William A. Jones v. State of Indiana ( 2012 )

Pursuant to Ind. Appellate Rule 65(D), this
Memorandum Decision shall not be FILED
regarded as precedent or cited before any Oct 25 2012, 9:07 am
court except for the purpose of
establishing the defense of res judicata, CLERK
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ATTORNEY FOR APPELLANT: ATTORNEYS FOR APPELLEE:
LEANNA K. WEISSMANN GREGORY F. ZOELLER
Lawrenceburg, Indiana Attorney General of Indiana
IAN MCLEAN
Deputy Attorney General
Indianapolis, Indiana
IN THE
COURT OF APPEALS OF INDIANA
WILLIAM A. JONES, )
)
Appellant-Defendant, )
)
vs. ) No. 40A05-1204-CR-210
)
STATE OF INDIANA, )
)
Appellee-Respondent. )
APPEAL FROM THE JENNINGS SUPERIOR COURT
The Honorable Gary L. Smith, Judge
Cause No. 40D01-1009-FD-446
October 25, 2012
MEMORANDUM DECISION – NOT FOR PUBLICATION
BAKER, Judge
Appellant-defendant William A. Jones appeals his convictions for Operating
While Intoxicated,1 a class D felony, and False Informing,2 a class B misdemeanor,
challenging the sufficiency of the evidence. Specifically, Jones argues that the State
failed to show that he was the driver of a vehicle or that he had supplied any false
information to the police about the driver. Finding the evidence sufficient, we affirm
Jones’s convictions.
FACTS
On August 18, 2010, at approximately 4:00 a.m., Sandy Vance was asleep in her
North Vernon home and woke up to a “crashing noise.” Tr. p. 194-95. Sandy looked out
a window and saw a truck in a ravine just outside her house. She called 911 and her
husband, Barry, saw Jones enter the vehicle, start it, and attempt to back the vehicle out
of the ravine.
A few minutes later, Jennings County Sheriff’s Deputy Tom Webster arrived on
the scene and approached Jones. Deputy Webster noticed that Jones was unsteady on his
feet, smelled of alcoholic beverages, had watery eyes, and was slurring his speech. Jones
claimed that he was “playing ball” with some friends in a nearby field and his friend,
1
Ind. Code § 9-30-5-1(b), -3.
2
Ind. Code § 35-44-2-2. This statute has been repealed and is now codified at Ind. Code § 35-44.1-2-
3(d)(1). The substance of the present version of the statute has not changed from the one under which
Jones was charged. Both versions of the statute provide that
(d) A person who:
(1) gives a false report of the commission of a crime or gives false information in the
official investigation of the commission of a crime, knowing the report or information to
be false. . . commits false informing, a Class B misdemeanor.
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“John Smith,” had been driving the vehicle. Deputy Webster again asked who the driver
was, and Jones responded that it was “John Smitz.” Tr. p. 76. Jones also told Deputy
Webster that his friends “went off that way.” Id.Sergeant Jeff Jones of the Jennings County Sheriff’s Office arrived and also
noticed that Jones smelled of alcohol, had glassy and bloodshot eyes, and was slurring his
speech. Deputy Webster asked Sergeant Jones to stay at the scene while he spoke with
the 911 caller and investigated whether Jones’s friends were in the area.
Deputy Webster interviewed Barry, who told him that Jones appeared to be
driving the vehicle and that no one else was in the area. Barry then gave Deputy Webster
permission to walk around the property to investigate whether Jones’s friends might be
nearby. As Deputy Webster was walking back, Sergeant Jones noticed that Deputy
Webster had made tracks in the morning dew with his footprints. And despite Jones’s
assertion about other individuals being in the area, there were no footprints in the dew
other than those that Deputy Webster had just made. Jones then admitted that he had
been drinking and changed his story several times about who was with him and which
way they had run.
Concluding that Jones was intoxicated, Deputy Webster arrested Jones and
transported him to the jail to administer field sobriety tests. Upon arriving at the jail,
Deputy Webster administered a field sobriety test that Jones failed. Deputy Webster then
administered the datamaster program, which is a machine that measures blood alcohol
content. Jones’s blood alcohol content was .22.
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Back at the scene of the crash, Sergeant Jones took several photographs and
noticed that wet mud had sprayed into the fender area of the vehicle. Sergeant Jones
concluded that this type of mud spatter indicated that someone had attempted to move the
vehicle after impact.
