Opinion
NOT TO BE PUBLISHED
Alameda County Super. Ct. No. J187734
RIVERA, J.
A.G. appeals the juvenile court’s order finding she had committed robbery, assault, and battery; adjudging her a ward of the court; and placing her on probation in her mother’s home. She contends there is no substantial evidence to support the juvenile court’s finding that she committed assault and robbery. We affirm.
I. Background
A petition pursuant to Welfare and Institutions Code section 602 was filed in the Alameda County Juvenile Court alleging in count 1 that A. had committed felony robbery (Pen. Code, § 211), in count 2 that she had committed felony assault with a firearm (§ 245, subd. (a)(2)), and in count 3 that she had committed misdemeanor battery (§ 242). The petition included firearm enhancements. (§§ 12022.5, subd. (a), 12022.53, subd. (b).)
All undesignated statutory references are to the Penal Code.
The assault and robbery counts stemmed from an incident on January 21, 2006. At about 2:30 or 3:00 in the morning, Ronald Goodwin and his passenger Charles Lyons were driving in a pickup truck in Oakland. When they stopped in front of Lyons’s house, a car pulled up on the other side of the street. A man and a female, who was later identified by Goodwin as A., got out of the car and ran toward the truck with guns in their hands. A. was holding a weapon that looked like a pistol, and the man had what appeared to be an AK-47. Goodwin drove away. After a few blocks, the car Goodwin and Lyons had seen earlier got behind them and chased them. The male driver was holding a gun out of the window, and pointed it at the truck. Goodwin lost control of the truck and hit the curb, damaging the vehicle. A. and the man got out of the car and approached Goodwin’s truck, and the man told him to get out. Goodwin did so, and the man hit him on his head and arms with the gun and told him to get to the ground. A. pointed a gun at Goodwin and poked him in the face with the gun as he lay on the ground. They were approximately two feet apart, and he looked at her to see if he would have the chance to get the gun from her. The man took Goodwin’s wallet, keys, money, and cell phone and told him “ ‘I know who you are. I know where you stay at now since I got your I.D. You better not say nothing.’ ” He yelled at a woman across the street who was watching, telling her to be quiet before he shot her. A. did not yell during the incident. A police car arrived, and the man and woman drove away without being apprehended.
A. does not raise any issues in connection with the battery count, which was based on a separate incident; and we will not recite the pertinent facts here.
Goodwin testified that the man who attacked him appeared to be a young Mexican, less than 21 years old; and that he had described the female to the police as an African-American between 17 and 23 years old, fairly small, with brown, highlighted, shoulder-length hair and a short jean skirt. He identified her in court as A. Although he did not get a good look at A. during the initial encounter, he saw her clearly during the chase when the car pulled alongside the truck. The airbags went off when the truck crashed, but Goodwin testified that he was not dazed. He had had approximately three beers that evening.
In the weeks after the attack, Goodwin saw the male attacker on a few occasions, sometimes with A., but did not notify the police. Someone told him the two were romantically involved, but Goodwin did not learn their names. A. did not act inappropriately or move away quickly when Goodwin saw her. Sometime around February 2006, Goodwin saw a picture of the male attacker with the attacker’s obituary, and gave it to the police.
Lyons did not get a good enough look at the woman to be able to identify her. He did not identify A. from among six photographs in an array. He testified that she was light-skinned, but did not identify her ethnicity. He did not hear her speaking in Spanish and did not know what kind of clothes she was wearing, how old she was, or how tall she was.
Police reports admitted into evidence indicated that a resident, William Pannell, had told the police that on the night of the incident he heard two crashes and ran to his window. He saw a Hispanic male with a shotgun in his hand, pointing it at someone on the ground and yelling. A Hispanic female was yelling in Spanish. After about three minutes, she ran across the street and he ran after her. The female had long dark hair and was wearing dark pants. However, Pannell told an investigator that he was “not paying attention” to what the female was wearing or looked like, and that she was running around so fast it was hard to get a good look at her. Although Pannell did not understand Spanish, it appeared that she was yelling for the male suspect to leave with her. Pannell and his wife were shown a photo lineup that included A.’s picture, but were unable to identify her.
The juvenile court concluded there was “strong compelling eye-witness evidence,” and that “there’s no conclusion other than that this minor was the one who did it.”
II. Discussion
In an appeal challenging the sufficiency of the evidence to support a juvenile court judgment sustaining the criminal allegations of a petition pursuant to Welfare and Institutions Code section 602, we apply the same standard that is used in reviewing challenges to the sufficiency of the evidence in a criminal case. (In re Ryan N. (2001) 92 Cal.App.4th 1359, 1371.) “Under this standard, the critical inquiry is ‘whether, after reviewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution, any rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt.’ [Citation.] An appellate court ‘must review the whole record in the light most favorable to the judgment below to determine whether it discloses substantial evidence—that is, evidence which is reasonable, credible, and of solid value—such that a reasonable trier of fact could find the defendant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.’ [Citations.]” (Ibid.)
In the case of eyewitness identification of the perpetrator, the identification alone “ ‘is sufficient to sustain the conviction.’ [Citation.] [W]hen the circumstances surrounding the identification and its weight are explored at length at trial, where eyewitness identification is believed by the trier of fact, that determination is binding on the reviewing court.” (In re Gustavo M. (1989) 214 Cal.App.3d 1485, 1497.) “ ‘[T]o entitle a reviewing court to set aside a jury’s finding of guilt the evidence of identity must be so weak as to constitute practically no evidence at all.’ [Citation.]” (People v. Prado (1982) 130 Cal.App.3d 669, 674.) Furthermore, “[a] single witness’s uncorroborated testimony, unless physically impossible or inherently improbable, is sufficient to sustain a conviction [citation]. Purported weaknesses in identification testimony of a single eyewitness are to be evaluated by the jury.” (People v. Elwood (1988) 199 Cal.App.3d 1365, 1372.)
Applying this standard, we conclude there is substantial evidence to support the juvenile court’s finding that A. took part in the assault and robbery. A. points out that Goodwin’s identification is the only link between her and the crime, and argues that the identification is inherently improbable because Goodwin had had three beers, he did not know her, and he was under stress as a result of being threatened and chased by two strangers, crashing his car, being robbed, and having a gun pointed at him. She also argues that Goodwin may have been influenced by seeing her with the male attacker in the weeks after the incident. Finally, she points to the evidence that an independent witness, Pannell, had said the female assailant was Hispanic and spoke in Spanish and that his description of her differed from Goodwin’s.
All of these factors were matters that properly could be—and were—argued to the trier of fact, but they do not make the identification of A. either impossible or inherently improbable. Goodwin testified that he saw A. clearly during the chase and that he was looking at her over the course of at least two or three minutes as they were “face-to-face,” approximately two feet apart, while he was on the ground. In the face of his positive identification, we cannot conclude there is no substantial evidence to support the juvenile court’s finding.
III. Disposition
The order appealed from is affirmed.
We concur: RUVOLO, P. J. REARDON, J.