The defendant places his chief emphasis in this Court upon his exceptions to the refusal of the trial court to grant his motion for judgment of nonsuit made when the State rested its case and renewed after all the evidence was concluded.
The State relies entirely upon circumstantial evidence. It is an established principle in the administration of criminal law that circumstantial evidence is insufficient to sustain a conviction unless the circumstantial facts shown on the hearing are “of such a nature and so connected or related as to point unerringly to the defendant’s guilt and exclude any other reasonable hypothesis.” S. v. Harvey, ante, 62, 44 S. E. (2d), 412. See, also, in this connection: S. v. Coffey, ante, 119, 44 S. E. (2d), 886; S. v. Madden, 212 N. C., 56, 192 S. E., 859.
' It is undoubtedly proper to contend that the circumstances adduced by the State in the case at bar give rise to a strong suspicion that the accused is guilty of one or more of the offenses set out in the indictment. Yet, it cannot be gainsaid that these circumstances are quite compatible with a reasonable conclusion that the defendant is wholly innocent.
It is to be noted that there is not a syllable of testimony in the record indicating that the quarters lying upon the dresser in the bedroom of the accused were the twenty-five cent pieces removed from the cash drawer *521in the Coastal Lunch. Any contention to that effect is merely conjectural.
The testimony that the print of the left thumb of the defendant appeared upon the outside surface of a piece of glass which originally occupied a position near the knob of the front door of the Coastal Lunch has no legitimate tendency to show that he was present when the shop was broken and entered and the coins'were taken therefrom. The fact that finger-prints corresponding to those of an accused are found in a place where a crime was committed is without probative force unless the circumstances are such that the finger-prints could have been impressed only at the time when the crime was perpetrated. 20 Am. Jur., Evidence, section 358; 16 A. L. R., Annotation, 370; 63 A. L. R., Annotation, 1324. The thumb print of the defendant was found in a public place. There were finger-prints upon the same piece of glass other than that identified as the defendant’s. The finger-print expert called to the stand by the State testified that there was “no way of knowing” when the defendant’s thumb print was impressed upon the glass near the door knob, or “whose the other finger-prints were.” There is not a scintilla of evidence to negative the reasonable assumption that the left thumb print of the accused was put upon the glass when he entered the shop during business hours on the night in question for the lawful purpose of buying beer in response to the implied invitation extended to the public by the operator of the Coastal Lunch.
The circumstances that the sharp edge of a piece of broken glass sticking in the molding of the door of the shop was bloody and that the defendant had one or more little cut places “that looked like fresh cuts” in the palm of his right hand are as consistent with innocence as they are with guilt upon the record here. The State itself offered in evidence the reasonable explanation of the accused that he had cut his hand with a razor blade while engaged in making billfolds out of leather.
The testimony offered by the State over the defendant’s objection and exception to the effect that at some time in the past the defendant had committed a crime similar in nature to those set out in the indictment had no tendency to establish the defendant’s guilt in the case at bar. Nothing was shown justifying any inference that the former crime of the defendant and the offenses now charged against him were necessarily committed by the same person.
The circumstances relied on by the State are inconclusive and do not lead to a satisfactory deduction that the accused, and no one else, perpetrated the crimes alleged in this action. All of these circumstances can be true, and the defendant can still be innocent. Consequently, the trial court erred in refusing to dismiss the action. The defendant’s motion *522for judgment of nonsuit is sustained on tiis appeal in conformity to G. S., 15-173.
Reversed.