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FOR IMMEDIATE NEWS RELEASE NEWS RELEASE # 15 FROM: CLERK OF SUPREME COURT OF LOUISIANA The Opinions handed down on the 26th day of February, 2008, are as follows:

PER CURIAM: 2007-K -0219 STATE OF LOUISIANA v. RANCE DUNBAR (Parish of Orleans) (Unauthorized Use of a Motor Vehicle - Third Felony Offender) Accordingly, the decision of the court of appeal is reversed and this case is remanded for consideration of the defendant's remaining assignments of error pretermitted on original appeal. DECISION OF COURT OF APPEAL REVERSED; CASE REMANDED.

2/26/08

SUPREME COURT OF LOUISIANA

No. 07-K-0219 STATE OF LOUISIANA v. RANCE DUNBAR

On Writ of Certiorari to the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeal

PER CURIAM: The state charged defendant by bill of information with unauthorized use of a motor vehicle in violation of La. R.S. 14:68.4. A six-person jury found him guilty as charged. The trial court subsequently adjudicated defendant a third felony offender for purposes of La. R.S. 15:529.1 and sentenced him to 12 years imprisonment at hard labor. On appeal, the Fourth Circuit reversed defendant's conviction and sentence, finding that the state failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the vehicle subject to the unauthorized use belonged to the person specifically named in the bill of information charging the offense. State v. Dunbar, 06-0130 (La. App. 4th Cir. 1/10/07), 950 So.2d 872. We granted the state's application to consider the correctness of that decision and now reverse. The evidence at trial revealed that at approximately 4:25 a.m. on February 16, 2005, New Orleans Police Officers Hurst and Singleton, conducting a routine patrol, sat in their unit parked in the median on Claiborne Avenue at State Street. The officers noticed a white Acura traveling on Claiborne with its headlights off.

The vehicle was occupied by two men, and its windows were down despite the cold. Officer Hurst waved to the driver as a signal to pull over. Hurst intended only to caution the driver that his lights were off and not to cite him with any traffic violation. However, when the Acura pulled abreast of the officers, the occupants gave the officers a startled look and the driver gunned the car, turning from Claiborne onto Octavia Street. The officers gave chase as Singleton ran the Acura's plate number through his computer and determined that the vehicle had been reported stolen on the preceding day. The Acura turned from Octavia onto McKenna Street with the officers in close pursuit. The vehicle then stopped in the middle of McKenna, and the driver and his passenger bolted from the car, its engine still running, crossing in front of it as they fled in different directions into the neighborhood. With the assistance of a canine unit, back-up officers called to the scene found defendant in the area and placed him under arrest. Both Hurst and Singleton positively identified defendant as the driver of the car. According to both officers, they too had their windows rolled down despite the cold weather, and they had an unobstructed view of the Acura's driver from only a few feet away when the vehicle pulled abreast of their patrol unit. Although the car had been reported stolen, the officers acknowledged that keys were in the ignition, the steering column did not appear to have been defeated, and the vehicle otherwise showed no signs of forced entry. Officer Singleton testified at trial that he had learned the name of the owner, whom he did not identify, when he ran the Acura's plate number through his computer. Following defendant's arrest, he contacted the owner who confirmed that her car had been stolen the day before. Officer Singleton testified that police routinely ask the owners of recovered stolen vehicles whether they wish to have the car towed to a secure location or leave it

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secured at the location where it was recovered. In the present case, Officer Singleton stated that he left the Acura at the location where the police had recovered it. Patricia Abrams testified that at approximately 9:00 p.m. on the evening of February 15, 2005, while working at the V.A. Medical Center in New Orleans, she realized that she had left her keys in her car which she had parked outside of the hospital. She went outside to recover her keys and discovered that her vehicle had been stolen. She immediately went back inside and called the police. At approximately 5:30 a.m., police contacted her at work about her vehicle. Abrams testified that she told the officers to leave the car at the scene because she could not retrieve it until her shift ended. She did not identify the officer who called her by name and did not identify or otherwise describe her vehicle. Defendant took the stand and testified that on the night of February 15, 2005, he was at home when his friend, Marvin Robertson, arrived and told him that he had some women that they could visit. Defendant walked outside and climbed into the passenger seat of a white Acura, which Robertson explained belonged to his sister. After visiting the women, Robertson was driving defendant home when he saw Officer Hurst's signal for him to pull over. Instead, Robertson, who did not have a driver's license, panicked and sped away as defendant urged him to stop. Robertson eventually abandoned the vehicle in the middle of McKenna Street and defendant, panicked by his friend's response, joined in the flight from the scene on foot. Defendant eventually surrendered to the canine unit. Defendant flatly denied that he had been driving the car and testified that he did not see anything such as a broken steering column or broken window that would have indicated to him that the car was stolen. According to defendant, the keys were in the ignition and a

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purse was on the back seat. Defendant stated that he did not give Robertson's name to the police because he would not inform on a friend. He further claimed that the police told him that if he refused to name the driver, they would identify him as the individual driving the vehicle. Defendant admitted that he had two prior felony convictions for accessory after the fact to carjacking and for unauthorized entry of a business. In reversing defendant's conviction and sentence, the court of appeal acknowledged that defendant's flight from the officers and apparent false testimony in direct contradiction of Hurst and Singleton that he was not the driver of the car provided jurors with two factors to consider in assessing whether defendant had guilty knowledge that the Acura was stolen. Dunbar, 06-1030 at 10-11, 950 So.2d at 877-78. With respect to defendant's flight from the scene, the court of appeal thought it unlikely that an open beer can found by Officer Hurst in the Acura prompted defendant to run "from police because he knew this was illegal and did not want to receive a municipal summons for that infraction." Id., 06-1030 at 10, 950 So.2d at 877. However, the court of appeal stopped short of stating explicitly that a rational trier of fact could have found guilty knowledge beyond a reasonable doubt because it viewed as a fatal flaw in the state's case its failure to present any "direct or compelling circumstantial evidence that the vehicle Dunbar was driving belonged to Patricia Abrams, the owner of the vehicle

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