State v. Bradbury

• Decision Date: 17 March 2020
• Docket Number: AC 41544
• Citation: 230 A.3d 877,196 Conn.App. 510
• Court: Connecticut Court of Appeals
• Parties: STATE of Connecticut v. Wayne S. BRADBURY

196 Conn.App. 510

230 A.3d 877

STATE of Connecticut

v.Wayne S. BRADBURY

AC 41544

Appellate Court of Connecticut.

Argued January 16, 2020

Officially released March 17, 2020

Robert L. O'Brien, assigned counsel, with whom, on the brief, was Christopher Y. Duby, assigned counsel, for the appellant (defendant).

Margaret Gaffney Radionovas, senior assistant state's attorney, with whom, on the brief, were Patrick J. Griffin, state's attorney, and John P. Doyle, Jr., senior assistant state's attorney, for the appellee (state).

Alvord, Prescott and Bright, Js.

BRIGHT, J.

The defendant, Wayne S. Bradbury, appeals from the judgment of conviction, rendered following the jury's guilty verdict, of criminal possession of a firearm in violation of General Statutes § 53a-217 (a) (1) and carrying a pistol without a permit in violation of General Statutes § 29-35 (a).¹ The defendant claims that, in light of the jury's not guilty finding on the remaining charges, there was insufficient evidence to support his conviction. We affirm the judgment of the trial court.

The state presented the following relevant evidence to the jury. On May 5, 2016, Zachary Ourfalian contacted the defendant to arrange to purchase $1500 worth of marijuana from him. Ourfalian previously had purchased marijuana from the defendant. They arranged to meet at the Home Depot in Wallingford. Ourfalian knew that the defendant would be driving a white BMW automobile. Prior to the meeting, Ourfalian picked up his friend, Leo Spencer, to take the ride with him, as he drove his mother's white Infinity FX 35. Ourfalian did not have a weapon with him, and he had never possessed a firearm. As Ourfalian was driving to meet the defendant, the defendant contacted him and changed the location of the meeting to Connecticut Beverage Mart (Mart), located across the street from the Home Depot in Wallingford. When Ourfalian and Spencer arrived at the Mart, Ourfalian saw the defendant waiting in a white BMW, which was parked on the side of the building, in the shadows. At approximately 8:45 p.m., Ourfalian parked in front of the Mart and walked around to the side of the building where the defendant had backed his BMW into a parking space. Ourfalian had $1500 tucked into his waistband of his pants.

The defendant was standing outside of the vehicle, which may have been running, with the passenger side door open. Another man was seated in the driver's seat. The defendant told Ourfalian that the marijuana was in a shoe box in the front of the car. Ourfalian felt uncomfortable about this because it would require him to reach into the car with his back to the defendant, so he looked around to investigate. The defendant then told him to hand over his money. Ourfalian saw a gun in the defendant's hand, and, as he started to turn and run, he heard a gunshot. When he returned to his vehicle, the $1500 was no longer in his waistband, and he realized that he had been shot. Ourfalian told Spencer that he needed to drive and Ourfalian got into the passenger's seat, and Spencer drove away from the Mart.

Ourfalian started looking on his cell phone for the addresses of local hospitals, but he was getting information on other types of medical facilities and could not narrow his search. He had Spencer drive to one of the locations, but it was not a hospital, so they asked a security guard in the area for directions to a hospital. After attempting to follow those directions, they pulled into the entrance of an elementary school, Cook Hill School, and Ourfalian called his girlfriend and 911. Before emergency responders arrived, Ourfalian deleted from his cell phone some of the messages between him and the defendant regarding the marijuana purchase.

At approximately 9 p.m., Anthony Baur, an officer with the Wallingford Police Department, received a report via his police radio about a shooting in the Cook Hill School area. When he arrived, other officers already were on scene at the school, speaking with two individuals, who had exited a white Infinity automobile.² Baur went to assist the other officers, and he asked Ourfalian to raise his arms so that he could be frisked for weapons. Baur then saw that Ourfalian had been shot in the abdomen, and he relayed their exact location to paramedics. Ourfalian appeared pale and in shock. Spencer, who was not being cooperative, was placed in handcuffs and put in the backseat of a police cruiser.

