Robinson v. State

749 So. 2d 1140, 1999 Miss. App. LEXIS 502, 1999 WL 562785
CourtCourt of Appeals of Mississippi
DecidedAugust 3, 1999
DocketNo. 98-KA-00288-COA
StatusPublished

This text of 749 So. 2d 1140 (Robinson 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
Robinson v. State, 749 So. 2d 1140, 1999 Miss. App. LEXIS 502, 1999 WL 562785 (Mich. Ct. App. 1999).

Opinion

IRVING, J., for the Court:

¶ 1. Ricky Earl Robinson was convicted of burglary in the Circuit Court of Coaho-ma County. He was sentenced as a habitual offender to a term of life imprisonment without parole. Feeling aggrieved of the judgment against him, Robinson appealed and assigned the following issue as error:

APPELLANT CONTENDS THE COURT ERRED IN OVERRULING APPELLANT’S MOTION FOR DIRECTED VERDICT AND SUBSEQUENT MOTION FOR JUDGMENT NON OBSTANTE VERDICTO OR ALTERNATIVELY FOR A NEW TRIAL SINCE THAT [SIC] THE VERDICT IS AGAINST THE OVERWHELMING WEIGHT OF THE EVIDENCE AND NOT SUPPORTED BY SUFFICIENT CREDIBLE EVIDENCE.

FACTS

¶ 2. At the trial of this matter Angela Troupe, a resident of Wade Walton Apartments in Clarksdale, testified that on September 12, 1996, she encountered Robinson, whom she knew, while returning to her apartment from a visit to her mother. She further testified that she spoke to him and he spoke to her. She testified that Robinson, who also lived at the apartment complex, was standing at the apartment door of Christine Adams. Adams’s apartment was located across from Troupe’s. After Troupe entered her apartment she looked out of her window and saw Robinson use some sort of object on the door of the Adams apartment then use his shoulder to force the door open. She immediately left the window and called the police. She reported that there was a break-in taking place and described the person she saw as wearing white shorts and a white shirt. She did not identify the perpetrator, at that time, as being Robinson. Troupe testified that following this call to the police she returned to the window to see Robinson leaving the Adams apartment with an object, that she was not able to identify, in his hands. She then called the police a second time.

¶ 3. John Chambers, a patrolman with the Clarksdale Police Department, testified that he received the call on September 12, 1996, to go to Wade Walton Apartments to investigate a report of a burglary in progress. The perpetrator, he was told, was a black male dressed all in white. Officer Chambers testified that when he arrived on the scene he immediately recognized Robinson from the description he had been given. He said that he and Robinson looked at each other and Robinson turned to go in a different direction when Robinson noticed that he was preparing to get out of his patrol car. Chambers testified that when he opened the door of his car Robinson started to run between the apartment buildings. Chambers said that he immediately radioed to dispatch that the suspect was running from him and that he was beginning a foot pursuit. At about that same time John Rybolt, Chambers’s police captain, drove up and apprehended Robinson, putting [1142]*1142him in handcuffs. A small chest-like freezer belonging to Christine Adams was later found near the corner of her apartment building.

¶4. At the trial, Robinson’s girlfriend, Debra Hall, testified that Robinson had been home helping her bathe her handicapped son on the night of the burglary. She said that she asked him to go out and get cokes and chips at approximately 9:00 p.m. and, one to two minutes after he left, she saw him under arrest by the police. Troupe testified that she thought that the burglary took place some time between 8:43 and 8:55 p.m. Hall testified that she was certain about the time that Robinson left her apartment. She stated that she gives her son medicine every evening at about 9:00 p.m. and that Robinson was with her at the time she prepared the medicine on the night of the burglary. Hall also testified that approximately thirty minutes before she and Robinson gave her son a bath she went outside to take the trash and saw her neighbor’s boyfriend sitting on the apartment stairs smoking a cigarette dressed in light colored clothing.

