Title: State v. Tester

State: vermont

Issuer: Vermont Supreme Court

Document:

State v. Tester (2003-538); 179 Vt. 627; 895 A.2d 215

2006 VT 24

[Filed 08-Mar-2006]

                                 ENTRY ORDER

                                 2006 VT 24

                      SUPREME COURT DOCKET NO. 2003-538

                             OCTOBER TERM, 2004

  State of Vermont                    }          APPEALED FROM:
                                      }
       v.                             }          District Court of Vermont,
                                      }          Unit No. 1, Windham Circuit
  Dwight Tester, Sr.                  }
                                      }          DOCKET NO. 539-4-03 Wmcr

                                                 Trial Judge:  Karen R. Carroll

             In the above-entitled cause, the Clerk will enter:

       ¶  1.  Defendant Dwight Tester, Sr., appeals from his conviction for
  aggravated sexual assault following a jury trial.  He asserts that the
  trial court erred in admitting hearsay statements of the putative victim
  pursuant to Vermont Rule of Evidence 804a because the statements lacked
  sufficient indicia of trustworthiness, and they were taken in preparation
  of legal proceedings.  Even assuming that the hearsay statements were
  properly admitted, defendant argues, the evidence was insufficient to
  support his conviction.  Defendant also maintains that the trial court
  committed reversible error by allowing an investigator from the Department
  of Social and Rehabilitation Services (SRS) to testify that the victim's
  actions were "typical" of an abused child, thereby bolstering the victim's
  credibility.  We reject these arguments, and affirm.  

       ¶  2.  In April 2003, defendant was charged with aggravated sexual
  assault after allegedly inserting his finger into the genital opening of
  his daughter, D.T., born in May 1995. (FN1)  The State later added a charge
  of lewd and lascivious conduct with a child.  By motion, the State
  indicated its intent to introduce D.T.'s hearsay statements at trial, and
  pursuant to V.R.E. 804a, the court held a pre-trial hearing to determine
  the statements' admissibility. 

       ¶  3.  The following evidence was presented at the hearing.  Joanne
  Gaffron-Hargrove testified that she had been D.T.'s therapeutic foster
  mother for approximately four months.  On the morning of April 17, 2003,
  Ms. Gaffron-Hargrove informed D.T. that her visit with defendant had been
  cancelled, to which D.T. replied "good."  D.T. stated that she hated
  defendant because he had asked her if Ms. Gaffron-Hargrove and her husband
  had "touched" her.  Ms. Gaffron-Hargrove asked D.T. if she meant a "bad
  touch," and D.T. replied, "Yes, a bad touch."  When Ms. Gaffron-Hargrove
  asked D.T. if defendant had ever touched her, D.T. replied that he had, but
  she was not supposed to talk about it.  Ms. Gaffron-Hargrove testified that
  when D.T. made this statement, her head went down, she did not maintain eye
  contact, and her body slumped.
   
       ¶  4.  D.T. later explained to Ms. Gaffron-Hargrove that she had
  been sleeping on a blow-up bed, and she heard defendant enter the room. 
  Defendant knelt by the bed, and touched her vagina.  When Ms.
  Gaffron-Hargrove asked D.T. if she had told anyone about the incident, D.T.
  replied that she had not told defendant's girlfriend, Amanda, because she
  "didn't want Amanda to leave."  Ms. Gaffron-Hargrove explained to D.T. that
  they needed to report the incident, and  D.T. replied, "Let's go right
  now."  Ms. Gaffron-Hargrove testified that this reaction differed from past
  instances when D.T. had been caught telling lies.  

       ¶  5.  Ms. Gaffron-Hargrove contacted SRS, and Janet Melke, an SRS
  investigator, subsequently contacted Detective William Hoyt of the Bellows
  Falls Police Department.  Later that afternoon, Ms. Melke and Detective
  Hoyt interviewed D.T. at the SRS office.  At the beginning of the
  interview, D.T. indicated that she understood the difference between the
  truth and a lie.  After a series of questions, D.T. stated that she
  wouldn't feel safe staying with defendant.  When asked why, D.T. became
  withdrawn, dropped her head, and replied that she didn't remember.  D.T.
  acknowledged telling Ms. Gaffron-Hargrove that someone had done something
  to her that she did not like.  When Detective Hoyt asked D.T. who she was
  talking about, D.T. became withdrawn, and said that she did not remember. 
  D.T. later indicated that she was talking about defendant.