Baur rode with Ourfalian in the ambulance to Yale New Haven Hospital (hospital), where Ourfalian was taken into surgery. Meanwhile, other officers went to the Mart, where they found a .45 caliber shell casing, Ourfalian's hat, and Ourfalian's earbuds, but no weapons or money. The next day, Baur and Detective Shawn Fairbrother went to the hospital to interview Ourfalian and to present to him a photographic array. Ourfalian identified the photograph of the defendant, and stated that he was the person who had shot him.

On May 9, 2016, the police arrested the defendant, and he was charged with assault in the first degree in violation of General Statutes § 53a-59 (a) (1),³ criminal attempt to commit robbery in the first degree in violation of § 53a-134 (a) (2),⁴ criminal possession of a firearm, and carrying a pistol without a permit. During trial, the defendant, who admitted to being a convicted felon, testified that it was Ourfalian who pulled a gun on him, and that when he pushed Ourfalian's gun away, he heard it go off.⁵ Following the trial, the jury found the defendant guilty of criminal possession of a firearm and carrying a pistol without a permit; it found him not guilty of the remaining charges. The court accepted the jury's verdict and rendered a judgment of conviction, sentencing the defendant to a total effective sentence of ten years imprisonment, execution suspended after six years, with three years probation. This appeal followed.

On appeal, the defendant claims that there was insufficient evidence to support his conviction as demonstrated by the inconsistency of the jury's verdict, wherein the jury "credited nonexisting evidence in finding the defendant guilty of [the] firearms charges ...."⁶ He argues: "Based on the evidence introduced at trial, there was only one way the defendant could have been guilty of assault or attempted robbery: If the jury believed that the defendant held the firearm, pointed it at Ourfalian, demanded his money, and then fired. The jury simply did not believe that version of events because they acquitted the defendant of the assault and attempted robbery charges. Put simply, they did not credit the evidence that the defendant was holding the weapon to complete the assault and attempt the robbery." We conclude that the evidence was sufficient.

"In reviewing a sufficiency of the evidence claim, we apply a [two part] test. First, we construe the evidence in the light most favorable to sustaining the verdict. Second, we determine whether upon the facts so construed and the inferences reasonably drawn therefrom the jury reasonably could have concluded that the cumulative force of the evidence established guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. ... On appeal, we do not ask whether there is a reasonable view of the evidence that would support a reasonable hypothesis of innocence. We ask, instead, whether there is a reasonable view of the evidence that supports the jury's verdict of guilty." (Internal quotation marks omitted.) State v. Daniel B. , 331 Conn. 1, 12, 201 A.3d 989 (2019).

This "inquiry does not require a court to ask itself whether it believes that the evidence at the trial established guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. ... Instead, the relevant question is whether, after viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution, any rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt." (Citation omitted; emphasis in original; internal quotation marks omitted.) Jackson v. Virginia , 443 U.S. 307, 318–19, 99 S. Ct. 2781, 61 L. Ed. 2d 560 (1979). "The question whether the evidence is constitutionally sufficient is of course wholly unrelated to the question of how rationally the verdict was actually reached. Just as the standard ... does not permit a court to make its own subjective determination of guilt or innocence, it does not require scrutiny of the reasoning process actually used by the [fact finder]—if known." Id., at 319–20 n.13, 99 S. Ct. 2781 ; see also State v. Arroyo , 292 Conn. 558, 586, 973 A.2d 1254 (2009) ("claims of legal inconsistency between a conviction and an acquittal are not reviewable"), cert. denied, 559 U.S. 911, 130 S. Ct. 1296, 175 L. Ed. 2d 1086 (2010).

In the present case, the defendant does not actually challenge whether the state introduced sufficient evidence to support each element of the crimes of which the jury found him guilty but, rather, his challenge is to the consistency of the verdict because, in his view, it was obvious that the jury did not credit certain evidence, having found him not guilty of assault and robbery.⁷ The defendant's attempt to obtain review of the legal inconsistency between a conviction and an acquittal by recasting it as a claim of evidentiary insufficiency, although artful, does not change the nature of his claim. See State v. Arroyo , supra, 292 Conn. at 583–86, 973 A.2d 1254 (discussing whether claims of legal inconsistency between conviction and acquittal are reviewable). Accordingly, we will consider only whether the state presented sufficient evidence to support the defendant's conviction. See State v. Blaine , 168 Conn. App. 505, 512, 147 A.3d 1044 (2016) (explaining that prior case law has "resolved any...