State v. Geanuracos

Syllabus

Convicted, after a jury trial, of the crimes of burglary in the third degree and larceny in the third degree, the defendant appealed to this court, challenging the sufficiency of the evidence to support the charge of burglary. The defendant was involved in a relationship with V, whom he visited frequently at her home. After the defendant drove V home from a medical appointment, he was in her bedroom with her while she was removing jewelry that she had been wearing. Shortly thereafter, V discovered that some of her jewelry was missing and she filed a police report. When V confronted the defendant, he admitted to stealing her jewelry. Held that the evidence adduced at trial was insufficient to support the defendant's conviction of burglary in the third degree: the state conceded that it failed to prove that the defendant entered or remained unlawfully in V's home; V testified to the contrary that the defendant was allowed in her home only when she or her children were present or with her permission, V did not contend that the defendant had ever entered her home without her permission, and the state did not present any evidence that the defendant had entered her home at any time without her permission; moreover, although the prosecutor argued that the defendant's permission to be in V's home was implicitly revoked when he stole her jewelry, the state did not present any evidence surrounding the actual circumstances of the theft of the jewelry, V did not know exactly when her jewelry was stolen, only that it had been stolen within a few days prior to her discovery that it was missing, and, because the defendant stole V's jewelry without her knowledge, the jury could not reasonably have concluded that he did so in a manner likely to terrorize her. Submitted on briefs January 11—officially released March 23, 2021