State v. Johnson

Citations

• 2020 Ohio 5255

Syllabus

Manifest weight of the evidence suggestive photo array gruesome photographs costs of prosecution. It is the province of the jury to accept or reject any part of a witness' testimony. Conviction is not against the manifest weight of the evidence where a witness identifies the perpetrator of a crime depicted in surveillance video on the night of a crime and confirms in court that the defendant is that person, but fails to conclusively identify the defendant in a photo array presented the day after the crime. Evidence that is unrelated to guilt, regardless of whether the jury found it believable does not constitute evidence weighing heavily against conviction and does not cause a conviction to be against the manifest weight of the evidence. Moreover, a conviction is not against the manifest weight of the evidence merely because the state did not present conclusive physical evidence of guilt. A trial court does not err by denying a motion to suppress a photo array where a defendant fails to establish that the photo array was unnecessarily suggestive. A photo array is not unnecessarily suggestive if the other people shown along with the defendant look relatively similar in age, features, skin tone, facial hair, dress and photo background. A defendant does not establish plain error in the admission of photographic evidence pursuant to Evid.R. 403 where he fails to identify any specific photograph as violative of the rule or articulate a basis by which to draw such a conclusion. A defendant fails to establish that the trial court abused its discretion in denying his motion to waive the imposition of the cost of prosecution where the argument, asserted for the first time on appeal consists of mere speculation that is not supported by the record.