NOT TO BE PUBLISHED

OPINION

MAZE, JUDGE.

Appellant, James White, appeals from his conviction for burglary in the second degree and receiving stolen property under $10,000 by the Christian Circuit Court. After careful review of the single issue raised on appeal, we affirm White's conviction at trial.

This case stems from the burglary of a home in Oak Grove, Kentucky on August 17, 2009. That morning, while the occupant of the home attended military training, his home was broken into and property including two video game consoles and more than two dozen video games was stolen. Upon investigating the scene, a police officer was unable to locate fingerprints from around the home. Fingerprints taken later from the stolen items were inconclusive. Police did observe footprints leading from the back porch of the home toward a wooded area and nearby park.

Knowing that the park had surveillance cameras, police contacted the curator of the park and asked him to preserve the video from those cameras. After being alerted to the burglary, the curator walked the grounds of the park and discovered a green military bag hidden in tall grass near the wood line. Inside the bag were the items stolen from the home earlier that morning. Police replaced the property inside with assorted boxes and left the bag in place, positioning a nearby park surveillance camera to observe anyone who returned to retrieve the bag.

That afternoon, the video recorded two subjects, later identified as James White and his co-defendant Anthony Vallant (a female), park near the bag, get out of their car and walk around the park in the vicinity of the bag. After only a few moments, the couple got back in their car and left without the bag. An hour later, the same couple returned. The video showed White walking around the area near where the bag was placed and peering into the tall grass. At one point, White stepped into the grass and pushed aside brush as if looking for something. White then returned to the vehicle and left the park, again without the bag. The car in which the couple drove was identified and traced to an address nearby. In addition to the video showing the vicinity of the bag throughout the day, another camera showed White walking through the park, in the direction of the burglarized residence at 5:51 a.m. the morning of the burglary, and walking in the opposite direction ten minutes later. He was not carrying a bag either time.

When police arrived at the home three days after the burglary, the occupants initially denied them entry. After gaining entry from the homeowner, police found White, Vallant and another woman inside. The woman testified at trial that White and Vallant told her not to answer the door when the police knocked. She also testified that White attempted to evade authorities by hiding under a crib and inside a linen closet. Additionally, Vallant provided the police with a false name. In searching the home, officers collected a shirt matching the one worn by the subject observed by surveillance cameras walking in the park the day of the burglary.

During questioning by police, White stated that he was at the park for purposes of exercise. When asked why he peered into the grass near the bag, he stated he was looking for a place to urinate. Vallant's explanation of the previous day's events was different. She explained to police that she and White were having an affair at the time and were in the park for purposes of privacy and as a place to wait until their spouses were not home. She stated White was looking into the tall grass for a misplaced pocket knife, and that while doing so, he believed he had seen a body.

At trial, the jury was shown the surveillance video taken from both cameras in the park. Vallant testified that she and White were in bed together at the time of the burglary and that neither of them had gone anywhere that morning. Additionally, a fingerprint expert testified that he could neither include nor exclude White as having left the prints that were found on the stolen items. The Commonwealth asserted White and Vallant were the two individuals seen in the park on surveillance video, evidenced by the shirt found at the home and by the positive identification of the couple made by two acquaintances at whose home they were staying. The Commonwealth further argued that White and Vallant were not at the park on two different occasions on the day of the burglary for the reasons they claimed. They were there to retrieve the bag of stolen electronics White had left there earlier in the day. The Commonwealth also asserted that the inconsistencies between Vallant and White's statements, as well as their conduct at the home when the police arrived, indicated their guilt. At the close of the Commonwealth's case, White's attorney moved the trial court for a directed verdict on the charges against White. The trial court overruled the motion and proceeded with the trial. White's attorney renewed his motion for directed verdict at the close of proof. The trial court again overruled the motion. A jury found White guilty of burglary and receiving stolen property, recommending concurrent sentences of ten and five years, respectively. This appeal followed.

On appeal, White argues the evidence proffered by the Commonwealth at trial was insufficient to sustain a verdict of guilty and that the trial court erred in overruling his motions for a directed verdict. We disagree.

On appellate review, the test of a directed verdict is, if under the evidence as a whole, it would be clearly unreasonable for a jury to find guilt, only then is the defendant entitled to a directed verdict of acquittal. Commonwealth v. Benham, 816 S.W.2d 186, 187 (Ky. 1991)(citing Commonwealth v. Sawhill, 660 S.W.2d 3 (Ky. 1983)). When ruling on a directed verdict motion, the trial court must assume the evidence for the Commonwealth is true and draw all fair and reasonable inferences from the evidence in favor of the Commonwealth. Id. However, "[i]t should be remembered that the trial court is certainly authorized to direct a verdict for the defendant if the prosecution produces no more than a mere scintilla of evidence. Obviously, there must be evidence of substance." See Sawhill, supra.

Viewing the entirety of the evidence presented by the Commonwealth in this case, we find that there was "more than a mere scintilla of evidence" upon which the jury could have based its verdict. At trial, the court was required to assume that all fair and reasonable inferences made from the Commonwealth's evidence were true when making its decision regarding White's motions for directed verdict. See Benham, supra. Therefore, the question becomes whether it was fair and reasonable to infer that White's presence in the footage proved his role in the crime, that White was in the park because he had stolen the property and was looking for items he had placed there that morning, and that White's attempt to evade police indicated his guilt.

Due to the nature of the evidence in this case, we find the above inferences drawn from that evidence to be fair and reasonable, and therefore properly held as true by the trial court in making its decision. It is fair and reasonable for a juror to infer White's guilt from video footage of White walking toward the scene of the crime at such an early hour and walking away from the scene of the crime only ten minutes later, doing so in very close proximity to both the scene of the burglary and where the stolen items were found. It is fair and reasonable for a juror to infer White's guilt from the fact that he was observed twice walking directly to the exact area in the park where the items were hidden and once entering the tall grass to look for something when he claimed he didn't know anything was there. Despite White's claims that he was at the park to exercise and was milling around in the grass because he needed to urinate, he was in the park only a few minutes both times and never actually used the bathroom, either in the grass or in the functioning bathroom that was only yards away. Finally, it is fair and reasonable for a jury to infer White's guilt from the fact that he attempted to hide from authorities when they knocked at his residence.

White asserts that these items of evidence constituted little more than conjecture and circumstantial evidence upon which no reasonable inference of guilt could be based. While the evidence presented by the Commonwealth and considered by the judge in his decision is indeed circumstantial, the rule of law regarding directed verdict expressly permits for inferences to be made from such evidence, as long as they are fairly and reasonably made. In other words, it was not the Commonwealth's job at directed verdict to have proven its case beyond a reasonable doubt and without inference drawn from certain facts. Rather, the burden at directed verdict was to have presented evidence from which the jury could have reasonably inferred guilt. The copious evidence in this case, circumstantial though it may have been, achieves that feat easily.

Because the inferences presented by the Commonwealth were fair and reasonable, the trial court was required to assume that these inferences were true. When compiled and assumed to be true as Benham and Sawhill require, the Commonwealth's evidence constituted "more than a mere scintilla of evidence" and was sufficient to "induce a reasonable juror to believe beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant is guilty." See Benham, supra, at 187. Accordingly, we find that the trial court, having properly assumed as true all reasonable inferences made by the Commonwealth, correctly denied White's motions for directed verdict. Therefore, White's conviction is affirmed.

ALL CONCUR.