IRAAC Writing Assignment

Using Giles v. Commonwealth, 672 S.E.2d 879 (Va. 2009), the case that you briefed last week, as your analogous case, using IRAAC of the following fact pattern. Do not perform any outside research for this assignment.

Jimmy Stewart is a famous Hollywood star who owns many homes throughout the United States and Europe. Recently, he bought a get-away cabin deep in woods of western Virginia. He had become tired of the shallow, back-stabbing life that must be endured by rich and famous persons in Los Angeles. He had hoped to use the ten-room cabin at least once-amonth for long weekends. He could easily jet to a nearly airport and helicopter the rest of the journey deep into the woods. He had a chic Hollywood interior designer buy furniture for the ten rooms based on pictures provide to him by Jimmy. Jimmy purchased the recommended furniture and had most of it stored in the spacious basement/air-raid shelter, and as he had time, he would decorate each of the rooms.

However, he had the delivery persons put a table and chair into the kitchen along with some cooking and eating utensils. He also had them throw a mattress into the next room for sleeping. He hung blankets over the windows of these two rooms to give himself privacy from the roving bands of wildlife. However, things did not go as planned. Despite the beloved status that Jimmy held in the motion picture community, he was no longer getting offered any "A" movie roles. Because he was a proud man, he turned down roles in many lesser movies. After he had bought the cabin, his attorney and manager called him and said that because of the downturn in the economy and the collapse of the housing market, all his other houses were underwater and the attorney recommended that he default on the mortgages. Fortunately, Jimmy had paid for the cabin in cash.

This sudden turn of events snapped Jimmy back into economic reality. He was broke. This realization humbled him and he began looking for movie roles wherever he could get them. The only offer he received was for a sit-com in Japan. He gladly took the role and moved into a small apartment in Tokyo. Jimmy was glad for the job but his plan to use the cabin monthly was never fully realized. In fact, after three monthly visits, he has not been to the cabin in two years. He has not given up plans to eventually begin using it again, if and when his economic fortunes improved. Technically, the house still had electricity because of the windmill on the roof that provided periodic power, depending on the wind. The kitchen still had a box of Kellogg's Frosted Flakes, but it appeared that mice had eaten some of it, and the refrigerator still contained some boxes of two-year old Chinese food. There was water for the kitchen sink whenever the power came on.

However, to make matters worse, the sheriff of the local county in which the cabin was located, wrote him a letter and stated that about one month ago, burglars had broken into the house and stolen everything in the basement storage area. The sheriff eventually caught one of the burglars, Black Jack Smith. Black Jack was caught when he tried to sell some of Jimmy's furniture at a local police bazaar.

Black Jack was charged and convicted of burglary under Va. Code Ann. 18.2-89 (1950). Black Jack's attorney, Swifty Lazaar, appealed the conviction based on the theory that Jimmy's cabin was not a dwelling house. You are the local prosecutor who has been assigned the task of trying to uphold the conviction at the court of appeals. Please answer the following issue in IRAAC form:

Issue: Should Jimmy's cabin, at the time of the burglary, be considered a dwelling house pursuant to Code 18.2-89. (please copy and paste this issue statement into your assignment)