State v. Eppenauer, WD
| Decision Date | 16 December 1997 |
| Docket Number | No. WD,WD |
| Citation | 957 S.W.2d 501 |
| Parties | STATE of Missouri, Respondent, v. James J. EPPENAUER, Appellant, 53944. |
| Court | Missouri Court of Appeals |
Karl L. Madden, Jr., Moberly, for appellant.
James Bradley Funk, Asst. Pros. Atty., Macon County, for respondent.
Before ULRICH, C.J., and SPINDEN and SMART, JJ.
James J. Eppenauer appeals his conviction and sentence for driving while intoxicated, section 577.010 1. He claims that the evidence was insufficient to prove his guilt of driving while intoxicated. He also contends that his arrest for driving while intoxicated was unlawful because it did not occur within one and one-half hours of the claimed violation as mandated by section 577.039.
The judgment of conviction is affirmed.
Trooper Kevin Linear of the Missouri State Highway Patrol was on duty in the early morning hours of July 28, 1996, when he received a radio dispatch at approximately 1:00 a.m. regarding a vehicle in a ditch in rural Macon County. He immediately proceeded to the scene, which was 20 miles away. Upon arriving at the scene, he found a tan 1988 Chevrolet Nova in a ditch. The vehicle was unoccupied and locked. Nobody was in the area. Trooper Linear conducted a computer check of the automobile's license plate number and learned that the vehicle was registered to the appellant, James Eppenauer.
Trooper Linear then drove west to search for the driver of the vehicle and found Mr. Eppenauer walking along the road approximately one mile away. As Mr. Eppenauer got in the patrol car, Trooper Linear noticed that he smelled of alcohol and had to balance himself against the car to keep from falling. Inside the car, Trooper Linear observed that Mr. Eppenauer had slurred speech and glassy eyes. Mr. Eppenauer explained that "a big truck had run him off the road."
Trooper Linear then informed Mr. Eppenauer that he wanted to perform some sobriety tests and drove to a nearby camping area. Four sobriety tests were administered to Mr. Eppenauer: the horizontal gaze nystagmus test, the one leg stand test, the walk-and-turn test, and recitation of the alphabet. Mr. Eppenauer failed them all. He was then arrested and informed of his Miranda rights. Trooper Linear and Mr. Eppenauer then returned to Mr. Eppenauer's car. The contents of a cooler in the back seat were searched, and no alcoholic beverages were found. Mr. Eppenauer was then transported to the Macon County sheriff's office.
At the sheriff's office, Mr. Eppenauer denied being in an accident and denied drinking alcohol. He admitted to driving the vehicle and restated that a truck had run him off the road. Mr. Eppenauer took a breath test and registered a blood alcohol content of .17 percent. He was then issued a citation for driving while intoxicated. This appeal followed.
On appeal, Mr. Eppenauer claims that the trial court erred in finding him guilty of driving while intoxicated. He argues that the evidence was insufficient to prove the elements of the offense beyond a reasonable doubt.
Review of a challenge to the sufficiency of the evidence to support a criminal conviction is limited to determining whether sufficient evidence was presented from which a reasonable trier of fact might have found the defendant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. State v. Silvey, 894 S.W.2d 662, 673 (Mo. banc 1995). A reviewing court accepts as true all evidence and inferences that support the verdict and disregards unfavorable evidence and inferences. State v. West, 825 S.W.2d 402, 403 (Mo.App.1992).
A person commits the crime of driving while intoxicated if he operates a motor vehicle while in an intoxicated or drugged condition. § 577.010. Each word in the name of the offense, driving while intoxicated, identifies an element of proof. Wilcox v. Director of Revenue, 842 S.W.2d 240, 242 (Mo.App.1992). Circumstantial evidence may prove the elements of the offense, driving while intoxicated. Id. at 243. In non-engine-running cases, significant additional evidence of driving and the connection of driving in an intoxicated state is required to sustain a criminal conviction. Id.
Trooper Linear's senses detected Mr. Eppenauer's manifest indicia of intoxication. Trooper Linear smelled a strong odor of alcohol, observed Mr. Eppenauer's unsteady balance and glassy eyes, and heard Mr. Eppenauer's slurred speech. Additionally, Mr. Eppenauer failed four sobriety tests and had a blood alcohol content of .17 percent. Trooper Linear testified that in his opinion, Mr. Eppenauer was intoxicated. Mr. Eppenauer admitted to Trooper Linear that he was driving the automobile when he drove the vehicle off the road, stating that he had been "run off the road" by a truck. The remote site of the one-car accident and the absence of alcohol containers in Mr. Eppenauer's car or the surrounding area reasonably tended to show access to alcoholic drink was unavailable from the time the car was driven into the ditch until Mr. Eppenauer was found by the trooper. A reasonable inference could be drawn, therefore, that Mr. Eppenauer was intoxicated when he drove his vehicle into the ditch. The evidence was sufficient to prove that Mr. Eppenauer was guilty of the offense, driving while intoxicated. See ...
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State v. Davis
...was promptly reported, and the officer arrived eleven minutes after the report and found defendant intoxicated"); State v. Eppenauer, 957 S.W.2d 501, 503 (Mo.App. 1997) (defendant found intoxicated while walking about a mile from accident and "remote site of the one-car accident and the abs......
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State v. Hall
...connecting the defendant to each element of the crime." State v. Howell, 143 S.W.3d 747, 752 (Mo.App.2004); see State v. Eppenauer, 957 S.W.2d 501, 503 (Mo.App.1997). This Court accepts as true all evidence favorable to the verdict and disregards all evidence and inferences to the contrary.......
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State v. Mitchell
...2005). Therefore, the State could establish the operation element of the offense via circumstantial evidence. See State v. Eppenauer, 957 S.W.2d 501, 503 (Mo. App. 1997). 4. In Troutner, the defendant was found asleep behind the wheel of his truck on a private parking lot. The truck's engin......
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State v. Laughlin
...connection of driving in an intoxicated state is required to sustain a criminal conviction." Anderson, 107 S.W.3d at 450 (quoting Eppenauer, 957 S.W.2d at 503). consequence of adducing additional evidence in a "non-running engine" case is to provide a temporal connection between the discove......
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