Wilson v. State
| Decision Date | 23 December 1981 |
| Docket Number | No. 13-81-154-CR,13-81-154-CR |
| Citation | 626 S.W.2d 840 |
| Parties | Randolph WILSON, Appellant, v. STATE of Texas, Appellee. |
| Court | Texas Court of Appeals |
J. Manuel Banales, Corpus Christi, for appellant.
Mike Westergren, County Atty., Corpus Christi, for appellee.
Before NYE, C. J., and UTTER and KENNEDY, JJ.
This is an appeal from a conviction for Class A misdemeanor theft. Punishment was assessed at 60 days in jail.
This is a circumstantial evidence case. On Saturday, May 31, 1980, appellant and a female companion entered Accents, Etc., a ceramic and gift shop in Corpus Christi, Texas. The couple was met by Helen Hause, one of the store owners. The female companion asked to buy some water color paint. While Hause was attending to the female's request, the appellant was walking back and forth in the store. When the sale was made, Hause executed a sales slip. She kept the original and gave the female a copy printed on yellow paper. The couple then left the store.
Hause was suspicious of the couple and made a check of the store's merchandise. She discovered a copper ring missing. An inventory conducted on the following Monday revealed a second ring to be missing, a silver one with a black stone. On that same day, Elaine Rice, an employee of the store, received a telephone call from a man who did not identify himself. The call came at around 7:00 p. m. The caller asked about the store hours and said he wanted to return two rings because they did not fit. Rice told the caller he would have to produce a receipt. The caller said that he no longer had the receipt and hung up.
One hour after this phone call was made, the appellant arrived at the store. He told Ms. Rice that he wanted to return two jars of paint that his wife had purchased because the paint was not the right color. He also stated he wanted to return the two rings which he laid down on the counter. Ms. Rice requested his sales receipt. Appellant produced the yellow customer receipt. On the sales receipt, in addition to other writing, was written, "two rings." Rice noticed that the color of the ink used to write "two rings" was different from the ink used on the rest of the receipt. She left and obtained the original receipt and observed that it contained no entry concerning rings, only an entry relating to the jars of water color paint. Ms. Rice then told the appellant that because of these discrepancies she would not refund his money for the rings. She told him that if he wanted a refund for the rings, he would have to return and talk with the store manager. Rice refunded appellant's money for the paint, whereupon the appellant took the rings and the yellow receipt and left the store. The rings were never recovered.
In ground of error one, appellant challenges the sufficiency of the evidence to support the conviction. Circumstantial evidence will be sufficient to support a conviction if the facts proved support a reasonable inference that the defendant committed the crime and exclude to a moral certainty any inference consistent with his innocence. Galvan v. State, 598 S.W.2d 624, 627 (Tex.Cr.App.1979); Thomas v. State, 148 Tex.Cr.R. 526, 189 S.W.2d 621, 625 (1945). Inferences consistent with innocence must be reasonable and based on the facts proved. Phelps v. State, 594 S.W.2d 434, 436 (Tex.Cr.App.1980); Flores v. State, 551 S.W.2d 364, 367 (Tex.Cr.App.1977). It is not necessary that every fact proved point directly and independently to the defendant's guilt. It is enough if the inference of guilt is warranted by the combined and cumulative force of all the incriminating facts proved. Flores v. State, 551 S.W.2d at 367. Each case must be determined by its own facts and viewed in the light most favorable to the verdict. Ysasaga v. State, 444 S.W.2d 305, 308 (Tex.Cr.App.1969).
Appellant argues that the rings that the appellant returned to the store were not identified as the same rings found to be missing in the inventory. Where, as here, evidence of possession of recently stolen goods is relied upon for conviction, it must be shown that the goods were the goods taken from the owner. York v. State, 511 S.W.2d 517, 518 (Te...
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Wilson v. State
...of the case, we find it unnecessary to consider them. The judgments of the Court of Appeals and the trial court are reversed, 626 S.W.2d 840 (Tex.App.1981), and the case is remanded to the trial court with instructions that an order of acquittal be ONION, Presiding Judge, concurring. I whol......