State v. Pettijohn

DIXON, Presiding Judge.

Defendant appeals from a judgment and sentence of twenty years imposed upon a jury verdict of guilty and fixing the punishment for the crime of sodomy. Upon defendant’s claim that the jury should have been instructed on circumstantial evidence, the cause must be reversed and remanded for a new trial.

The nature of the assigned error compels a detailed factual recital. On September 13, 1974, Ronald R. Seaman, a Kansas City Policeman, noticed a car parked in a park area in Kansas City. As he approached the car, he saw that the car’s engine was running, that all of the…