¶ 5. Robinson testified in his own behalf that he was with Hall all evening until approximately 9:00 p.m. when he told Hall that he was going out to get snacks as usual. He said that he was on his way to purchase the snacks when he was arrested.

ANALYSIS OF THE ISSUE PRESENTED

DID THE TRIAL COURT ERR IN OVERRULING APPELLANT’S MOTION FOR DIRECTED VERDICT AND SUBSEQUENT MOTION FOR JNOV OR ALTERNATIVELY FOR A NEW TRIAL?

¶ 6. Robinson contends that the verdict is against the overwhelming weight of the evidence. He asserts that his motion for directed verdict and subsequent motion for judgment non obstante verdicto should have been granted because — taking all the evidence in the light most favorable to the State — the State failed to meet its burden of proof.

STANDARD OF REVIEW

¶ 7. The supreme court held as follows in Illinois Central Railroad Company v. L.A. Clinton, 727 So.2d 731, 733 (Miss.App.1998):

Because the standards of review for the denial of a judgment notwithstanding the verdict (JNOV) and a directed verdict are the same, Steele v. Inn of Vicksburg, Inc., 697 So.2d 373, 376 (Miss.1997), we will group the appellant’s first two arguments for discussion purposes. Under the applicable standard, this Court will consider the evidence in the light most favorable to the appellee, giving that party the benefit of all favorable inference[s] that may be reasonably drawn from the evidence. If the facts so considered point so overwhelmingly in favor of the appellant that reasonable men could not have arrived at a contrary verdict, we are required to reverse and render. On the other hand if there is substantial evidence in support of the verdict, that is, evidence of such quality and weight that reasonable and fair minded jurors in the exercise of impartial judgment might have reached different conclusions, affirmance is required.

¶ 8. In support of his argument that his motions for directed verdict and JNOV should have been granted, Robinson claims that the proof is against the overwhelming weight of the evidence and that there is reasonable doubt based on the following proof: 1) there was not enough time for him to burglarize the Adams apartment and hide the freezer between the time that he left his apartment and the time he was arrested; 2) Troupe failed to identify the burglar to the police dispatcher as Robinson even though she knew him; 3) Robinson presented alibi testimony at trial; 4) no physical evidence that he committed the burglary; and 5) reasonable doubt about Troupe’s identification.

[1143]*1143¶ 9. At the trial of this matter the State presented eyewitness testimony of Robinson breaking and entering the door of the Adams apartment as well as eyewitness testimony that placed him in possession of property taken from the Adams apartment. The jury heard his alibi testimony and chose to reject it, as it was entitled to do under Burrell v. State, 613 So.2d 1186, 1191 (Miss.1993):

Finally, it is well settled the jury is under no obligation to accept an alibi defense asserted by the accused and his witnesses. Rather, an alibi simply raises an issue of fact to be resolved by the jury. “It is elemental that the State does not have to prove an alibi to be untrue.”

¶ 10. The lack of any physical evidence against Robinson is of no consequence in light of all of the other evidence against him. It is enough to say that the jury, and not the reviewing court, judges the credibility of the witnesses as well as the weight and worth of their conflicting testimony. Gathright v. State, 380 So.2d 1276, 1278 (Miss.1980).

¶ 11.

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Related

Burrell v. State
613 So. 2d 1186 (Mississippi Supreme Court, 1993)
Gathright v. State
380 So. 2d 1276 (Mississippi Supreme Court, 1980)
Groseclose v. State
440 So. 2d 297 (Mississippi Supreme Court, 1983)
Illinois Cent. R. Co. v. Clinton
727 So. 2d 731 (Court of Appeals of Mississippi, 1998)
Steele v. Inn of Vicksburg, Inc.
697 So. 2d 373 (Mississippi Supreme Court, 1997)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
749 So. 2d 1140, 1999 Miss. App. LEXIS 502, 1999 WL 562785, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/robinson-v-state-missctapp-1999.