State v. Brady

• Decision Date: 07 October 1902
• Citation: 91 N.W. 801
• Parties: STATE v. BRADY.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

91 N.W. 801

STATE

v.BRADY.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

Oct 7, 1902.

Appeal from district court, Polk county; W. F. Conrad, Judge.

Indictment charging defendant with burglariously breaking and entering a building with intent to commit burglary. There was a verdict of guilty, and judgment committing defendant to the penitentiary for a term of two years. Defendant appeals. Reversed.Stewart & Cohen and A. P. Chamberlain, for appellant.

Chas. W. Mullan, Atty. Gen., and Chas. A. Van Vleck, Asst. Atty. Gen., for the State.

WEAVER, J.

The evidence for the state tended to show that on the night of September 29, 1900, the barn of one Stuart, situated several miles east of the city of Des Moines, was unlawfully broken and entered, and certain harness stolen therefrom; that on said night defendant was seen upon the public highway in that neighborhood; that about ten days thereafter the stolen property, or some of it, was found in his possession; and that he made some statements or admissions serving to strengthen the suspicion of his guilt. The defendant denied his guilt, and offered considerable evidence tending to prove an alibi, and explained his possession of the harness by the statement that he bought it of a person who brought it to his residence in Des Moines on the morning after the alleged crime, which statement was also corroborated by several witnesses. Among the instructions given by the court to the jury are the following: “(2) The defendant is presumed to be innocent of the offense charged, and the burden is upon the prosecution to overcome this presumption, and to establish his guilt thereof beyond a reasonable doubt. No mere weight of evidence is sufficient, unless it excludes all reasonable doubt as to guilt. The proof of guilt must be inconsistent with any other rational supposition. The doubt that entitles to acquittal must be reasonable, not unreasonable; real, captious, or imaginary, not forced or artificial; but must be a doubt which, without being sought after, fairly and naturally arises in the mind after carefully considering the whole case. The proof is sufficient if it establishes guilt to a moral certainty,--such a certainty as fully and fairly convinces the understanding of the jurors.” “(8) So, too, the possession of property that has been recently stolen from a building by means of breaking and entering said building is sufficient to raise a presumption of guilt of the person in whose possession said property is found; that is, it creates the presumption that he is the party that broke and entered said building, and took therefrom the said property, unless the attending circumstances or evidence explains said possession, and shows that the same may have been otherwise honestly acquired. If, therefore, in this case, you find that the building in controversy was in fact broken into substantially as alleged in the indictment, and that there was therein at the time harness and other property, which was kept there for use, deposit, or safe-keeping, and that said property, or some of it, was at the same time alleged stolen and carried away from said building, and shortly thereafter the same, or some of it, was found in the possession of defendant, the said possession would raise a presumption of guilt of the defendant as to matters and things charged in the indictment, unless the attending circumstances or other evidence overcome the presumption that is hereby raised as to create a reasonable doubt of the defendant's guilt. In deciding the weight to be given to such presumption, you will take into consideration the time which has elapsed between the taking of the goods and the finding of them in the possession of the defendant, if you find they were so found in his possession; the place from where the goods were taken, and the distance therefrom to the place where said goods were found in his possession, if you find they were so found; the kind of property; whether easily transferable or not; what, if anything, was said at the time by the defendant, and what, if any explanation, he made in regard to his possession of said property, and all other evidence tending to explain said possession; and all other facts and circumstances proved fairly tending to show whether the defendant came into possession of said property fairly and honestly.” The defendant asked the court to supplement its charge as given to the jury with certain other instructions, of which we will here quote the following: “First. You are further instructed that, where the state seeks a conviction upon circumstantial evidence alone, it must not only show that the alleged facts and circumstances are true, but that they are absolutely incompatible with any reasonable hypothesis of the innocence of the accused.” “Third. You are further instructed that, even if you should find from the evidence that the defendant had in his possession property that had been taken from the building as described in the indictment, a short time after it was taken, that fact does not raise a presumption of law that the defendant is guilty of the crime of breaking as charged in the indictment, or shift the burden of proof upon the defendant to satisfactorily explain his possession of the property. Unless you find from the evidence that the state has proven to a moral certainty and beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant did break and enter the building for the purpose of committing a public offense, as charged in the indictment, your verdict must not be guilty.” “Fifth. You are further instructed that, if the evidence in this case raises a reasonable doubt in your minds whether or not the defendant received these harness from some other person, no matter if he did get them on Sunday, or even if he had reason to believe the harness had been stolen by the man from whom he got them from; and if the evidence does raise in your minds a reasonable doubt that he received these harness from some other person,--then it is your duty to acquit. Sixth. You are further instructed that the words ‘honestly acquired,’ as used in these instructions, mean nothing more than that the defendant obtained these harness otherwise than breaking and entering, as charged in the indictment.”