On September 24, 2010, Jones was charged with operating a motor vehicle with an
alcohol concentration equivalent to .15 grams, a class A misdemeanor; operating while
intoxicated, a class C misdemeanor; and false informing, a class A misdemeanor. The
State also filed a separate information alleging that Jones had a conviction in 2006 for
operating while intoxicated within five years preceding the charged offense, making the
operating offense in this case a felony. Following a jury trial that concluded on March 8,
2012, the jury convicted Jones as charged, except for the false informing charge. The
jury found Jones guilty of this charge as a class B misdemeanor. Jones also admitted that
he had a prior conviction in 2006 for operating while intoxicated.
Citing double jeopardy concerns, the trial court vacated all of Jones’s convictions
except for the class D felony operating while intoxicated charge and the false informing
charge. Thereafter, Jones was sentenced to three years on the class D felony charge with
two years suspended. The trial court also imposed a 180-day sentence for false
informing, of which 120 days were suspended to probation. That sentence was ordered to
run concurrently with the sentence for operating while intoxicated. Jones now appeals.
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DISCUSSION AND DECISION
I. Standard of Review
When reviewing a challenge to the sufficiency of the evidence, we do not reweigh
the evidence or reassess the credibility of the witnesses. Bond v. State, 925 N.E.2d 773,
781 (Ind. Ct. App. 2010), trans. denied. We consider only the evidence most favorable to
the judgment and the reasonable inferences drawn therefrom. Id. We will affirm the
conviction if the evidence and those inferences constitute substantial evidence of
probative value to support the verdict. Id. Also, the State’s evidence need not overcome
every reasonable hypothesis of innocence. Lock v. State, 971 N.E.2d 71, 74 (Ind. 2012).
A conviction for operating while intoxicated can be sustained on circumstantial evidence
alone. Dorsett v. State, 921 N.E.2d 529, 531-32 (Ind. Ct. App. 2010).
II. Jones’s Claims
A. Operating While Intoxicated
As noted above, Jones claims that his conviction for this offense must be vacated
because there was no proof that he was the driver of the vehicle. To convict Jones of the
offense as a class D felony, the State was required to prove that on or about August 18,
2010, Jones operated a “vehicle with an alcohol concentration equivalent to at least . . .
0.15 gram of alcohol per . . . 210 liters of the person’s breath,” and that he had a previous
conviction of operating while intoxicated within the last five years. I.C. §§ 9-30-5-1(b);
9-30-5-3.
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In this case, the evidence demonstrated that Deputy Webster spoke with Barry,
who informed him that Jones was the only individual at the truck and Jones had
attempted to drive the vehicle out of the ravine. Tr. p. 77-78, 177. Sandy also testified
that she saw Jones trying to back the truck out of the ditch. Id. at 203.
Jones suggests that the State relied on one set of footprints in the dew as the sole
means of proving its case. Appellant’s Br. p. 9-11. However, it is apparent that the State
relied on the Vances’ testimony that they saw Jones enter the driver’s side of the truck,
start it, and try to drive out of the ravine. Id. at 77-78, 177, 191, 203. These observations
were further corroborated by Sergeant Jones’s observation that the mud he saw on the
fender of the vehicle was consistent with Jones’s attempt to force the truck out of the
ravine. Id. at 48-49.
In light of the evidence that was presented at trial, we find that Jones’s action of
entering the truck, starting it, and attempting to back it out of the ravine was sufficient to
prove that he was the driver. As a result, we decline to set aside Jones’s conviction on
this offense. See Custer v. State, 637 N.E.2d 187, 189 (Ind. Ct. App. 1994) (holding the
evidence sufficient to support a finding that the defendant was driving the vehicle for
purposes of a conviction for driving while intoxicated when he was discovered along the
side of a four-lane highway).
B. False Informing
Jones also argues that his conviction for this offense must be set aside because
“the State did not present reliable evidence that Jones gave [the] police false
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information.” Appellant’s Br. p. 16. To convict Jones of false informing as a class B
misdemeanor, the State was required to prove that Jones falsely reported the commission
of a crime or gave false information in the official investigation of the commission of a
crime while knowing the report or information to be false. I.C. § 35-44-2-2.3
Here, the evidence established that Jones knowingly informed the police officers
that a fictitious individual by the name of either “John Smith” or “John Smitz” drove the
truck into the ravine. Tr. p. 41-42, 55-56, 76-78. A reasonable inference could thus be
drawn that Jones lied to the police about his involvement in the accident and also misled
the officers into believing that another person was involved. Id. at 41-42, 55-56, 76-78,
154.
Jones’s arguments to the contrary are an invitation for us to reweigh the evidence
and credit his self-serving statements. We decline such an invitation and conclude that
the evidence was sufficient to support Jones’s conviction for false informing.
The judgment of the trial court is affirmed.
ROBB, C.J., and BRADFORD, J., concur.
3
As previously noted, this statute is now recodified at Indiana Code section 35-44.1-2-3(d)(1).
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