Court Opinion

ID: 9843816
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 02:43:37.779872+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:15:14.002024
License: Public Domain

KAPSNER, Justice,
concurring in the result.
[¶ 28] I concur in the result, but I do not join in the adoption of what is described as the intermediate position.
[¶ 29] Rather, our statute and prior case law dictate that we follow an approach more closely aligned with New Jersey as described in paragraph 13 of the majority opinion — that a person must understand the nature of the act and that one need not engage in the act for the carnal gratification of another. As the New Jersey court has stated, “it involves an inquiry into whether or not the complainant could appreciate the inviolability of her person and that others could not, without her consent, invade her person for carnal gratification.” State v. Olivio, 237 N.J.Super. 428, 568 A.2d 111, 112 (1989). Put more simply, does the victim understand that she has a right to say, “No”? This right is inherent in the concept of consent.
[¶ 30] In the later case of State v. Olivio, 123 N.J. 550, 589 A.2d 597, 599 (1991), the Supreme Court of New Jersey expanded on this application of the statute under which Olivio was convicted:
These significant policy considerations commend a narrow interpretation of the concept of mentally defective under [N.J. Stat. Ann.] 2C:14-lh. The statutory concept of “mentally defective” implicates both the intellectual or cognitive capacity and the volitional or consensual capacity of the individual with respect to personal sexual activity. The consensual capacity involves knowing that one’s body is private and is not subject to the physical invasions of another, and that one has the right and ability to refuse to engage in sexual activity. The cognitive capacity, which is also implicit in the notion of consensual capacity, involves the knowledge that the conduct is distinctively sexual. In the context of this criminal statute, that knowledge extends only to the physical or physiological aspects of sex; it does not extend to an awareness that sexual acts have probable serious consequences, such as pregnancy and birth, disease, infirmities, adverse psychological or emotional disorders, or possible adverse moral or social effects.
Olivio, 589 A.2d at 604-05.
[¶ 31] The approach is consistent with the decision of this Court in State v. Kingsley, 383 N.W.2d 828 (N.D.1986). In that case, the convictions for gross sexual imposition were affirmed because:
[the victims’] testimony, together with that of social worker Marian Sorenson, quite clearly demonstrates that they were incapable of understanding or appreciating the nature of what was taking place or that they had any ability to stop or otherwise cope with the activity that *671was, in effect, being unilaterally perpetrated upon them.
Id. at 830.
[¶ 32] The jury saw Doe testify and could evaluate her understanding of the act. As noted in paragraph 22 of the majority opinion, Dr. Degree testified that Doe is subject to exploitation and might “agree” to sex because that is something she feels she has to do when approached by someone she would regard as an authority figure. Mosbrucker had been living at Doe’s home. From this, the jury might have found that Doe suffers from a mental disease or defect that rendered her incapable of understanding the nature of her conduct because she didn’t understand that she could refuse to engage in sex.
[¶ 33] Given our standard of review of jury verdicts, there was evidence to sustain the conviction.
[¶ 34] CAROL RONNING KAPSNER