       ¶  6.  As a reprieve from direct questioning, Detective Hoyt asked
  D.T. to draw a picture of herself and her family.  He then directed the
  conversation back to the alleged assault.  Detective Hoyt asked D.T. to
  tell him about the incident; D.T. wanted Ms. Gaffron-Hargrove to speak on
  her behalf.  Detective Hoyt testified that it was difficult to get beyond
  this back and forth, so he asked D.T. to identify statements made by Ms.
  Gaffron-Hargrove as true or false.  Detective  Hoyt wrote "Tell me a lie
  first" on a piece of paper, which he showed only to Ms. Gaffron-Hargrove. 
  Ms. Gaffron-Hargrove then told a lie, which D.T. immediately identified as
  false.  Ms. Gaffron-Hargrove then stated that D.T. had revealed to her that
  she did not want to visit defendant because he had touched her in a bad
  way.  D.T. responded to this statement by saying, "That's the truth, that's
  what I had told Joanne this morning." 

       ¶  7.  D.T. indicated that she had been touched with a "bad touch." 
  When Detective Hoyt asked her what part of her body had been touched, D.T.
  stated that she did not want to say the word.  Instead, she wrote down
  "V-G-I-N-U."  When Detective Hoyt asked D.T. what word she was spelling,
  D.T. quietly said "vagina."  Detective Hoyt asked D.T. who had touched her
  vagina, and she wrote down "dad."  Detective Hoyt sought to confirm D.T.'s
  understanding of the word vagina, and he asked D.T. to identify the
  location of a vagina on a Barbie doll.  D.T. asked if she could instead
  identify it on the picture that she had previously drawn, and she circled
  her sister's groin area.  Detective Hoyt testified that D.T. made it very
  clear that she was talking about her own vagina.
        
       ¶  8.  Detective Hoyt asked D.T. if she could tell him what
  happened, and she indicated that she wanted to write it down.  D.T. wrote
  "He came into my 'R'," and then drew an arrow to the picture of herself
  lying in a bed.  Detective Hoyt asked D.T. what happened when defendant had
  come into her room, and she wrote "He touched my vagina," although she
  spelled vagina as "V-G-I-A," and spelled touch as "T-U-S-H."  Detective
  Hoyt confirmed that D.T. meant to say "he touched my vagina."  D.T.
  indicated that defendant had touched her under her underpants.  Detective
  Hoyt  asked D.T. if she remembered whether the touch was inside or outside
  of her vagina.  D.T. wrote down the word "in."  D.T. then told Detective
  Hoyt that defendant had told her to go to bed and close her eyes.  A few
  minutes later, he came into the room and knelt down beside her bed.  She
  was on an air mattress, and he touched her vagina with his hand.  D.T.
  explained that she knew it was defendant, although her eyes were closed,
  because his work boots made a lot of noise while he walked. 

       ¶  9.  Detective Hoyt asked D.T. if she had told anyone else about
  this incident, and she said that she had not.  He then asked her if she had
  discussed it with Amanda, and D.T. stated that she had not because she was
  afraid that Amanda would leave.  Detective Hoyt testified that D.T. told
  him she was relieved to have talked about the incident, and she appeared
  relieved as well.  At the end of the interview, Detective Hoyt asked D.T.
  if she remembered their conversation about truth and lying, and he
  confirmed with D.T. that she had told him the truth.  Ms. Melke did not
  testify to the substance of D.T.'s interview, without objection, after the
  court indicated that her testimony would be repetitive.
       
