Opinion
Court of Appeals No. A-10369.
November 18, 2009.
Appeal from the Superior Court, Fourth Judicial District, Fairbanks, Douglas Blankenship, Judge, Trial Court No. 4FA-08-1985 CR.
Shelley K. Chaffin, Law Office of Shelley K. Chaffin, Anchorage, for the Appellant. Tom V. Jamgochian, Assistant District Attorney, J. Michael Gray, District Attorney, Fairbanks, and Daniel S. Sullivan, Attorney General, Juneau, for the Appellee.
Before: Coats, Chief Judge, and Mannheimer and Bolger, Judges.
NOTICE
Memorandum decisions of this court do not create legal precedent. See Alaska Appellate Rule 214(d) and Paragraph 7 of the Guidelines for Publication of Court of Appeals Decisions (Court of Appeals Order No. 3). Accordingly, this memorandum decision may not be cited as binding precedent for any proposition of law.
MEMORANDUM OPINION AND JUDGMENT
A jury convicted Julius E. Bedminster of burglary in the first degree and assault in the fourth degree for entering an apartment belonging to Lisa Dingwall with the intent to assault Annie Johnson and then assaulting Johnson. Bedminster appeals, arguing that there was insufficient evidence to support the burglary conviction, because there was insufficient evidence to show that he was not entitled to enter the apartment, and because there was insufficient evidence to show that he formed the intent to assault Johnson before he actually entered the apartment. We conclude that there was sufficient evidence to support the jury's verdict.
AS 11.46.300(a)(1) and AS 11.41.230(a)(1), respectively.
Bedminster and Johnson had been involved in a romantic relationship for about four years. Bedminster had been periodically living at Johnson's apartment. On June 14, 2008, they got into an argument at Johnson's apartment. Johnson left and went down to another apartment in the same building which belonged to Lisa Dingwall. Bedminster knocked on the front door of the Dingwall apartment, but Dingwall would not let him in. Instead, Bedminster entered the apartment through a window. According to Johnson's testimony, after Bedminster entered through the window, he grabbed her around her throat.
When a defendant challenges the sufficiency of the evidence to support a conviction, we view the evidence in the light most favorable to upholding the verdict. We are to uphold the verdict if, viewing the evidence in this light, a reasonable jury could have found the defendant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.
Johnson v. State, 188 P.3d 700, 702 (Alaska App. 2008).
Johnson was charged with burglary in the first degree for unlawfully entering the dwelling of Lisa Dingwall with the intent to commit the crime of assault on Annie Johnson. Bedminster argues that there was insufficient evidence to show that, when he entered Dingwall's dwelling, he did not have permission to enter.
See AS 11.46.350(a)(1) (defining "enter or remain unlawfully").
We conclude that there was sufficient evidence for a reasonable jury to find that Bedminster did not have permission to enter Dingwall's apartment. Bedminster testified at trial that he first knocked on the door of the Dingwall residence. Apparently when this was unsuccessful, he then entered the apartment through the window. He stated that it was "not the first time" that he had entered that residence through the window. But Bedminster never stated that he thought he had permission to enter.
Lisa Dingwall testified that Bedminster initially knocked on the front door but she would not let him in. A short time later, she heard Bedminster come in through the window. She never gave any indication in her testimony that Bedminster ever had permission to enter her residence. From her testimony, a jury could reasonably conclude that, after Dingwall refused to let Bedminster enter her residence, he broke into her residence by coming in through the window.
Bedminster directly argued to the jury that the State failed to prove that he did not have permission to enter the apartment. The jury rejected his view of the evidence. Under these circumstances, a reasonable jury could have concluded Bedminster did not have permission to enter Dingwall's residence and therefore had entered unlawfully.
Bedminster also argues that the evidence was insufficient to show that he formed the intent to assault Annie Johnson before he entered Dingwall's apartment. But, according to the testimony of Jarrod Stoltz, Bedminster entered through the window and immediately assaulted Johnson. A reasonable jury could have concluded that Bedminster must have been extremely angry to unlawfully enter Dingwall's apartment through a window. And the testimony that he immediately assaulted Johnson when he entered further supports the inference that he intended to assault Johnson.
We accordingly conclude that there was sufficient evidence presented at trial for a reasonable jury to find Bedminster guilty of burglary in the first degree beyond a reasonable doubt.
The judgment of the superior court is AFFIRMED.