Cristhian J. Garcia v. State of Indiana (mem. dec.) , 121 N.E.3d 146 ( 2019 )

MEMORANDUM DECISION
Pursuant to Ind. Appellate Rule 65(D),
this Memorandum Decision shall not be FILED
regarded as precedent or cited before any Jan 30 2019, 9:45 am
court except for the purpose of establishing CLERK
the defense of res judicata, collateral Indiana Supreme Court
Court of Appeals
and Tax Court
estoppel, or the law of the case.
ATTORNEY FOR APPELLANT ATTORNEYS FOR APPELLEE
Melinda K. Jackman-Hanlin Curtis T. Hill, Jr.
Greencastle, Indiana Attorney General of Indiana
Matthew B. MacKenzie
Deputy Attorney General
Indianapolis, Indiana
IN THE
COURT OF APPEALS OF INDIANA
Cristhian J. Garcia, January 30, 2019
Appellant-Defendant, Court of Appeals Case No.
18A-CR-1895
v. Appeal from the Hendricks
Superior Court
State of Indiana, The Honorable Mark A. Smith,
Appellee-Plaintiff. Judge
Trial Court Cause No.
32D04-1708-MR-2
Bailey, Judge.
Court of Appeals of Indiana | Memorandum Decision 18A-CR-1895 | January 30, 2019 Page 1 of 7
Case Summary
[1] Cristhian Garcia (“Garcia”) challenges his convictions, following a jury trial,
for murder, a felony,1 and attempted murder, a Level 1 felony.2 He raises only
one issue on appeal, namely, whether the State presented sufficient evidence to
support his murder and attempted murder convictions.3
[2] We affirm.
Facts and Procedural History
[3] On August 15, 2017, Garcia’s wife, Alicia Canizales Rios (“Rios”), and Jesus
Huesca Moreno (“Moreno”) were shot at a Home Goods warehouse in
Brownsburg. Rios survived her injuries, but Moreno died from his injuries. On
August 17, the State charged Garcia with the murder of Moreno, attempted
murder of Rios, aggravated battery, and a firearm enhancement. At Garica’s
three-day jury trial that began on June 12, 2018, the following evidence was
presented.
[4] In the late evening of August 15, 2017, Garcia argued with Rios in their home
and refused to give Rios her car keys so that she could go to work. Rios called
1
Ind. Code § 35-42-1-1.
2
Id.; I.C. § 35-41-5-1.
3
Garcia does not appeal his firearm enhancement. And, although he purports to appeal his aggravated
battery conviction, the trial court vacated that conviction. App. at 16.
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Moreno, with whom she was romantically involved, and asked him to give her
a ride to work. When Moreno arrived to pick Rios up, Garcia confronted
Moreno about Moreno’s relationship with Rios. Moreno subsequently drove
Rios to her place of employment, the Home Goods warehouse in Brownsburg.
In the meantime, Garcia contacted Julio Bonilla (“Bonilla”) who lived with
Garcia and Rios, and asked Bonilla to give him a ride to Rios’ place of
employment. Bonilla did so, and GPS coordinates obtained from Garcia’s
cellular phone confirmed that he arrived at the Home Goods warehouse at 9:57
p.m. that same day.
[5] When Rios and Moreno arrived at the Home Goods warehouse and parked
behind it, Rios noticed Bonilla’s vehicle parked there as well. Rios saw Garcia
exit Bonilla’s vehicle with a gun in his hand and approach Moreno and Rios.
Another Home Goods employee, Irahi Ruiz (“Ruiz”), was also parked in the
same area at that time and also saw Garcia exit the vehicle with a gun and
approach Moreno and Rios. Rios and Ruiz then saw Garcia shoot Moreno.
Rios, Ruiz and Bonilla all also saw Garcia then shoot Rios. Garcia then ran
back to Bonilla’s vehicle, held his gun up to Bonilla’s head, and demanded that
Bonilla drive to Garcia’s father’s house. The GPS tracking location on Garcia’s
cellular phone indicated that Garcia left the warehouse location at 10:08 p.m.
and arrived at his father’s home at 10:42 p.m.
[6] When Bonilla and Garcia arrived at Garcia’s father’s home, Garcia told Bonilla
to back into the driveway and remove the license plate from the vehicle they
had driven. Once inside the home, Garcia told his father and brother that he
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shot Rios, and when local news began to cover the shooting, Garcia stated that
he shot Rios’s “lover.” Tr. Vol. III at 46-47. Garcia told his brother that he hid
the revolver in the basement of the house inside a container with bleach, and
Garcia repeatedly told Bonilla not to say anything about what he had
witnessed.
