Solomon v. The State

Branch, Judge.On appeal from his conviction for burglary, J. D. Solomon, Jr., asserts that the evidence was insufficient to support his conviction and that counsel was therefore ineffective when he failed to move for a directed verdict. We find that the evidence was sufficient to sustain his conviction, but that the trial court erred when it sentenced him under the current rather than the former version of the burglary statute, OCGA § 16-7-1. Although we therefore affirm the jury’s verdict, we vacate Solomon’s conviction and remand for entry of conviction and resentencing under the former OCGA § 16-7-1.

“On appeal from a criminal conviction, we view the evidence in the light most favorable to the verdict, with the defendant no longer enjoying a presumption of innocence.” Reese v. State, 270 Ga. App. 522, 523 (607 SE2d 165) (2004) (citation omitted). We neither weigh the evidence nor judge the credibility of witnesses, but determine only whether, after viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution, “any rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt.” Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U. S. 307, 319 (III) (B) (99 SCt 2781, 61 LE2d 560) (1979) (citation omitted).So viewed, the record shows that at 11:36 p.m. on the evening of September 4, 2011, an officer with the Warner Robins police department received a call that an alarm had been activated at a local church. Dispatch advised that the tripped alarm was located on the door of a storage shed, which the responding officer knew to be located on the western edge of the property. The officer and a trainee arrived at the scene two minutes later, parked their patrol car on the street west of the church, cut off the car’s lights, and approached the property from the south on foot. During a check of the space between two classroom trailers on the property, the officer saw Solomon folding up a metal ladder as he stood directly under a window of one of the trailers. The officer also saw a damaged window screen on the ground beside Solomon.