track results; conviction for unlawful dissemination of race track results reversed); Adams v. State, 102 So.2d 47 (Fla. 1st DCA 1958) (state's evidence deemed insufficient to identify which scrap iron the defendant sold to a junk dealer, although stolen scrap......
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Diecidue v. State, 30913
...of liberty and freedom is far too precious a garment to be trampled in the dust of mere inference compounded. As was stated in Adams v. State, [Fla. 102 So.2d 47], this court is fully cognizant of the rule that conviction may be had upon circumstantial evidence alone, and although the State......
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State v. Hodges, 62-765
...cannot amount to proof, however great the probability may be.' Also see State v. Trafficante, Fla.App.1961, 136 So.2d 264; Adams v. State, Fla.App.1958, 102 So.2d 47, for a discussion of the sufficiency of circumstantial evidence. Also see Freeman v. State, Fla.App.1958, 101 So.2d 887, wher......
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Hitchcock v. State
...of felony murder would go to the jury. To support his claim that the partial reservation was error, Hitchcock cites Adams v. State, 102 So.2d 47 (Fla. 1st DCA 1958), and State v. Rolle, 202 So.2d 867 (Fla. 2d DCA 1967). Both Adams and Rolle declared such reservation to be error. We agree an......