Opinion
NOT TO BE PUBLISHED
Superior Court County of Los Angeles Kathryne A. Stoltz, Judge Super. Ct. No. LA052450
William J. Capriola, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant.
Edmund G. Brown, Jr., Attorney General, Dane R. Gillette, Chief Assistant Attorney General, Pamela C. Hamanaka, Senior Assistant Attorney General, Stephanie C. Brenan, Yun K. Lee, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.
PERREN, J.
Mark Antonio Williams appeals the judgment following his conviction for first degree residential burglary. (Pen. Code, § 459.) He admitted a prior serious felony conviction pursuant to section 667, subdivision (a)(1) and the three strikes law (§§ 667, subds. (b)-(i), 1170.12, subds. (a)-(d)), and was sentenced to 13 years in prison. The sentence consisted of the four-year midterm for burglary, doubled as a second strike, and five years for the section 667, subdivision (a)(1) enhancement. Williams claims there was insufficient evidence to support the conviction. We affirm.
All statutory references are to the Penal Code.
FACTS
Victims Diana and Henry Sitz lived in a house with an attached garage, and surrounded by a brick wall. The house had a front and side door and a door that led from the garage into the back yard. A Lexus car was parked in the driveway. It was locked and covered with a car cover. The keys to the Lexis were on a key holder in the kitchen of the house. Because the car was rarely used, its battery had been disconnected.
At noon, the victims locked the two doors to the house and went to an appointment. They failed to lock the door from the garage to the backyard.
Three to three and one-half hours later, they returned home to find the side door to the house was open, garbage cans had been moved, and the doors to the Lexis were open and the cover removed. Henry Sitz flagged down a police unit on the street, and Diana Sitz went inside the house to check on her pets and found the house had been ransacked. It was discovered that jewelry had been stolen, and a safe in the bedroom was damaged in a manner that suggested someone had tried to pry it open. Henry Sitz's hammer and crowbar that were stored in the garage were found in the room with the safe. The keys to the Lexis were found in the trunk of the vehicle. Police surmised that someone had left the keys there after attempting to steal the car.
The Sitz's owned several cats, and two of Williams' fingerprints were found on a ceramic food bowl used by their cat named Cujo. Although normally kept in the garage, the food bowl was found in the backyard after the burglary. Diana Sitz washed the bowl every other day with soapy water and disinfectant, and two or three times a week washed it in a dishwasher. Although under some circumstances, fingerprints can last for months or years, a fingerprint specialist testified that fingerprints on the food bowl would not have survived washing with soapy water or in a dishwasher.
DISCUSSION
Williams contends that there was insufficient evidence to support his conviction because the only evidence linking him to the burglary was his fingerprints on Cujo's food bowl. He concedes that the jury could reasonably infer he handled the bowl during the three to three and one-half hour period when the burglary was committed but, because the bowl was kept in the garage and found in the backyard, it was mere speculation that Williams entered the house. We disagree, and conclude that substantial evidence supports the judgment.
In considering a substantial evidence claim, we review the entire record in the light most favorable to the judgment to determine whether it discloses evidence which is reasonable, credible, and of solid value sufficient for a reasonable trier of fact to find the defendant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. (People v. Prince (2007) 40 Cal.4th 1179, 1251.) "We presume '"in support of the judgment the existence of every fact the trier could reasonably deduce from the evidence.". . .'" (Ibid.) The same standard of review applies to cases in which the prosecution relies primarily on circumstantial evidence and, if the circumstances reasonably justify the jury's findings, the judgment may not be reversed simply because the circumstances might also reasonably be reconciled with a contrary finding. (People v. Guerra (2006) 37 Cal.4th 1067, 1129.)
It is well established that, other than DNA, fingerprints are the strongest evidence of identity and ordinarily are sufficient by themselves to identify the perpetrator of a crime. (People v. Andrews (1989) 49 Cal.3d 200, 211, overruled on other grounds in People v. Trevino (2001) 26 Cal.4th 237.) In People v. Figueroa (1992) 2 Cal.App.4th 1584, 1586-1587, the court concluded that fingerprints found on a window which was the point of entry for the burglar was sufficient for a conviction. Although the defendant had visited the apartment before the burglary, there was no evidence of his presence between a cleaning of the window and the burglary. (Id., at p. 1588.) In People v. Preciado (1991) 233 Cal.App.3d 1244, 1246-1247, the court concluded that a defendant's fingerprints on a box in a burgled apartment was sufficient for a conviction because the victim did not know the defendant, and the box had never left the home.
Here, the jury could reasonably infer that Williams was the burglar or one of the burglars based on evidence that he was in the garage, the garage was entered by the burglar before entry into the house, and tools from the garage were taken into the house for purposes of committing theft.
Williams relies on Mikes v. Borg (9th Cir. 1991) 947 F.2d 353, a murder case, where the Ninth Circuit reversed a conviction based solely on the presence of defendant's fingerprints on a turnstile post which was the murder weapon. The court recognized that fingerprint evidence alone may support a conviction under certain circumstances, but concluded that, "in fingerprint-only cases in which the prosecution's theory is based on the premise that the defendant handled certain objects while committing the crime in question, the record must contain sufficient evidence from which the trier of fact could reasonably infer that the fingerprints were in fact impressed at that time and not at some earlier date. [Citations.] In order to meet this standard the prosecution must present evidence sufficient to permit the jury to conclude that the objects on which the fingerprints appear were inaccessible to the defendant prior to the time of the commission of the crime." (Id., at pp. 356-357, fn. omitted.) In Mikes, the court concluded that the defendant's fingerprints may have been placed on the turnstile post before it had been purchased by the victim a few months before the murder. (Id., at p. 359.)
As an opinion of an intermediate federal appellate court, Mikes is not binding authority on California courts. (Rohr Aircraft Corp. v. San Diego County (1959) 51 Cal.2d 759, 764-765.) In addition, other Ninth Circuit cases have declined to strictly follow Mikes. (Schell v. Witek (9th Cir. 2000) 218 F.3d 1017, 1022-1023; Taylor v. Stainer (9th Cir. 1994) 31 F.3d 907, 909-910.)
Furthermore, the rationale of Mikes actually supports the conviction of Williams. Here, there was sufficient evidence for the jury to "reasonably infer that the fingerprints were in fact impressed at [the time of the offense] and not at some earlier date," and that "the objects on which the fingerprints appear were inaccessible to the defendant prior to the time of the commission of the crime." (Mikes v. Borg, supra, 947 F.2d at pp. 356-357.)
Here, the evidence shows that Cujo's food bowl was inaccessible to the burglar prior to the time of the burglary and that Williams placed his fingerprints on the bowl during the relatively short period in which the burglary occurred. This evidence supports the inference, and constitutes substantial evidence, that Williams committed the burglary. There is no other reasonable explanation for the presence of the fingerprints. Williams would have us believe that he handled the food bowl when he and the thief serendipitously and separately entered the garage at approximately the same time. Such speculation would offend logic as well as Cujo's palate.
The judgment is affirmed.
We concur: GILBERT, P.J., COFFEE, J.