[7] The following morning, after a night during which law enforcement cordoned
off the block where Garcia and Bonilla lived, Garcia and Bonilla ran out the
back door of their house, got into a silver Infiniti, and led police on a high-speed
chase before the vehicle was stopped and Garcia was arrested. Prior to the
arrest, Garcia again instructed Bonilla not to say anything to the police.
[8] After obtaining information from Bonilla about the crime and Garcia’s plan to
hide the murder weapon in the basement, law enforcement officers executed a
search warrant and discovered a nickel-plated Taurus .38 special revolver in a
bucket of bleach in the basement crawlspace of Garcia’s father’s house.
[9] The jury found Garcia guilty as charged. At sentencing, the trial court vacated
the aggravated battery conviction. The court sentenced Garcia to sixty years for
his murder conviction enhanced by ten years for the firearm enhancement, and
thirty years for his conviction for attempted murder, with the sentences to be
served consecutively. This appeal ensued.
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Discussion and Decision
[10] Garcia challenges the sufficiency of the evidence to support his convictions for
murder and attempted murder. Our standard of review for the sufficiency of
the evidence is well-settled:
When reviewing the sufficiency of the evidence needed to
support a criminal conviction, we neither reweigh evidence nor
judge witness credibility. Bailey v. State, 907 N.E.2d 1003, 1005
(Ind. 2009). “We consider only the evidence supporting the
judgment and any reasonable inferences that can be drawn from
such evidence.” Id. We will affirm if there is substantial
evidence of probative value such that a reasonable trier of fact
could have concluded the defendant was guilty beyond a
reasonable doubt. Id.Clemons v. State, 996 N.E.2d 1282, 1285 (Ind. Ct. App. 2013), trans. denied.
Moreover, “[a] conviction may be based on circumstantial evidence alone so
long as there are reasonable inferences enabling the factfinder to find the
defendant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.” Lawrence v. State, 959 N.E.2d
385, 388 (Ind. Ct. App. 2012) (citation omitted), trans. denied. And a conviction
may be sustained on only the uncorroborated testimony of a single witness.
Bailey v. State, 979 N.E.2d 133, 135 (Ind. 2012).
[11] To support Garcia’s conviction of murder, the State was required to show that
Garcia (1) knowingly or intentionally (2) killed (3) Moreno. I.C. § 35-42-1-1(1).
To support Garcia’s conviction of attempted murder, the State was required to
show that Garcia (1) acting with the intent to kill (2) engaged in conduct
constituting a substantial step toward the commission of the crime of murder.
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See, e.g., Osborne v. State, 754 N.E.2d 916, 924 (Ind. 2001). The requisite intent
to kill “may be inferred from the deliberate use of a deadly weapon in a manner
likely to cause death or serious injury.” Henley v. State, 881 N.E.2d 639, 652
(Ind. 2008).
[12] The State provided evidence that three eyewitnesses—Rios, Ruiz, and
Bonilla—saw Garcia shoot Moreno, who eventually died from his wounds.
The State also presented evidence that two eye-witnesses—Rios and Ruiz—saw
Garcia shoot Rios. That evidence alone is sufficient to support Garcia’s murder
and attempted murder convictions. See Green v. State, 756 N.E.2d 496, 497 (Ind.
2001) (“The testimony of a single eyewitness to a crime is sufficient to sustain a
murder conviction.”); King v. State, 799 N.E.2d 42, 46 (Ind. Ct. App. 2003)
(holding the victims’ unequivocal identifications of defendant as the person
who shot them were sufficient to support convictions for attempted murder),
trans. denied.
[13] However, the eyewitness testimony was bolstered by: evidence that Bonilla
heard Garcia say that he shot Rios and Rios’s “lover,” Tr. Vol. III at 47;
evidence that Bonilla heard Garcia tell his brother that Garcia had put the gun
in the basement of Garcia’s father’s house in a bucket with bleach, and police
later found the gun in that house in a bucket of bleach, id. at 47-48, 62-63, 74-
76, 83; State’s Ex. 95-97; and GPS evidence that placed Garcia at the scene of
the crime at the time of the shootings, Tr. Vol. III at 27-32.
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[14] There was sufficient evidence to support Garcia’s convictions for murder and
attempted murder. Garcia’s contentions to the contrary are simply requests that
we reweigh the evidence, which we cannot do. Clemons, 996 N.E.2d at 1285.
[15] Affirmed.
Bradford, J., and Brown, J., concur.
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