State v. Broome

136 So. 3d 979, 2014 WL 1385871, 2014 La. App. LEXIS 979
CourtLouisiana Court of Appeal
DecidedApril 9, 2014
DocketNo. 49,004-KA
StatusPublished
Cited by42 cases

This text of 136 So. 3d 979 (State v. Broome) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Louisiana Court of Appeal primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
State v. Broome, 136 So. 3d 979, 2014 WL 1385871, 2014 La. App. LEXIS 979 (La. Ct. App. 2014).

Opinion

GARRETT, J. •

|TThe defendant, Wanda Gail Broome, was convicted of one count of possession of a Schedule III controlled dangerous substance (“CDS”), hydrocodone, and one count of distribution of a Schedule III CDS, hydrocodone. She was adjudicated a fourth felony offender and was given the mandatory sentence of life imprisonment without benefit of parole, probation, or suspension of sentence. The defendant appeals her convictions and her adjudication as a multiple offender. We affirm.

FACTS

The Shreveport Police Department received information that Broome was involved in drug activity. A female confidential informant (“Cl”) was secured who knew Broome personally. A Shreveport police task force, the Cl, and Deputy Jonathan Kennedy, who was an undercover officer from the Caddo Parish Sheriffs Office, embarked upon an investigation. Six hundred hydrocodone pills, also known as Lortab, were checked out of the Shreveport Police Department property room and given to Kennedy who, along with the Cl, sought to trade the hydrocodone pills to Broome in exchange for methamphetamine.

On May 31, 2011, Kennedy and the Cl went to Broome’s residence in Oil City, Louisiana. Kennedy claimed he observed Broome sell methamphetamine to a man named Dennis in her front yard. Then Kennedy sold Broome 15 hydrocodone tablets for $60. Broome gave six of the pills to Dennis and she kept the rest. A search warrant was obtained for Broome’s residence. An arrest team gained entry to the residence and Broome was arrested. However, the hydrocodone pills were not recovered.

12Broome was charged with one count of possession of hydrocodone, one count of distribution of methamphetamine, and one count of distribution of hydrocodone. On April 18, 2012, following a jury trial, the defendant was found guilty of one count of possession and one count of distribution of hydrocodone. She was acquitted on the charge of distribution of methamphetamine. A motion for new trial and a motion to modify and/or amend the sentence were denied by the trial court on April 23, 2012. On January 31, 2013, the defendant was given concurrent sentences of five years at hard labor on the possession con-[983]*983vietion and 10 years at hard labor on the distribution conviction. She was also ordered to pay a fine of $5,000 on each charge plus court costs.

Broome was charged in an amended habitual offender bill of information with being a fourth felony offender based upon her conviction for distribution of hydroco-done. Broome filed a motion to quash the habitual offender bill of information, claiming that she was not properly informed of her rights when the predicate guilty pleas were entered. At the habitual offender hearing on May 1, 2013, the trial court denied the motion to quash. On May 9, 2013, Broome was adjudicated a fourth felony offender. Her prior sentence of 10 years for distribution was vacated and the mandatory sentence of life in prison without benefit of parole, probation, or suspension of sentence was imposed. Broome appealed.

SUFFICIENCY OF THE EVIDENCE

Broome argues that the evidence presented at trial was insufficient to convict her of one count of possession and one count of distribution of hydrocodone. Broome argues that the prosecution was required to prove that |sshe did, in fact, possess and distribute hydrocodone. According to Broome, because no hydroco-done pills were recovered from her residence, the prosecution failed to provide one scintilla of evidence that she possessed or distributed hydrocodone. Broome contends that all the prosecution proved was that one pill in the batch of 600 checked out of the police property room was identified as hydrocodone by a crime lab analyst based upon the markings on that pill. Broome argues there was no evidence that the sample pill identified at the crime lab was similar to the 15 pills which Kennedy claimed he sold to her, six of which she then distributed to another person. According to Broome, for the prosecution to have established its case at trial by proof beyond a reasonable doubt, it would have had to produce evidence that the sample pill was identical in chemical composition to the pills which Broome is alleged to have possessed and distributed. Broome maintains that the prosecution failed to show whether the sample pill was taken from the same bottle as the pills involved here, whether the 600 pills came from one prior case or multiple cases, whether the pills were all Schedule III hydrocodone as opposed to Schedule II hydrocodone where no other non-narcotic element is present, and whether the chemical composition of the pills was previously tested. These arguments are without merit.

Legal Principles

The proper test for determining a claim of insufficiency of evidence in a criminal case is whether, after viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution, any rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime proven beyond a reasonable doubt. Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 99 S.Ct. 2781, 61 L.Ed.2d 560 (1979).

UThis standard, now legislatively embodied in La. C. Cr. P. art. 821, does not provide the appellate court with a vehicle to substitute its own appreciation of the evidence for that of the fact finder. State v. Pigford, 2005-0477 (La.2/22/06), 922 So.2d 517; State v. Moore, 44,429 (La.App.2d Cir.8/26/09), 20 So.3d 1137, writ not cons., 2009-2166 (La.4/9/10), 31 So.3d 378; State v. Strother, 43,363 (La.App.2d Cir.8/20/08), 990 So.2d 130, writ denied, 2008-2289 (La.5/15/09), 8 So.3d 580. The appellate court does not assess the credibility of witnesses or reweigh evidence. State v. Smith, 94-3116 (La.10/16/95), 661 So.2d 442; State v. Moore, supra. A reviewing court accords great deference to a jury’s decision to accept or reject the testi[984]*984mony of a witness in whole or in part. State v. Eason, 43,788 (La.App.2d Cir.2/25/09), 3 So.3d 685, writ denied, 2009-0725 (La.12/11/09), 23 So.3d 913; State v. Hill, 42,025 (La.App.2d Cir.5/9/07), 956 So.2d 758, writ denied, 2007-1209 (La.12/14/07), 970 So.2d 529; State v. Moore, supra.

Circumstantial evidence consists of proof of collateral facts and circumstances from which the existence of the main fact may be inferred according to reason and common experience. State v. Moore, supra. For a case resting essentially upon circumstantial evidence, that evidence must exclude every reasonable hypothesis of innocence. La. R.S. 15:438; State v. Gipson, 45,121 (La.App.2d Cir.4/14/10), 34 So.3d 1090, writ denied, 2010-1019 (La.11/24/10), 50 So.3d 827.

The Jackson standard is applicable in cases involving both direct and circumstantial evidence. An appellate court reviewing the sufficiency of ^evidence in such cases must resolve any conflict in the direct evidence by viewing that evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution. When the direct evidence is thus viewed, the facts established by the direct evidence and inferred from the circumstances established by that evidence must be sufficient for a rational trier of fact to conclude beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant was guilty of every essential element of the crime. State v. Sutton, 436 So.2d 471 (La.1983); State v. Moore, supra; State v. Barakat, 38,419 (La.App.2d Cir.6/23/04), 877 So.2d 223.

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Bluebook (online)
136 So. 3d 979, 2014 WL 1385871, 2014 La. App. LEXIS 979, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-broome-lactapp-2014.