Cridiso v. State

956 So. 2d 281, 2006 WL 2865500
CourtCourt of Appeals of Mississippi
DecidedOctober 10, 2006
Docket2004-KA-00413-COA
StatusPublished
Cited by7 cases

This text of 956 So. 2d 281 (Cridiso v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Mississippi primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Cridiso v. State, 956 So. 2d 281, 2006 WL 2865500 (Mich. Ct. App. 2006).

Opinion

956 So.2d 281 (2006)

Joseph Michael CRIDISO, Appellant
v.
STATE of Mississippi, Appellee.

No. 2004-KA-00413-COA.

Court of Appeals of Mississippi.

October 10, 2006.
Rehearing Denied February 27, 2007.

*283 Jonathan Michael Farris, attorney for appellant.

Office of the Attorney General by W. Glenn Watts, attorney for appellee.

Before KING, C.J., SOUTHWICK and IRVING, JJ.

IRVING, J., for the Court.

¶ 1. Joseph Michael Cridiso was convicted of one count of business burglary by a jury and was sentenced by the Forrest County Circuit Court to serve seven years in the custody of the Mississippi Department *284 of Corrections, without the possibility of any form of early release or parole, as a non-violent habitual offender. Aggrieved, Cridiso appeals and asserts that the trial court erred (1) in denying his motion to quash the indictment and in allowing the State to amend the indictment, (2) in denying his motion in limine seeking to prevent the admission of certain evidence, and (3) in denying his motion for a directed verdict, peremptory instruction, and judgment notwithstanding the verdict. Cridiso also argues that the verdict was against the overwhelming weight of the evidence and was manifestly wrong as a matter of law.

¶ 2. Finding no error, we affirm.

FACTS

¶ 3. On March 31, 2003, at around five to five-thirty in the morning, Lori Howard arrived at her place of employment, the Fuelmart in Petal, Mississippi. Howard discovered that the store had been broken into and that over ninety cartons of cigarettes had been stolen. The break-in was apparently achieved through a hole that had been made in the back wall of the building, which was a public bathroom that allowed no entry into the rest of the store. An additional hole had been made to gain admission to the actual store. Howard also noticed that a box of clear garbage bags had been moved to a location near one of the holes. Howard informed the Petal Police Department of the break-in. Thereafter, police officers came to the Fuelmart to investigate the scene and take photographs. Unfortunately, the photographs were accidentally erased and were not available at trial. No fingerprints or other identifying forensic evidence was recovered from the crime scene.

¶ 4. Around the same time as the report of the break-in and the investigation of the scene, Cridiso was stopped by Forrest County Deputy Sheriff David Klem, who had been informed of the break-in at the Fuelmart. Klem testified that he stopped Cridiso because he believed that the vehicle, which was coming out of a dead-end alley near the Fuelmart at around five-thirty in the morning, was suspicious. Klem also testified that he had previously seen switched tags on Cridiso's vehicle. After Cridiso was stopped, he was asked to get out of his car, which he did. At that time, Klem observed white powder on Cridiso's clothing. Cridiso's wife was also in the car and was also covered in white powder. When asked what he was doing out, Cridiso informed Klem that he was on his way to work. When Klem looked in the front seat of Cridiso's vehicle, he observed a claw hammer, maul, and flashlight between the driver's seat and the passenger's seat. The instruments were covered in what appeared to be the same white dust as Cridiso and his wife.

¶ 5. After making these observations, Klem contacted the Petal officers and informed them of his findings. After the Petal police officers arrived, they further examined what could be seen by looking into the car. Several cartons of cigarettes, in clear plastic bags, were observed underneath bags of clothing in the backseat of Cridiso's vehicle. Through empty audio holes in the rear of the car, officers were able to observe additional cigarette cartons located in the trunk of Cridiso's car. Some time after the Petal officers arrived, Cridiso and his wife were taken into custody.

¶ 6. Howard was brought to the vehicle to see if she could identify the cartons of cigarettes as the ones that had been taken from her store. She was able to positively identify several of the cartons because either she or another Fuelmart employee had handwritten the number "seven" on the cartons after receiving them. This was *285 a standard practice that the Fuelmart used to identify promotional cartons, which contain only seven packs of cigarettes as opposed to the ten packs that come in other cartons. Cridiso's vehicle was then taken to the Petal Police Department, where it was processed. A wrench was found in the car along with the objects observed by the deputy. Around ninety cartons of cigarettes were discovered in the vehicle.

¶ 7. Thereafter, Howard came to the Petal Police Department to attempt to identify the cartons that had been removed from the vehicle as the cartons that were stolen from her store. She was able to positively identify only the cartons that had "seven" handwritten on them, but she testified that the other cartons almost exactly matched the number and brand of cartons that had been taken from the store. At that time, the majority of the cartons were returned to her for sale at the Fuelmart. Before giving her the cartons, law enforcement photographed and inventoried the cartons. Testimony indicated that the cartons were returned to Howard in part because tobacco has a limited shelf-life, and the cigarettes would likely become unsaleable if kept until after Cridiso's trial. The cartons that Howard was able to identify positively as having come from the Fuelmart were kept for use at trial.

ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION OF THE ISSUES

1. Indictment

¶ 8. In Mississippi, issues of law are reviewed de novo by appellate courts. Jones v. State, 912 So.2d 973, 975(¶ 8) (Miss.2005) (citing UHS-Qualicare, Inc. v. Gulf Coast Cmty. Hosp., Inc., 525 So.2d 746, 754 (Miss.1987)). Because a determination of whether an amendment is one of form or one of substance is a question of law, a court's decision to allow the amendment of an indictment "deserves a relatively broad standard of review. . . ." Id. (citing Peterson v. State, 671 So.2d 647, 652 (Miss.1996)).

¶ 9. In general, a trial court can only grant amendments of form to an indictment, not amendments of substance. Mixon v. State, 921 So.2d 275, 280(¶ 15) (Miss.2005) (citing Shive v. State, 507 So.2d 898, 900 (Miss.1987)). Any amendment which "change[s] the charge made in the indictment to another crime" is an amendment of substance. Id. (quoting Shive, 507 So.2d at 900). Amendments of form are those that do not prejudice the defense. Jones, 912 So.2d at 976(¶ 9) (quoting Pool v. State, 764 So.2d 440, 443(¶ 10) (Miss.2000)). "The test for whether an amendment to the indictment will prejudice the defense is whether the defense as it originally stood would be equally available after the amendment is made." Id. (quoting Pool, 764 So.2d at 443(¶ 10)). If a defect is found to be one of substance, the indictment can be corrected only by the grand jury, not by the trial court. Id. (citing Rhymes v. State, 638 So.2d 1270, 1275 (Miss.1994)).

¶ 10. In the present case, we find that the amendment granted by the trial court was an amendment of form and not an amendment of substance. The original indictment in the case alleged that Cridiso had burglarized a store in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. In reality, the store was located in Petal.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
956 So. 2d 281, 2006 WL 2865500, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/cridiso-v-state-missctapp-2006.