State v. Glass

214 Conn.App. 132

279 A.3d 203

STATE of Connecticut

v.Edwin Ronald GLASS

AC 43092

Appellate Court of Connecticut.

Argued November 10, 2021

Officially released August 2, 2022

John R. Weikart, assigned counsel, with whom was Emily Graner Sexton, assigned counsel, for the appellant (defendant).

Melissa L. Streeto, senior assistant state's attorney, with whom, on the brief, were Sharmese L. Walcott, state's attorney, and Richard J. Rubino, senior assistant state's attorney, for the appellee (state).

Bright, C. J., and Alvord and Seeley, Js.^*

ALVORD, J.

The defendant, Edwin Ronald Glass, appeals from the judgment of conviction, rendered after a jury trial, of burglary in the first degree in violation of General Statutes § 53a-101 (a) (3), and robbery in the first degree in violation of General Statutes § 53a-134 (a) (3).¹ On appeal, the defendant claims that there was insufficient evidence to establish his identity as the person who committed the burglary and robbery.² We agree and, accordingly, reverse the judgment of the trial court.

The jury was presented with evidence of the following facts. On the evening of September 4, 2016, F³ was alone at her home on Ferncrest Drive in East Hartford. Although her son, S, lived with her, he was away for the weekend. At about 8 p.m., F remembered that she had left a bag in her car from a shopping trip earlier that day. She went outside to retrieve the bag and saw a person dressed in all black walking in front of her driveway. She felt uneasy, went back into her house, and locked all the windows and doors on the first floor. She placed her car keys on the end table by the couch in the living room.

Around 10:30 p.m., while F was watching television in the living room, she heard a noise upstairs, which she thought was her cat. After hearing the noise two more times, she thought her cat was stuck behind a door and went upstairs to investigate. She peeked into her bedroom, went into S's room and her spare bedroom, and then opened the door to her "junk room."⁴ At that time, an intruder came out from behind the door. F described him as a black man, in his late twenties or early thirties, wearing all black clothing, including pants, a shirt, sneakers, and a baseball cap, and about F's height or a little bit taller.⁵ The intruder grabbed her, and the two wrestled to the ground while she tried to get away. The intruder pushed her into the spare bedroom as they continued to wrestle. F had a pen in her hand, and she attempted to jab the intruder with the pen.⁶ F screamed, and the intruder told her not to scream and put a blanket over her head. He told her he had a knife and poked it into her leg. When she tried to grab "something," the intruder told her that she did not want to cut herself, and she let go. He then tied her hands behind her back using a soft cloth.

During the struggle, F smelled a strong odor of latex.⁷ She was not able to see the intruder's face because he told her not to look at him and he kept twisting her body so that he was behind her. At trial, F testified that she could not identify the intruder who robbed her. F also testified that she did not recognize the defendant and that she never had allowed him into her home.

The intruder pushed F into her bedroom and face forward down onto her bed. At that time, he saw her purse on the dresser and asked whether there was money in it. When she replied that there was no money in it, he accused her of lying. When he grabbed the purse, the strap got looped around her neck and she feared she was "gone." He then removed it from her neck and looked in the purse. F told him that there was money in another purse that was in the living room downstairs. He then pulled her by the hair and led her down the stairs. He pushed her face first onto the couch and dumped the contents of the second purse onto the couch. The intruder then told F that he was going to take her upstairs and "wash [her] down." He pushed her back up the stairs, all the while keeping her in front of him, and told her to get into the shower. He then washed her with a washcloth, untied her hands, and told her not to move. After he went into and out of different rooms, he came back and told her: "Listen to me, I know where you live; don't call the cops; if I see them in the area I will come back and I will kill you."

F heard the intruder go down the stairs and the front door open and close. She did not hear a vehicle start. The intruder took $400 from F's wallet, an orange vest from a teddy bear that was located in the spare bedroom, a baseball cap, a blanket, and the cloth, which F later testified was a T-shirt, that he had used to tie her hands. She waited four or five minutes and called the police at 11:02 p.m.