Aside from the question of the sufficiency of the evidence, which we will not discuss further than to say we would not be inclined to disturb the verdict on this ground alone, it will be observed from the foregoing statement that the principal points for our consideration have reference to the legal effect of the possession of goods stolen by burglarious means, and the sufficiency of circumstantial evidence in the proof of crime.

1. As to the effect to be given in prosecutions for burglary to proof of possession of goods stolen in connection with the breaking and entering, the authorities are not entirely in harmony. There are decisions which hold without qualification that the fact of possession of property recently stolen, under such circumstances has no tendency to prove the possessor's guilt of the burglary. People v. Gordon, 40 Mich. 716. And, on the other hand, there seem to be cases which hold that such fact alone creates a sufficient presumption of guilt to justify conviction of the accused. Knickerbocker v. People, 43 N. Y. 177. The rule, however, which is recognized by the great weight of authority, and most commends itself to our sense of reason and justice, adopts neither of the extremes mentioned, and may be stated as follows: There is no presumption of guilt of burglary attaching to the mere possession of the stolen goods by the accused, but such fact, if the alleged crime be of recent occurrence, has a tendency to prove his guilt, and, if there be other proved circumstances tending to connect him with the commission of the offense, the fact of possession, thus aided, will sustain a conviction. Reviewing an instruction quite like the one now under consideration, the supreme court of Kansas says: “Assuming, however, that a presumption of guilt arises, in case of larceny, from the possession of goods recently stolen, we do not feel warranted in still further extending the presumption that the evidence is of itself sufficient, if unexplained, to warrant a conviction for burglary. * * * The possession of stolen goods taken on the occasion of a burglary is evidence tending to establish the guilt of the possessor, and may, when taken in connection with other criminating circumstances, raise a presumption of guilt sufficient to warrant a conviction; but the mere possession, without any other facts indicative of guilt, is not prima facie evidence that such person committed burglary.” State v. Powell, 58 Pac. 968. Substantially the same rule is announced in Methard v. State, 19 Ohio St. 368, where the court cites the following passage from Best on Presumptions: “There can be nothing more persuasive than the circumstance of possession commonly is when corroborated by other criminative circumstances; nothing more inconclusive supposing it to stand alone.” See, to the same effect: People v. Fagin (Cal.) 6 Pac. 394; Same v. Hannon, 85 Cal. 374, 24 Pac. 706;Metz v. State, 46 Neb. 547, 65 N. W. 190; Davis v. People, 1 Parker, Cr. R. 447; State v. Conway, 56 Kan. 682, 44 Pac. 627;Ryan v. State, 83 Wis. 486, 53 N. W. 836;State v. Graves, 72 N. C. 482;State v. Hodge, 50 N. H. 510;Taliaferro v. Com., 77 Va. 411;Falvey v. State, 85 Ga. 157, 11 S. E. 607;Stuart v. People, 42 Mich. 255, 3 N. W. 863;Brooks v. State, 96 Ga. 353, 23 S. E. 413; 1 McClain, Cr. Law, § 514.

Our own cases are in some apparent confusion on this point, but a careful review of the several holdings indicates that we are fairly committed to the rule last above cited, and in harmony with the general trend of the decisions. Taking the principal cases bearing upon the proposition in their chronological order, we find that in State v. Reid, 20 Iowa, 413, this court approved an instruction to the effect that the mere...