Sims v. State

• Decision Date: 26 May 1975
• Docket Number: No. 48484,48484
• Parties: James A. SIMS v. STATE of Mississippi.
• Court: Mississippi Supreme Court

Page 388

313 So.2d 388

James A. SIMS v. STATE of Mississippi.

No. 48484.

Supreme Court of Mississippi.

May 26, 1975.

Jacobs, Griffith & McIntosh, Cleveland, for appellant.

A. F. Summer, Atty. Gen. by John C. Underwood, Jr., Sp. Asst. Atty. Gen., Jackson, for appellee.

Before RODGERS, INZER and WALKER, JJ.

WALKER, Justice, for the Court:

The appellant, James A. Sims, was indicted, tried and convicted in the Circuit Court of the First Judicial District of Bolivar County, Mississippi, for the crime commonly referred to as 'receiving stolen property,' and sentenced to three years in the state penitentiary with eighteen months suspended. We reverse and remand for a new trial.

The gist of the offense of 'receiving stolen property' is guilty knowledge that the accused came into possession of the property knowing that it had been stolen. Johnson v. State, 247 So.2d 697 (Miss.1971). This Court has said many times, however, that it is not necessary that the defendant actually know that the property has been stolen, but that '. . . if a person has information from facts and circumstances which should convince him that property has been stolen, or which should lead a reasonable man to believe that property had been stolen, then in a legal sense he knew it.' Pettus v. State, 200 Miss. 397, 410, 27 So.2d 536, 540 (1946).

In the case now before us, the appellant was charged with unlawfully receiving a 1972 Ford Bronco vehicle that he knew had been stolen. His defense was that he had been in the market for a Bronco vehicle and had negotiated with a salesman whom he thought worked for Bob Morrow Ford in West Memphis, Arkansas; that he first gave the man a draft for $3,000 upon the condition that it could not be cashed except with a 'title certificate attached'; that he took possession of the Bronco vehicle; and that four months later, during which time the draft was not cashed, the 'salesman' came to his home, presented him with what he considered at the time to be a title certificate which later turned out to be no more than an Alabama tag receipt, but which accurately described the Bronco vehicle in his possession including the correct serial numbers. (A certified copy, under Act of Congress, of the tag receipt was admitted into evidence). The Bronco had been in possession of the appellant for approximately fourteen months when he was arrested and charged.

It is not necessary to detail all of the facts developed during the trial, but suffice it to say the state's case was extremely close on the question of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.

Appellant's primary contention on appeal is that during the course of the trial, while the defendant was on the stand identifying the Alabama tag receipt that he received from the 'salesman' and which he contends he accepted as a certificate of title, the trial judge committed reversible error by commenting on the weight of such evidence. In that regard, the following colloquy took place:

Q. (By appellant's attorney) What proof (of title) did you get?

A. The document you hold in your hand.

Thereafter, the court made the following comment regarding the instrument:

COURT:-Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, the document you are reading now merely states that this registration number appeared in Alabama, the car registration as far as the tag is concerned; it is not evidence of title whatsoever; it is not evidence that it is a bill of sale whatsoever at all; it is just whatever it says that it is and nothing more, and it means, of course, that the clerk's signature has been verified by the judge of that court. (Emphasis added).

Appellant contends that the trial judge's remarks amounted to a comment on the weight of the evidence and in effect virtually cut his defense out from under him.

We recognize that it is proper in many instances for a trial judge to instruct the jury that a particular instrument is admitted into evidence for a limited purpose. However, in this case, the defendant was not attempting to prove that the instrument offered into evidence was a certificate of title but was offering it for the purpose of showing that he received an instrument which he thought was a title certificate from the 'salesman' at the time he paid him $3,000 and that under the circumstances he had no reason to suspect that the vehicle had been stolen at the time he received the Bronco or anytime thereafter.

The appellant's position is well taken. The effect of the judge's remarks with respect to the tag receipt was that the appellant had no right to believe nor did the jury have any right to consider that the tag receipt was related in any manner to title and ownership of the vehicle and that appellant should have known when he received it that it was not a title. The appellant contends that he was dealing in good faith with a man whom he knew as Bobbie Gene Broglen, and that the tag receipt from Alabama was in the name of Bobbie Gene Broglen and described the Ford Bronco that he had purchased including the motor serial numbers. Under these circumstances, the jury had the right to consider the tag receipt, free of the court's comments, along with all the other relevant evidence, in determining whether or not the appellant received the Bronco knowing that it had been stolen.

We are of the opinion that when the trial judge told the jury that they could not consider the tag receipt at all as evidence of title this amounted to a comment on the weight of the evidence and was so prejudicial as to be reversible error.

The...