       ¶  10.  At the close of the hearing, the court concluded that D.T.'s
  hearsay statements were admissible under Rule 804a(a), and it made findings
  on the record.  The court found that D.T. was under the age of ten and that
  her statements were offered in a sexual abuse case where she was the
  putative victim.  The court explained that the "time, content and
  circumstances of the statements" provided substantial indicia of
  trustworthiness.  It rejected the argument that the interviews had been
  leading.  As the court explained, D.T.'s initial disclosure had been made
  in a secure setting to someone she trusted.  Her statements after the
  initial disclosure were internally consistent as to where the incident
  occurred, how it occurred, where defendant had touched her, and why she had
  not told defendant's girlfriend about the incident.  The court found that
  D.T.'s body language was consistent with how she was feeling-her head was
  down and her body was slumped.  The court recognized that D.T. had had a
  problem with lying in the past, but it found that D.T.'s behavior in this
  case was completely different from instances in which she had been caught
  lying.  Additionally, the court explained, D.T.'s lies in the past had not
  implicated others.

       ¶  11.  The court found that the interview at SRS had been conducted
  properly.  As the court explained, D.T. had a difficult time expressing
  what had happened to her, but once she began talking about the incident,
  her statements were consistent.  D.T. indicated her ability to distinguish
  between the truth and a lie, and the court found nothing to indicate that
  her statements were untrustworthy merely because they had been written
  down.  Indeed, the court found that this made them even more trustworthy in
  light of D.T.'s age.  The court therefore concluded that D.T.'s  statements
  possessed sufficient indicia of reliability.  Turning to the requirement
  that statements not be "taken in preparation for a legal proceeding," the
  court explained that the fact that an SRS investigator or police officer
  interviewed a child did not necessarily mean that the resulting statements
  were gathered in preparation for a legal proceeding.  The court also
  rejected defendant's assertion that D.T.'s statements must be excluded
  because there were ongoing family court proceedings at the time that the
  statements were taken.  Thus, having found that the requirements of Rule
  804a(a) were satisfied, the court found D.T.'s hearsay statements
  admissible at trial.
        
       ¶  12.  Ms. Gaffron-Hargrove, Ms. Melke, and Detective Hoyt testified
  to D.T.'s hearsay statements at trial.  At the close of the State's case,
  defendant moved for a judgment of acquittal, asserting that his presumption
  of innocence could not be overcome by D.T.'s hearsay statements because she
  had a problem with lying.  The court denied defendant's motion, finding the
  evidence sufficient to support a guilty verdict. 

       ¶  13.  D.T. testified after being called by defendant.  She stated
  that defendant had hurt her.  When asked how, she testified that she did
  not remember.  D.T. acknowledged that she had told Ms. Gaffron-Hargrove
  that defendant had touched her vagina.  She reiterated that defendant had
  touched her, but testified that she did not know how he had touched her. 
  Defendant testified on his own behalf, denying that he had sexually
  assaulted D.T.  At the close of the evidence, defendant renewed his motion
  for judgment of acquittal, which the court denied.  The jury found
  defendant guilty of both charges against him, although, at the State's
  request, the court entered a finding of guilty only on the aggravated
  sexual assault charge. 

       ¶  14.  In a post-judgment motion for judgment of acquittal,
  defendant asserted that the evidence did not support his conviction because
  D.T. had testified only that defendant had touched her vagina, and touching
  without intrusion was insufficient to sustain an aggravated sexual assault
  conviction.  The court denied the motion, explaining that although D.T. had
  not discussed penetration while testifying, the jury had the Rule 804a
  statements that she had made to other witnesses prior to trial.  The court
  found that these statements were properly considered by the jury as
  substantive evidence and they provided a sufficient basis for a guilty
  verdict on the aggravated sexual assault charge.  This appeal followed.

       ¶  15.  We begin with defendant's assertion that the trial court erred
  in admitting D.T.'s hearsay statements. (FN2)  Rule 804a allows a witness
  to testify to hearsay statements made by a child ten years old or younger
  if the statements are offered in a sexual abuse case where the child is an
  alleged victim, the statements were not taken in preparation for a legal
  proceeding, the child is available to testify, and the "time, content and
  circumstances of the statements provide substantial indicia of
  trustworthiness."  V.R.E. 804a(a)(1)-(4).  The trial court "has great
  discretion in admitting or excluding evidence under the rule, and we will
  not reverse such decisions unless there has been an abuse of discretion
  resulting in prejudice."  State v. Fisher, 167 Vt. 36, 39,