People v. Toole

• Decision Date: 03 February 1998
• Docket Number: Docket No. 198681
• Citation: 576 N.W.2d 441,227 Mich.App. 656
• Parties: PEOPLE of the State of Michigan, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Bobby Darnell TOOLE, Defendant-Appellant.
• Court: Court of Appeal of Michigan — District of US

Page 441

576 N.W.2d 441

227 Mich.App. 656

PEOPLE of the State of Michigan, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Bobby Darnell TOOLE, Defendant-Appellant.

Docket No. 198681.

Court of Appeals of Michigan.

Submitted Nov. 4, 1997, at Lansing.

Decided Feb. 3, 1998, at 9:25 a.m.

Released for Publication April 30, 1998

Frank J. Kelley, Attorney General, Thomas L. Casey, Solicitor General, Michael D. Thomas, Prosecuting Attorney, and J. Thomas Horiszny, Assistant Prosecuting Attorney, for People.

Daniel D. Bremer, Burton, for Defendant-Appellant on appeal.

Before SAAD, P.J., and HOLBROOK, Jr., and DOCTOROFF, JJ.

DOCTOROFF, Judge.

After a jury trial, defendant was convicted of breaking and entering with intent to commit larceny, M.C.L. § 750.110; M.S.A. § 28.305, and was subsequently convicted of being an habitual offender, third offense, M.C.L. § 769.11; M.S.A. § 28.1083. He was sentenced to thirty months' to ten years' imprisonment. He now appeals as of right. We affirm.

Defendant's convictions arise out of an incident that occurred at the International Center at Delta College in Saginaw. On April 11, 1996, at approximately 3:00 p.m., Bruce Walbecq, a Delta College maintenance worker, entered a storage room to get a ladder. The storage room adjoined a large classroom that was used for a class in building totem poles. When he left the storage room to go to the adjoining classroom, he turned off the light and closed the door. He observed defendant in the classroom admiring one of the totem poles and assumed that defendant was a student in the class. Walbecq and defendant were the only people in the classroom. Walbecq took the ladder outside the building and returned to the classroom about five minutes later. He noticed that the door to the storage room was open and the light was on. Defendant was gone.

At about the same time, a security officer at the International Center observed defendant carrying a computer monitor through the first-floor area of the building. In response to questioning, defendant told the officer that he had brought the monitor in for repair. The officer told defendant that there were no repair facilities in the building, and defendant walked away, indicating that he was taking the monitor to his car. The officer followed defendant outside the building and asked him to bring the monitor into the building so that he could check the serial numbers. The officer recognized the monitor as one he had seen in the storage room because it was marked with a "backup" sticker. When police arrived, defendant ran away, leaving the monitor behind. He was subsequently apprehended by Saginaw police.

On appeal, defendant argues that the evidence was insufficient to convict him of breaking and entering with intent to commit larceny. In reviewing the sufficiency of the evidence in a criminal case, this Court must determine whether the evidence viewed in a light most favorable to the prosecution was sufficient to allow a rational trier of fact to find that the essential elements of the crime were proved beyond a reasonable doubt. People v. Turner, 213 Mich.App. 558, 565, 540 N.W.2d 728 (1995).

The elements of the offense of breaking and entering with intent to commit larceny are: (1) the defendant broke into a building, (2) the defendant entered the building, and (3) at the time of the breaking and entering, the defendant intended to commit a larceny therein. People v. Adams, 202 Mich.App. 385, 390, 509 N.W.2d 530 (1993). Defendant argues that the evidence was insufficient to support the breaking element because he was lawfully in the building, which was open to the public, and only opened an inner door of the building. We disagree.

Under Michigan law, any amount of force used to open a door or window to enter the building, no matter how slight, is sufficient to constitute a breaking. People v. Wise, 134 Mich.App. 82, 88, 351 N.W.2d 255 (1984). There is no breaking if the defendant had the right to enter the building. People v. Brownfield (After Remand), 216 Mich.App. 429, 432, 548 N.W.2d 248 (1996). In the present case, the International Center was open to the public. Therefore, defendant had a right to enter the building. However, the storage room, which was unlocked, was posted "keep out," and access to the storage room was restricted to maintenance and security personnel. This Court has previously held that a breaking of an inner portion of a building constitutes the requisite element for burglary. People v. Clark, 88 Mich.App. 88, 91, 276 N.W.2d 527 (1979). Therefore, because defendant was not lawfully permitted to enter the storage room, his opening the door from the classroom to the storage room was sufficient to satisfy the element of breaking.

Defendant argues that Clark is inapplicable to the facts of the present case. In Clark, the defendants entered a building from the outside through the boiler room. There was no evidence of a forced entry into the boiler room, and there was nothing in the record to indicate whether the doors to the outside were open or closed. Once inside the boiler room, the defendants broke through an interior wall into the kitchen of a restaurant. Id. at 90-91, 276 N.W.2d 527. Defendant argues that the present case is distinguishable because there was no...