People v. Halaseh, 14CA0478
| Citation | 468 P.3d 1 |
| Decision Date | 27 July 2017 |
| Docket Number | 14CA0478 |
| Parties | The PEOPLE of the State of Colorado, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. John M. HALASEH, Defendant-Appellant. |
| Court | Court of Appeals of Colorado |
Cynthia H. Coffman, Attorney General, Kevin E. McReynolds, Assistant Attorney General, Denver, Colorado, for Plaintiff-Appellant
Megan A. Ring, Colorado State Public Defender, Jud Lohnes, Deputy State Public Defender, Denver, Colorado, for Defendant-Appellee
Opinion by JUDGE HAWTHORNE
¶ 1 Defendant, John M. Halaseh, appeals his conviction for class 3 felony theft. We vacate the judgment and remand the case for entry of four convictions for class 4 felony theft and for correction of the mittimus and to resentence defendant accordingly.
¶ 2 Defendant assisted his father in setting up a joint bank account for depositing his father's Supplemental Security Income (SSI) checks from the Social Security Administration (SSA). One month later, defendant's father left the United States to live in Jordan. He never returned. Though the SSI application and notice of award informed defendant's father that he must report to the SSA if he left the United States for more than thirty days, he never did so.
¶ 3 From January 2008 to January 2011, the SSA deposited checks monthly into the joint account, and defendant withdrew the funds to pay for household expenses. When the SSA realized that defendant's father had been outside the country for years, it sent two agents to defendant's home. Defendant confessed to the agents that he knew the funds were "government money" and that it was wrong for him to take them. Later, defendant received a letter from the SSA informing him that $24,494 had been overpaid to his father.
¶ 4 Defendant was charged with a single count of theft of $20,000 or more from the SSA. At trial, the prosecution introduced an exhibit detailing thirty-seven instances of theft committed by defendant totaling $24,494. A jury found defendant guilty as charged.
¶ 5 Defendant contends that the prosecution failed to present sufficient evidence to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that he committed theft.1 We disagree.
¶ 6 We review de novo whether evidence is sufficient to support a conviction. People v. Randell , 2012 COA 108, ¶ 29, 297 P.3d 989. To determine whether the prosecution presented sufficient evidence, we apply a substantial evidence test that considers "whether the relevant evidence, both direct and circumstantial, when viewed as a whole and in the light most favorable to the prosecution, is substantial and sufficient to support a conclusion by a reasonable mind that the defendant is guilty of the charge beyond a reasonable doubt." Clark v. People , 232 P.3d 1287, 1291 (Colo. 2010) (citation omitted). We "must give the prosecution the benefit of every reasonable inference which may be fairly drawn from the evidence." Id. at 1292.
¶ 7 As pertinent here, a defendant commits theft when "he or she knowingly obtains, retains, or exercises control over anything of value of another without authorization or by threat or deception" and "[i]ntends to deprive the other person permanently of the use or benefit of the thing of value." § 18-4-401(1)(a), C.R.S. 2017.
¶ 8 Initially, we reject the People's contention that defendant waived any challenge to whether the funds belonged to the SSA. Even if defendant may have conceded this point in his closing argument, "the prosecution has the burden of establishing a prima facie case of guilt through introduction of sufficient evidence." Clark , 232 P.3d at 1291 ; see also Randell , ¶ 30 ().
¶ 9 The evidence, when viewed in the light most favorable to the prosecution, was sufficient for a reasonable person to conclude that defendant committed theft. This evidence included the following:
¶ 10 Defendant argues, however, that the prosecution failed to present sufficient evidence that (1) the SSA, and not defendant's father, had any possessory or proprietary interest in the $24,494 such that it was the victim of theft; and (2) he knowingly took the money without authorization, or by threat or deception. We disagree.
¶ 11 First, a reasonable juror could infer that defendant's father was not an intermediary victim as defendant suggests, but part of defendant's deception to obtain government funds. Thus the checks and direct deposits from the SSA were sufficient evidence to show that the SSA had a possessory interest in the $24,494. And second, a juror could infer from defendant's actions, statements, and expenses that he knowingly deceived the SSA when he led the agency to believe that his father, and not he, would receive the benefit of the deposited funds. Accordingly, we conclude that the prosecution presented sufficient evidence for a reasonable juror to find beyond a reasonable doubt that defendant committed theft from the SSA.
¶ 12 Defendant concedes failure to preserve, but contends that the trial court plainly erred when it failed to instruct the jury (1) on the definition of the word "another" in the theft statute and (2) on its requirement to find that the "aggregate value" exceeded $20,000 within one of the prescribed units of prosecution. The People respond that defendant waived instructional error, if any. But even if defendant did not waive this argument, we conclude that the trial court did not plainly err.
¶ 13 We review unpreserved instructional errors for plain error. People v. Miller , 113 P.3d 743, 750 (Colo. 2005). Plain error occurs where the error is both "obvious and substantial" and "so undermined the fundamental fairness of the trial itself so as to cast serious doubt on the reliability of the judgment of conviction." Id. (citations omitted).
¶ 14 At trial, the court instructed the jury on the elements of theft. Its instruction included the following elements: "[t]hat defendant ... knowingly obtained or exercised control over anything of value which was the property of another person."
¶ 15 Defendant argues that the trial court should have included an additional instruction to define the word "another." Specifically, he cites section 18-4-401(1.5), which provides that "[a] thing of value is that of ‘another’ if anyone other than the defendant has a possessory or proprietary interest therein." He then argues that this alleged error harmed him because (1) the prosecution never proved that the SSA had a possessory or proprietary interest in the funds, and (2) his defense against the charges was on the ground that he did not know the money was the property of the SSA.
¶ 16 But, for three reasons, we discern no plain error.
¶ 17 First, defendant fails to cite any authority requiring an instruction defining "another" in a theft case. See Scott v. People , 2017 CO 16, ¶ 17, 390 P.3d 832 ().
¶ 18 Second, the SSA's possessory or proprietary interest in the funds was not, despite defendant's arguments, a disputed issue in this case. The disputed issue was whether defendant knew the SSA had an interest in the funds, not whether it actually had an interest in them. Even defendant's counsel admitted to the jury that the funds were the property of the SSA:
[A]nd so you have to be proven beyond a reasonable doubt that [defendant] knew that the money he had belonged to the Social Security Administration. He believed it belongs to [his father]. He believed that he could use it because [his father] told him he could. He did not know that that was the property of the Social Security Administration.
¶ 19 Finally, testimony and a written confession signed by defendant showed that defendant knew the funds were government money. An SSA special agent testified that defendant told him that "he knew [the funds were] government money." And defendant's written confession stated that he was "willing to work on paying [the funds] back" to the SSA.
¶ 20 For these reasons, we discern no error, much less plain error, in the trial court's not instructing the jury on the definition of the word "another" in the theft statute. See People v. Dunlap , 124 P.3d 780, 794 (Colo. App. 2004) (...
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