Broadway v. State

Per Curiam. Appellant was convicted by the court sitting without a jury of possession and control of narcotics and on an addendum thereto found to be a second offender. He was sentenced to five years imprisonment. He contends on this appeal that the court erred in receiving the incriminating narcotics in evidence and that, in any event, the evidence was insufficient to support his conviction.

There was evidence adduced at the trial from which the trier of fact could find that police had obtained a search warrant for a designated two-story dwelling house in Baltimore City based on probable cause to believe that the narcotics laws were there being violated, with particular reference to the second floor rear bedroom; that the police forcibly entered the dwelling, ascended immediately to the second floor rear bedroom, and there found Robert Johnson and Hazel Magbee, lawful occupants of the dwelling, together with appellant; that the room was exceptionally small, with barely enough room for a bed; that appellant was sitting on the bed, watching television, and that on the floor, approximately a foot from him, a bag containing five grams of ¹⁶⁶ heroin was found by police; that forty-two more bags of narcotics were recovered from a coat in the closet in the room; that appellant had fresh needle marks in his arms, as did Johnson and Magbee; and that appellant told the officer that he had used drugs while on the premises. Appellant contends that he was a mere visitor to the premises, had no proprietary interest therein, or in the drugs, and that there was no evidence that he had any drugs within his possession or control. He further contends that the needle marks on his arms indicated, at most, that he was a drug addict, which is not a crime; and that because he was not named in