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COURT OF APPEALS OF VIRGINIA Present: Judges Humphreys, Felton and Kelsey Argued at Salem, Virginia AMANZA JAMES POLLINO, S/K/A AMANZO JAMES POLLINO v. Record No. 3041-02-3 OPINION BY JUDGE D. ARTHUR KELSEY JANUARY 13, 2004

COMMONWEALTH OF VIRGINIA FROM THE CIRCUIT COURT OF THE CITY OF BRISTOL Charles B. Flannagan, III, Judge J. Douglas Fleenor for appellant. Paul C. Galanides, Assistant Attorney General (Jerry W. Kilgore, Attorney General, on brief), for appellee. On appeal, Amanza James Pollino argues that the trial court erred by not declaring a mistrial after the prosecutor made improper statements during closing argument. Finding that the prosecutor's statements were not improper, we affirm. I. On appeal, we review the evidence in the light most favorable to the Commonwealth. Kingsbur v. Commonwealth, 40 Va. App. 307, 308, 579 S.E.2d 357, 358 (2003). That principle requires us to discard the evidence of the accused in conflict with that of the Commonwealth and to regard as true all the credible evidence favorable to the Commonwealth and all fair inferences that may be drawn therefrom. Dugger v. Commonwealth, 40 Va. App. 586, 589, 580 S.E.2d 477, 479 (2003). On November 9, 2001, Sergeant Darrell Duty and Officer Tim Sexton of the Bristol Police Department arranged for Emma Rollins, a confidential informant, to make a controlled purchase of

crack cocaine. After providing a "body wire transmitter" and searching Rollins and her pickup truck, the officers followed Rollins until she entered an apartment complex in Bristol. There, Rollins parked her truck in a parking lot. Within a few minutes, a car driven by Pollino pulled up next to Rollins's vehicle. After a brief conversation between Pollino and Rollins, a passenger in Pollino's car, Pig Stout, exited the front passenger seat of the vehicle and walked to the other end of an adjacent apartment building. Rollins then got into Pollino's car and asked for "50 dollars worth of crack cocaine." After buying the drugs from Pollino, Rollins got back into her truck and drove away. Before she left, however, Pig Stout returned and got back into Pollino's vehicle. The entire encounter took between five to ten minutes. Rollins met the officers a few minutes later and turned over the drugs she purchased from Pollino, which turned out to be .06 grams of crack cocaine. Pollino was arrested for possession with intent to distribute in violation of Code

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