Branch v. State
Decision Date | 01 September 1985 |
Docket Number | No. 53,53 |
Citation | 305 Md. 177,502 A.2d 496 |
Parties | Larry Andre BRANCH v. STATE of Maryland. , |
Court | Maryland Court of Appeals |
Sherrie B. Glasser, Asst. Public Defender (Alan H. Murrell, Public Defender, on brief), Baltimore, for appellant.
Valerie W. Loftin, Asst. Atty. Gen. (Stephen H. Sachs, Atty. Gen., on brief), Baltimore, for appellee.
Argued before MURPHY, C.J., and SMITH, ELDRIDGE, COLE, RODOWSKY, COUCH and McAULIFFE, JJ.
Because of a substantial variation between the description initially given of a robber and that of the actual description of the defendant it is here contended that there was insufficient evidence to convict. We shall hold to the contrary. Hence, we shall affirm the judgment of the Court of Special Appeals.
Beatrice Mudge was robbed by two black males at approximately 7:15 a.m. on April 14, 1983, while enroute to her employment at The Johns Hopkins Hospital. She immediately reported the incident to security at the hospital who called the Baltimore City Police. At approximately 8:30 a.m. she advised the police that the individual who held the gun on her was a black male, approximately 5 feet 7 inches tall, 15 to 16 years of age, weighing 110-125 pounds, wearing a dark jacket, and carrying a silver handgun.
Miss Mudge was later interviewed by yet another police officer, unacquainted with the description given by her earlier, who asked her to look through two books containing a total of approximately 600 photographs. She was unable to identify any of those photographs as being of her assailant. Thereupon the police officer showed her three additional photographs. At about 10:45 a.m. she identified a picture of Larry Andre Branch as the individual who held the gun on her. 1 This photograph had on it no indication of height and weight.
Branch at the time in question was 19 years of age, 6 feet 3 inches tall, and weighed 185 pounds. Miss Mudge is approximately 5 feet 6 inches in height. Branch is said to have two missing front teeth. Miss Mudge did not note such a feature. The photograph which she selected does not show missing front teeth.
At trial Miss Mudge testified that there was no question in her mind when she saw Branch's photograph that he was the individual that had robbed her and that this was the same individual she saw as the defendant in the trial court. She said her assailant was taller than she, that they "were on a slant, too." In court she was asked on cross-examination if she remembered saying that her assailant weighed 110 to 125 pounds and was 15 to 16 years of age. The record then is:
On the issue of teeth Miss Mudge said she "didn't see anything specifically about his teeth."
At trial she was pressed on the issue of height and whether she had given a wrong description. The record then is:
On cross-examination of Miss Mudge the issue of the height of Branch was before the jury in the following manner:
The above demonstration was immediately followed up on redirect examination:
Branch claimed to have an alibi which was corroborated by his girlfriend, his aunt, and a ticket from a pawn shop for the day in question for a television set which he claimed to have pawned for his aunt at her request.
Branch appealed his conviction to the Court of Special Appeals. The intermediate appellate court affirmed in an unreported opinion (No. 351, September Term, 1984, decided Dec. 4, 1984). We granted a writ of certiorari to address the issue framed in the petition:
"Whether the Court of Special Appeals erred in affirming a blatant case of misidentification in that the victim had described the robber as being 5'7"', 110-125 pounds, 15-16 years old, with no unusual facial features--when the evidence revealed that Petitioner, convicted of this crime, was 6'3" tall, 185 pounds, 21 years old, with missing front teeth." 2
We point out that Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 99 S.Ct. 2781, 61 L.Ed.2d 560 (1979), and its holding that an accused "is entitled to habeas corpus relief if it is found that upon the record evidence adduced at the trial no rational trier of fact could have found proof of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt," 443 U.S. at 324, 99 S.Ct. at 2791-92, in no way changed the standard in effect in Maryland. In Williams and McClelland v. State, 5 Md.App. 450, 247 A.2d 731 (1968), cert. denied, 252 Md. 731, 734 (1969), Judge Orth carefully reviewed for the Court of Special Appeals a number of the prior cases of this Court such as Gibson v. State, 238 Md. 414, 209 A.2d 242 (1965); Shelton v. State, 198 Md. 405, 84 A.2d 76 (1951); Edwards v. State, 198 Md. 132, 81 A.2d 631, 83 A.2d 578 (1951); and Lambert v. State, 196 Md. 57, 75 A.2d 327 (1950). All of those cases arose subsequent to the constitutional amendment now embodied in Maryland Declaration of Rights, Art. 23 which provides that a trial court "may pass upon the sufficiency of the evidence to sustain a conviction," and, hence, that this was open to appellate review. Judge Orth then said for the Court of Special Appeals:
5 Md.App. at 458-59, 247 A.2d at 737 (emphasis added).
Applying this standard under Jackson, 443 U.S. 307, 99 S.Ct. 2781, 61 L.Ed.2d 560, Chief Judge Murphy said for the Court in State v. Rusk, 289 Md. 230, 240, 424 A.2d 720, 725 (1981), Accord Tichnell v. State, 287 Md. 695, 717, 415 A.2d 830, 842 (1980). 3
This Court said in Walters v. State, 242 Md. 235, 218 A.2d 678 (1966):
242 Md. at 237-38, 218 A.2d at 680.
For a more recent application of the rule see Mobley and King v. State, 270 Md. 76, 89, 310 A.2d 803, 811 (1973), cert. denied, 416 U.S. 975, 94 S.Ct. 2003, 40 L.Ed.2d 564 (1974); Kirby v. State, 48 Md.App. 205, 211, 426 A.2d 423, 427, cert. denied, 291 Md. 777 (1981).
No useful purpose would be served by reviewing the numerous cases dealing with identification cited by both sides. In the final analysis the responsibility is ours to determine whether there was sufficient evidence to permit a rational trier of fact to find beyond a reasonable doubt there was sufficient evidence to...
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