State v. Camerer

• Citation: 29 S.W.3d 422
• Parties: (Mo.App. S.D. 2000) State of Missouri, Respondent, v. Rose M. Camerer, Appellant. 23504
• Decision Date: 30 October 2000
• Court: Court of Appeal of Missouri (US)

29 S.W.3d 422 (Mo.App. S.D. 2000)

State of Missouri, Respondent, v. Rose M. Camerer, Appellant.

Missouri Court of Appeals Southern District

23504

10/30/2000

Appeal From: Circuit Court of Greene County, Hon. Don E. Burrell, Jr., Judge

Counsel for Appellant: Rosalynn Koch

Counsel for Respondent: Stacy L. Anderson

Opinion Summary: None

Barney, C.J., and Garrison, J., concur.

John C. Crow, Judge

A jury found Appellant guilty of possessing pseudoephedrine with intent to convert it to create methamphetamine, a controlled substance. Section 195.420, RSMo 1994.¹ The trial court entered judgment per the verdict, sentencing Appellant as a prior and persistent offender² to four years' imprisonment. This appeal followed.

Appellant's sole claim of error is that the evidence was insufficient to support the verdict. In adjudicating that issue, this court accepts as true all of the evidence favorable to the State, including all favorable inferences drawn therefrom, and disregards all evidence and inferences to the contrary. State v. Grim, 854 S.W.2d 403, 405 (Mo. banc 1993), cert. denied, 510 U.S. 997, 114 S.Ct. 562, 126 L.Ed.2d 462 (1993). This court's review is limited to a determination of whether there is sufficient evidence from which a reasonable juror might have found Appellant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. Id.

Viewed in accordance with the second sentence of the preceding paragraph, the evidence established that about 2:55 a.m., May 30, 1998, Douglas Browning, a patrol officer of the Greene County Sheriff's Department, was westbound in a "marked patrol vehicle" on U. S. Highway 266 where it passes over Interstate Highway 44. At that time, Browning saw an eastbound Toyota pickup on Highway 266 "driving very slowly, possibly having vehicular problems." He estimated its speed at five miles per hour or slower.

The pickup and Browning's vehicle passed each other on the overpass. Describing what occurred next, Browning related: "I proceeded on westbound to where I could make a uturn around the median.[³] And I did that and came up behind the [pickup] to see if I could render some assistance to [it]."

The pickup was still on the overpass when Browning overtook it. He followed it at an interval of "fifteen, twenty yards" without illuminating the "overhead lights" on his vehicle. The pickup continued east in a "straight line," its speed unchanged.

Immediately after the pickup reached the end of the over-pass, Browning saw "a large dark object being thrown out of the passenger side window." His testimony:

"Q. . . . Could you describe how that object came out of the [pickup] window?

A. As if it was tossed out the window.

Q. What made you think that?

A. It went approximately ten feet off the roadway. . . . .

Q. Did it have any kind of an arc on it? Did it go out in a straight line?

A. It was just an arch coming out of the window. It wasn't a real hard throw."

The object landed in a "grassy area . . . right at the end of the bridge railing where it comes back down to the ground." Asked where the object would have landed had it been jettisoned sooner, Browning responded, "[I]f it had been tossed over the overpass it would have landed on I-44."

Browning immediately "activated [his vehicle's] overhead lighting." The pickup proceeded approximately twenty-five yards farther east without changing its speed or swerving. Then, it stopped.

Browning exited his vehicle and approached the pickup. Inside were "a male subject driver and a female subject passenger."

Browning asked the duo for identification. The driver was Gifford Isbell; the passenger was Appellant.

Browning estimated the inside width of the pickup "from the driver's side all the way over to the passenger side" as between "four [and] four and a half feet."

Isbell told Browning he (Isbell) "believed he was having fuel pump problems."

Browning called for "backup" because he "needed to ascertain what was thrown from the [pickup] and . . . wished another officer to stay by the subjects while I went back there." Lieutenant Ted Haun arrived in approximately five minutes.

Upon Haun's arrival, Browning retreated to the area where he had seen the object tossed from the pickup. There, he found "a black backpack." He found no other object that size in the vicinity.

Browning carried the backpack to Haun's patrol car and opened it. Inside, he found a "bed sheet." Inside the sheet he found a plastic "shopping bag." Inside the bag he found a "pickle type jar."

Browning loosened the jar lid and detected a strong "ammonia odor" that "literally took [his] breath away."

Inside the jar was an inch or an inch and a half of liquid. Beneath the liquid, in the bottom of the jar, was "an inch or so" of "bluishgreen substance." Browning recognized the ammonia odor and the substance in the jar as being "consistent with . . . the manufacture of methamphetamine."

Browning placed Appellant in custody, then searched the pickup. On "the passenger side floorboard" he found a used "diabetic type syringe" with a "slight trace of [wet] substance in it." The syringe was "directly near where [Appellant's] feet would have been."

At trial, a "narcotics investigator" with the Greene County Sheriff's Department testified methamphetamine sells for approximately $100 per gram in Greene County. The investigator also testified that common insulin syringes are used to inject illicit drugs, including methamphetamine, in liquid form.

A criminalist assigned to the "Missouri State Highway Patrol Troop D Satellite Lab" in Springfield testified the substance in the jar found by Browning weighed 105.33 grams. A strong odor consistent with anhydrous ammonia emanated from the substance. The criminalist performed a "battery of tests" on the substance; the tests established the substance contained pseudoephedrine. The criminalist explained how pseudoephedrine and anhydrous ammonia are used to manufacture methamphetamine. One gram of pseudoephedrine normally yields one gram of methamphetamine. According to the criminalist, there is no "legitimate purpose" for mixing pseudoephedrine with anhydrous ammonia, hence anyone doing so would be trying to make methamphetamine.

Tests by the criminalist on the syringe found by Browning in the pickup were inconclusive "because of lack of material."

Appellant presented no evidence.

The trial court denied a motion by Appellant for judgment of acquittal at the close of the evidence.

Appellant's sole point relied on reads:

"The trial court erred in denying Rose's motion for judgment of acquittal and in entering judgment of conviction on the jury's verdict . . . because the evidence was insufficient to prove guilt of possessing pseudoephredrine [sic] with intent to manufacture a controlled substance, in that the evidence failed to establish beyond a reasonable doubt that Rose possessed the pseudoephredrine [sic] since the only evidence shown was that it had been in Mr. Isbell's truck, in which Rose was a passenger, and had been thrown out by someone in the truck, and it was complete speculation as to which of them threw the substance out of the truck."

As this court understands the point, Appellant does not claim the evidence was insufficient to support a finding that someone in the pickup possessed pseudoephedrine with intent to convert it to create methamphetamine; instead, Appellant maintains the evidence was insufficient to support a finding that she was the one who possessed pseudoephedrine with intent to convert it to create methamphetamine.

Appellant emphasizes the following segment of Browning's testimony:

"Q. And you certainly can't say who among the people that were riding in this truck may have tossed this object out if it was, in fact, tossed, is that correct?

A. That's correct."

Based on that testimony, Appellant argues: "The evidence . . . showed that both Rose and the driver were in the truck, with no...