Armando Guerrero Mora v. State of Indiana (mem. dec.) ( 2018 )

MEMORANDUM DECISION
Pursuant to Ind. Appellate Rule 65(D),
this Memorandum Decision shall not be FILED
regarded as precedent or cited before any Oct 26 2018, 10:29 am
court except for the purpose of establishing
CLERK
the defense of res judicata, collateral Indiana Supreme Court
Court of Appeals
estoppel, or the law of the case. and Tax Court
ATTORNEY FOR APPELLANT ATTORNEYS FOR APPELLEE
Darren Bedwell Curtis T. Hill, Jr.
Marion County Public Defender Attorney General of Indiana
Indianapolis, Indiana
Ellen H. Meilaender
Supervising Deputy Attorney
General
Indianapolis, Indiana
IN THE
COURT OF APPEALS OF INDIANA
Armando Guerrero Mora, October 26, 2018
Appellant-Defendant, Court of Appeals Case No.
18A-CR-938
v. Appeal from the Marion Superior
Court
State of Indiana, The Honorable Jeffrey L. Marchal,
Appellee-Plaintiff. Magistrate
Trial Court Cause No.
49G06-1801-F5-1670
Robb, Judge.
Court of Appeals of Indiana | Memorandum Decision 18A-CR-938 | October 26, 2018 Page 1 of 8
Case Summary and Issue
[1] Following a bench trial, Armando Mora was convicted of operating a vehicle
after license forfeited for life, a Level 5 felony, and auto theft, a Level 6 felony.
Mora now appeals, presenting only one issue for our review: whether the State
presented sufficient evidence to support his conviction of auto theft.
Concluding the State presented sufficient evidence to support his conviction of
auto theft, we affirm.
Facts and Procedural History
[2] Around 9:30 a.m. on January 10, 2018, Adrian Lopez went outside his home to
start his 2009 Chrysler Sebring to allow it to warm up while he returned inside
to gather his children and dress them in their winter attire. Alerted by his
daughter, Lopez returned outside and saw his vehicle being driven away by a
man wearing a “hoodie.” Transcript, Volume II at 14. Within five or ten
minutes, Lopez called 911 and reported that his vehicle had been stolen.
[3] Around 2:00 p.m. the same day, Officer Aaron Mauk of the Indianapolis
Metropolitan Police Department was on routine patrol when he noticed a
vehicle parked facing northbound. Officer Mauk performed a records check of
the vehicle and noticed that the license plate did not match the vehicle. Officer
Mauk then exited his vehicle and conducted a records check of the VIN number
located on the vehicle’s windshield and the vehicle returned as recently stolen.
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Officer Mauk radioed for additional units and Officer Jaidion Broader arrived
soon thereafter and assisted Officer Mauk in surveilling the area.
[4] Approximately ten minutes later, around 2:15 p.m., Mora entered the vehicle’s
driver’s seat, joined by Francisco Deloya in the passenger seat, and drove away.
Officers followed the vehicle and attempted to initiate a traffic stop. Rather
than pulling over, however, the vehicle proceeded into a nearby driveway
where the two occupants exited the vehicle. The officers then:
[gave] loud verbal commands to both occupants to stop. [Mora]
failed to obey those orders and began running around the car to
the front door of the house and trying to get in the door. The
passenger of the vehicle complied and put his hands in the air
and got on his stomach. Officer Broader then apprehended
[Mora] who was still attempting to get inside the door.
Id. at 29.
[5] Mora was dressed in a hoodie, identified himself as “Alfredo Gutierrez,” and
provided a false date of birth. Id. at 45, 61. After discovering his true identify,
officers learned Mora was an habitual traffic violator whose driving privileges
had been suspended for life. An inspection of the vehicle revealed Lopez’s
passport and his children’s car seats were missing, and his license plate had
been replaced with one belonging to another vehicle.
[6] The State charged Mora with operating a vehicle after license forfeited for life, a
Level 5 felony, and auto theft, a Level 6 felony. Mora waived his right to a jury
trial and a bench trial was conducted on March 7, 2018. There, following the
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State’s presentation of evidence, Mora testified that he was already at the house
where he was arrested and had offered two individuals whom he did not know
twenty dollars to take him home to his wife and children. In Mora’s version of
events, a third individual named “Jose” was driving the vehicle, and Mora sat
in the backseat of the vehicle on the driver’s side. When the vehicle stopped in
the driveway, Jose “walked towards an alley[,]” and Mora exited the vehicle to
return to the house to pick up his jacket, which he realized he had left there. Id.
at 56. Mora further testified that he had no knowledge that the vehicle was
stolen, he never drove the vehicle, and that he had provided officers with a false
name and date of birth in order to avoid arrest on an active warrant.
[7] The trial court found the testimony of the State’s witnesses to be credible but
did “not find [Mora]’s testimony to be credible.” Id. at 66. The trial court
found Mora guilty as charged and imposed a 545-day sentence on the
conviction of operating a vehicle after license forfeited for life and a one-year
sentence on the conviction of auto theft, to be served concurrently. Mora now
appeals.
