Circumstantial Evidence

[kate_nepveu]

This morning, I was in Rochester to argue two cases. When there are a lot of cases on the calendar before mine, I do my best to pay attention to them: it keeps me awake, it's educational on a number of levels, and I'm not going to be able to concentrate on my own case during other people's arguments (I prepare ferociously ahead of time instead). Today, I was rewarded with an interesting set of facts, which I believe went something like this:

Criminal conviction for drug possession. Defendant had jumped out of a still-running car and run through a series of backyards. He was eventually arrested some distance away (I did not hear any of the distances). A bag of drugs was found on the ground near a fence, which defendant had jumped over; the jumping was the only time the pursuing officer lost sight of defendant. It was a cold snowy day, and there were only two sets of footprints in the backyard, defendant's and the officer's. The bag was warm to the touch.

Is that sufficient evidence to convict defendant of possession? Recall that possession must be proved beyond a reasonable doubt.

(I think one of the justices said it would make an interesting law school test question.)

Then when I got home, I found myself with another circumstantial evidence question, which amused me. The faucet in the back wall of the house was on. A quick call to Chad confirmed that he hadn't left the water running for some reason, so I went out and turned it off. The faucet turned easily, and there were pieces of icicles on the ground around it. I immediately concluded that a falling icicle had hit the faucet in just the right way to turn it on—which is perhaps somewhat more improbable than the case I heard this morning, but since the stakes are so much lower, I am perfectly happy to accept it.

Do you all have any interesting examples of circumstantial evidence? Or want to weigh in on these examples?

(Note to self: find a "lawyerly" icon.)

Comments

[rachelmanija.livejournal.com]

I would have convicted on the warm bag case.

In the case where I was a jury member, we ended up deadlocking on two counts of possessing a stolen forklift and scissor lift. I felt that given that the property was in fact stolen, was found on a tow lot run by the defendant, was the sort of item that would be useful in his line of work, that other stolen property was also on the lot, that they had both been stolen right around the time when he took possession of the lot, that both were very valuable (so were unlikely to have been stolen and then immediately ditched, that he would have known their value due to his line of work, and that one of the lifts had been hotwired and its ID numbers scratched out, was sufficient to convince me beyond a reasonable doubt that he had either stolen it himself or he had at least known that it must have been stolen, if it had been on the lot before he took possession of it.

Exactly half the other jurors felt that it was possible that the lifts had been dumped on the lot prior to the defendants' possession of the lot, and that he had no idea where they came from.

[kate_nepveu]

That's an interesting one. Did the defendant testify?

[rachelmanija.livejournal.com]

No, he didn't. I was influenced in the matter of the forklifts by the overwhelming evidence that he was running a chop shop and possessed a stolen vehicle (which he was chopping), and we did convict on those counts; I figured that since he had definitely recieved one form of stolen property, and was running an illegal stolen car business, the odds that he would have not only innocently had stolen property abandoned on his lot, but also not know that it was stolen, were low. Personally, I think the lifts were on his property because he either personally stole them or had his associates steal them.

But there was definitely much less evidence linking him to the lifts than there was linking him to the car. For instance, he had been seen and recorded doing various things to the car, but no one testified that they had ever seen him doing anything with the lifts, so he theoretically could have not even known that they were there, though that's like me theoretically not knowing that I have a sofa in my living room.

[kate_nepveu]

though that's like me theoretically not knowing that I have a sofa in my living room

There are days . . .

But I see what you mean. Do you think it was a compromise verdict, explicitly or implicitly?

[rachelmanija.livejournal.com]

Yes, implicitly.

At the end we sent some questions to the judge (about a citizen's responsibility for stuff on his property that might not belong to him) and after answering them, the judge asked us one by one if we thought the answers meant we might be able to reach a verdict after deliberating some more. Since I was juror # 1, he asked me first. I said I thought it was possible. Then one by one, every other juror said, "No, no, absolutely not." While shooting vibes of loathing in my direction.

At that point the judge dismissed us.