People v. Warren

DOOLING, J. Appellant was convicted by a jury of a violation of Penal Code, section 4502, possession of a knife while a prisoner in a state prison. He appeals from the order denying his motion for a new trial. Prosecution witnesses testified that appellant took the knife from his jacket and threw it on the prison floor after being directed to step out of a line of prisoners by a prison officer. Appellant and certain other prisoners testified that appellant did not take the knife from his pocket nor throw it to the floor.

A prisoner, Bobby Johns, testified over objection, that in the evening two days before the date of the charged offense appellant entered his cell, pulled out a knife (identified by Johns as the same knife which other witnesses had testified was thrown to the prison floor by appellant) and held the knife to Johns’ side, stating:

“I got ways of making guys do things I want them to do. . . . You know it will go through, don’t you?”

He further testified that appellant, although he was not his cellmate, spent the night in his cell and exhibited the knife to him again the next morning, and that he had reported these facts to Lieutenant Wagner, of the prison staff.

Appellant argues that the admission of this evidence of other crimes was prejudicially erroneous. However in this case the introduction of this evidence falls 'within a settled exception to the rule that admission of evidence of other crimes is not ordinarily permitted. Here the possession of the knife at the time charged was denied by appellant and his witnesses.

Proof of his possession of the identical knife on the two separate days immediately preceding the day of the alleged offense had a strong probative value to rebut the defense testimony that he did not possess it on the date charged. Where the evidence has a reasonable tendency to connect the defendant with the crime charged it is admissible even though it may also show the commission of another offense. “It is the law that where the proffered evidence directly throws light upon the facts of the issue being tried, it is admissible although it proves another offense as well.” (People v. Ellis, 188 Cal. 682, 689 [206 P. 753]; People v. Vollman, 73 Cal.App.2d 769, 782 [167 P.2d 545].)

The court properly limited the effect and use of this evidence by its instruction that it was received for a limited purpose only, “not to prove distinct offenses or continual criminality but for such bearing, if any, as it might have, on [260]