Ruebin Clifton Fletcher v. Commonwealth of Virginia

CourtCourt of Appeals of Virginia
DecidedNovember 10, 2020
Docket1736192
StatusPublished

This text of Ruebin Clifton Fletcher v. Commonwealth of Virginia (Ruebin Clifton Fletcher v. Commonwealth of Virginia) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Virginia primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Ruebin Clifton Fletcher v. Commonwealth of Virginia, (Va. Ct. App. 2020).

Opinion

COURT OF APPEALS OF VIRGINIA

Present: Judges Beales, Huff and O’Brien Argued by videoconference PUBLISHED

RUEBIN CLIFTON FLETCHER OPINION BY v. Record No. 1736-19-2 JUDGE MARY GRACE O’BRIEN NOVEMBER 10, 2020 COMMONWEALTH OF VIRGINIA

FROM THE CIRCUIT COURT OF SPOTSYLVANIA COUNTY Joseph J. Ellis, Judge

Kevin E. Calhoun (Charles C. Cosby, Jr.; The Law Office of Charles C. Cosby, Jr., P.C., on brief), for appellant.

Sharon M. Carr, Assistant Attorney General (Mark R. Herring, Attorney General, on brief), for appellee.

Following a bench trial, Ruebin Clifton Fletcher (“appellant”) was convicted of carjacking,

in violation of Code § 18.2-58.1; attempted malicious wounding, in violation of Code §§ 18.2-26

and 18.2-51; abduction, in violation of Code § 18.2-47; felony destruction of property, in violation

of Code § 18.2-137; and assault, in violation of Code § 18.2-57. The court granted appellant’s

motion to strike a charge of attempted rape, in violation of Code §§ 18.2-26 and 18.2-61.

The court imposed a total sentence of forty-five years and eleven months of incarceration,

with thirty years suspended. The court’s sentence included twenty years of incarceration, with

fourteen years suspended, on the abduction conviction.

Appellant challenges the sufficiency of the evidence to support his carjacking and attempted

malicious wounding convictions. He also asserts that the court erred in sentencing him in excess of

the statutory maximum on the abduction conviction. BACKGROUND

At approximately midnight on July 17, 2018, the victim, who was driving home after

visiting a friend, stopped to inflate her tires at a gas station. Appellant, who was driving a white

sedan, stopped nearby, rolled down his window, and offered to help. The victim declined.

Appellant then parked and approached her on foot. He reiterated his offer to help, told her his

name, and asked for her name. Because she was uncomfortable, the victim gave a false name.

Appellant invited the victim to “hang out” and “smoke some weed,” but she declined.

Appellant continued attempting to engage the victim in conversation and repeatedly asked if

she wanted to “hang out.” The victim ignored him, finished inflating her tires, and left the gas

station parking lot. Appellant drove out “right behind” her and began following her. Concerned,

the victim texted her friend and turned onto a rural two-lane road which she thought was “more of a

highway.” Appellant followed and began to drive closer to the victim’s car.

The victim called 911 and reported that she was being followed. Meanwhile, appellant

pulled up close behind her car, crossed into the oncoming traffic lane, and accelerated past her.

Appellant returned to the victim’s lane and “slammed on his brakes,” forcing the victim to stop

abruptly. The 911 dispatcher told the victim to turn around. However, while attempting to do so,

the victim backed her car into a ditch; the front of her car remained on the road, obstructing a traffic

lane. Appellant backed up his car until it was perpendicular to the victim’s vehicle, forming a “T”

shape and blocking the victim’s vehicle so that she could not drive forward, even if she exited the

ditch.

Appellant got out of his car, wearing gloves and carrying a long metal object that witnesses

described as a “tire iron.” He approached the victim’s driver’s side window and demanded that she

get out and follow him. The victim refused. Appellant responded by trying to smash the window

with the tire iron. He hit the window three times, leaving scratches, but the window did not break. -2- At that time, the victim saw another car approach in the lane blocked by her car. Appellant

returned to his car to move it out of the way, still yelling at the victim to follow him. The victim

then flashed her lights and rolled her window down, calling for help. The approaching car pulled

over, and two men got out and ran toward the victim’s car. According to one of the men, the

victim’s car was angled “almost like in a T-bone[.] . . . [Y]ou could tell that [it] couldn’t really move

until [appellant’s] car moved.”

Appellant parked near the victim’s car and got back out, still wearing gloves and carrying

the tire iron. As the two men approached, he retreated to his car, where he remained for a minute

with his high beams on before driving away. He returned a short time later and stayed for “maybe

thirty seconds” before leaving again. The 911 dispatcher recorded the entire incident.

Two sheriff’s deputies responded to the scene. One deputy obtained a DMV photograph of

appellant based on his car’s license plate number and showed it to the victim. The victim identified

appellant from the photo.

A third officer who was driving nearby heard the dispatcher’s description of appellant’s

vehicle, and he saw a white car speed past him. He pursued the car for a short distance but was

unable to catch up; he estimated it was traveling between 100 and 120 miles per hour. He

subsequently identified the white car as appellant’s vehicle from a photograph taken from

surveillance footage at the gas station.

Appellant was arrested on July 26, 2018. The tire iron was never recovered.

ANALYSIS

In his first two assignments of error, appellant contests the sufficiency of the evidence to

support his convictions for carjacking and attempted malicious wounding. First, he contends that

the Commonwealth failed to prove that he seized or seized control of the victim’s vehicle, which is

an element of carjacking under Code § 18.2-58.1. Second, he argues that the Commonwealth failed -3- to prove that he had a specific intent to maliciously wound the victim, as required by Code

§ 18.2-51.

When considering a challenge to the sufficiency of the evidence supporting a conviction, an

appellate court reviews the facts “in the light most favorable to the Commonwealth, the prevailing

party at trial.” Gerald v. Commonwealth, 295 Va. 469, 472 (2018) (quoting Scott v.

Commonwealth, 292 Va. 380, 381 (2016)). In doing so, an appellate court “discard[s] the evidence

of the accused in conflict with that of the Commonwealth, and regard[s] as true all the credible

evidence favorable to the Commonwealth and all fair inferences to be drawn therefrom.” Kelley v.

Commonwealth, 289 Va. 463, 467-68 (2015) (quoting Parks v. Commonwealth, 221 Va. 492, 498

(1980)).

“The judgment of a trial court sitting without a jury is entitled to the same weight as a jury

verdict and will not be set aside unless it appears from the evidence that the judgment is plainly

wrong or without evidence to support it.” Wood v. Commonwealth, 57 Va. App. 286, 292 (2010)

(quoting Martin v. Commonwealth, 4 Va. App. 438, 443 (1987)); see Code § 8.01-680. In

reviewing the court’s verdict, an appellate court “does not ask itself whether it believes that the

evidence at the trial established guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.” Secret v. Commonwealth, 296

Va. 204, 228 (2018) (quoting Pijor v. Commonwealth, 294 Va. 502, 512 (2017)). “Rather, the

relevant question is, upon review of the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution,

whether any rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a

reasonable doubt.” Id. (quoting Pijor, 294 Va. at 512). Further, “[t]he credibility of a witness, the

weight accorded the testimony, and the inferences to be drawn from proven facts are matters solely

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