Officer Robert Jones of the East Hartford Police Department responded to F's home. He observed that other officers were present on the street, the front door to the home was open, F was standing in the doorway, and a set of keys was lying on the front steps. F identified the keys as belonging to her and stated that she had placed them on the end table earlier in the evening. Officer Jones went into the home and met with F, who told him what happened and gave him a description of the intruder. Officer Jones walked with F through the house to make sure there was no one else in the home. While walking through F's bedroom, Officer Jones observed a piece of latex on the floor next to the bed.

Officer Todd Mona, together with Casus, his tracking canine, also responded to F's home. He was the first or second officer to arrive. Officer Mona brought Casus to the front steps to get the intruder's scent from F's keys that the police believed had been dropped there by the intruder. He subsequently gave Casus a command to track. Casus began tracking in a southerly direction across the front yard and continued south. He stopped in front of 58 Ferncrest Drive and "downed on"⁸ a baseball cap and T-shirt, which Officer Mona described as a white tank top.⁹ Officer Mona transmitted via radio a request for an officer to stand beside the evidence to preserve it. When Officer Jared Richards arrived and took control of the area, Officer Mona and Casus continued tracking across front yards in a southerly direction, to the end of Ferncrest Drive where it intersects with Woodycrest Drive.¹⁰ Casus then tracked north on Woodycrest Drive, tracking by the defendant's house¹¹ at 31 Woodycrest Drive, and stopping a couple of houses north of the defendant's house, at 21 Woodycrest Drive. Casus took Officer Mona up to a garage window at 21 Woodycrest Drive. North of 21 Woodycrest Drive, Casus gave Officer Mona cues that the trail was no longer there, and Officer Mona ended the track. The entire track, which covered about fourteen houses, took approximately one minute, as it was a strong trail and they were moving at "almost a full sprint."

Officer Mona and Casus then walked back in a southerly direction on Woodycrest Drive, where they encountered the defendant talking with one or two other officers.¹² At that time, Casus was no longer tracking and he did not alert to the defendant. Officer Mona spoke with the defendant for a "brief minute." The defendant stated that he lived with his mother at 31 Woodycrest Drive, had just left his house, and was walking to his friend's house. Officer Mona placed his leather gloved hand on the defendant, over his clothing. Officer Mona stated that he appeared to be breathing normally and that his heartbeat felt normal and was not elevated. Officer Mona believed that the defendant met the description of the intruder in terms of his height and weight, although he was wearing clothing that did not match the clothing described by F. Officer Mona did not think he relayed to the other officers that the defendant said he was at home and that someone should go speak to his mother, as his function was handling his canine and he needed to return to the items to which Casus had alerted, to preserve the chain of evidence.

Detective Robert Zulick also was involved in the investigation. He responded to Ferncrest Drive and photographed and collected the baseball cap, orange teddy bear vest, and T-shirt. He then went to F's house, photographed the exterior of her house, and conducted a walk-through of the interior. Detective Zulick photographed and collected the piece of latex from the floor of F's bedroom, the washcloth, and the pieces of the pen with which she attempted to jab the intruder.¹³

Detective Donald Loehr was assigned to the investigation. A couple of days following the crime, Detective Loehr conducted a canvass of the neighborhood. He spoke with Tandra Denson, the defendant's mother, inside her home and also in the driveway. While speaking with Denson, Detective Loehr noticed that the defendant was watching the conversation from the front door. Denson told Detective Loehr that, on the night of the crime, she was home, she noticed flashlights outside the windows, and the defendant was coming out of the bathroom as she was looking out the window.

One or two days after the robbery, F noticed bruises, rug burns, and cuts on her body, and Detectives Christina Johnston and Zulick returned to her home to photograph them. Detective Zulick also took additional photographs of what was believed to be the point of entry to the home, where a screen in the window of the "junk room" on the second floor had been slit open. At trial, F testified that the window was unlocked.

The piece of latex was sent to the state forensics laboratory (laboratory), along with a buccal swab¹⁴ taken from F. Subsequently, the police received notice that the DNA sample from the piece of latex was associated with the defendant by way of a "hit off a database." Detective Loehr answered yes when asked during cross-examination if the identification of the defendant by the DNA report ended the case as far as he was concerned. A buccal swab subsequently was taken from the defendant. Along with the buccal...