Discussion and Decision
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I. Standard of Review
[8] Mora argues that State failed to present sufficient evidence to support his
conviction of auto theft. 1 Our standard of review for sufficiency of the evidence
claims is well settled:
When the sufficiency of the evidence to support a conviction is
challenged, we neither reweigh the evidence nor judge the
credibility of the witnesses, and we affirm if there is substantial
evidence of probative value supporting each element of the crime
from which a reasonable trier of fact could have found the
defendant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. It is the job of the
fact-finder to determine whether the evidence in a particular case
sufficiently proves each element of an offense, and we consider
conflicting evidence most favorably to the trial court’s ruling.
Wright v. State, 828 N.E.2d 904, 905-06 (Ind. 2005) (internal citations and
quotation omitted).
II. Sufficiency of the Evidence
[9] Mora was convicted of auto theft, a Level 6 felony. On the date of Mora’s
offense, January 10, 2018,2 Indiana Code section 35-43-4-2.5 provided, in
relevant part:
1
Mora does not challenge the sufficiency of the evidence supporting his conviction for operating a vehicle
after license forfeited for life, a Level 5 felony.
2
Indiana Code section 35-43-4-2.5 was repealed by our legislature effective July 1, 2018.
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b) A person who knowingly or intentionally exerts unauthorized
control over the motor vehicle of another person, with intent to
deprive the owner of:
(1) the vehicle’s value or use; or
(2) a component part (as defined in IC 9-13-2-34) of the
vehicle;
commits auto theft, a Level 6 felony.
[10] Here, the State presented the following evidence: Lopez reported his vehicle
stolen around 10:00 a.m. on January 10, 2018, and Mora was observed by
officers entering the same vehicle around 2:30 p.m., around four and one-half
hours later. Officer Mauk observed Mora enter the driver’s seat of the vehicle
and Francisco Deloya enter the passenger seat. Under continued surveillance,
officers attempted to conduct a traffic stop but the vehicle, still driven by Mora,
proceeded to pull into a driveway where Mora exited the vehicle, disregarded
officers’ “loud verbal commands[,]” and attempted to enter the home. Tr., Vol.
II at 29. A false license plate had been placed on the vehicle and Lopez’s
personal items had been removed. Lopez’s initial police report indicated that a
male wearing a hoodie had stolen his vehicle and Mora was a male wearing a
hoodie at the time of his arrest, four and one-half hours later. Mora provided a
false name and date of birth to officers and later testified to a version of events
which materially conflicted with Officer Mauk’s testimony and which the trial
court expressly found was not credible.
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[11] We conclude the State presented substantial evidence of probative value
supporting each element of the crime from which the trial court, acting as the
finder of fact, could have found Mora guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.
Wright, 828 N.E.2d at 906. First and foremost, the State presented evidence
Mora was in recent possession of Lopez’s vehicle as he was arrested exiting the
vehicle only four and one-half hours after it was stolen. Generally, “[t]he
unexplained possession of stolen property may be sufficient to support a
conviction for theft, but the inference is permitted only where the property was
‘recently stolen.’” Thacker v. State, 62 N.E.3d 1250, 1251-52 (Ind. Ct. App.
2016) (citation omitted). Four and one-half hours falls well within the
parameters of “recent” for the purposes of assessing whether property was
recently stolen. See Gibson v. State, 533 N.E.2d 187, 189 (Ind. Ct. App. 1989)
(concluding “‘recent’ is a lapse of time of less than twenty-four (24) hours”).
Moreover, this is a particularly brief period of time in light of the type of
property at issue because vehicles are difficult and time-consuming to sell and
are not items frequently given away to strangers or acquaintances. See Williams
v. State, 714 N.E.2d 671, 673 (Ind. Ct. App. 1999) (stating that to determine
whether a theft was “recent,” we also consider the “character of the goods, such
as whether they are readily salable and easily portable or difficult to dispose of
and cumbersome”) (internal quotations omitted).
[12] Although Mora’s recent possession of a stolen vehicle may have been sufficient
to support his conviction in and of itself, the State also presented additional
circumstantial evidence of his guilt. Mora was arrested dressed in a hoodie just
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four and one-half hours after Lopez had reported his vehicle stolen by a man in
a hoodie. A false license plate had been placed on the vehicle and items
belonging to Lopez had been removed, giving rise to an inference that Mora
was attempting to hinder identification of the vehicle. Mora also ignored
officers’ attempts to initiate a traffic stop, proceeded to pull into a driveway and
again ignored officers’ “loud verbal commands” when he attempted to enter the
home. Tr., Vol. II at 29. “Flight and related conduct may be considered by a
[finder of fact] in determining a defendant’s guilt.” Dill v. State, 741 N.E.2d
1230, 1232 (Ind. 2001). And finally, Mora lied about his identity to officers,
giving them both a false name and date of birth. See Bennett v. State, 883 N.E.2d
888, 892 (Ind. Ct. App. 2008) (stating “assumption of false identity [is]
indicative of a guilty mind”), trans. denied. Thus, taken together, we conclude
the State’s evidence was sufficient to support Mora’s conviction of auto theft.
Conclusion
[13] The State presented sufficient evidence to support Mora’s conviction of auto
theft. Accordingly, we affirm Mora’s conviction.
[14] Affirmed.
Baker, J., and May, J., concur.
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