Court Opinion

ID: 9676953
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 05:39:28.38542+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:16:52.576580
License: Public Domain

Jim Hannah, Justice, concurring. I concur with the majority’s holding that first-degree sexual abuse under these conditions is a strict-liability crime, but I write to address the trial court’s exclusion of the evidence of A.L.’s suggestive behavior and statements from the day of the crime. Two points should be made on this issue. First, according to the trial court’s order issued April 12, 2001, the trial court excluded this evidence because it was “not relevant and, therefore, not admissible.” Although the trial court issued this order after Mr. Short filed a motion pursuant to the rape-shield statute’s procedural requirements for admission of certain evidence, this order is unclear as to whether the evidence was excluded based on the protection of the rape-shield statute, or whether it was excluded under Ark. R. Evid. 401 merely because it was irrelevant to the issue of A.L.’s age. The majority opinion addresses this issue by applying the rape-shield statute. However, it is not at all clear that the trial court ruled on this issue based on the rape-shield statute, and to assume as much is not warranted by the trial court’s order. Second, I do not believe that the rape-shield statute’s exclusion of evidence of “prior sexual conduct” applies to this type of evidence. Mr. Short requested that the trial court allow him to present evidence of A.L.’s sexually suggestive comments and actions on the day of and leading up to the incident to show that Mr. Short reasonably believed that A.L. was at least fourteen years old. The majority opinion implies that “prior sexual conduct” is equivalent to sexually suggestive behavior and statements other than those defined by the statutes because the opinion, and the parties themselves, speak of these behaviors as “prior sexual conduct.” Arkansas’s Rape-Shield Statute, contained in Ark. Code Ann. § 16-42-101 (Repl. 1999), makes inadmissible opinion evidence, reputation evidence, or evidence of specific instances of the victim’s prior sexual conduct with the defendant or any other person, evidence of a victim’s prior allegations of sexual conduct with the defendant or any other person, which allegations the victim asserts to be true, or evidence offered by the defendant concerning prior allegations of sexual conduct by the victim with the defendant or any other person if the victim denies making the allegation. . . . Ark. Code Ann. § 16-42-101 (b). The rape-shield statute defines “sexual conduct” as “deviate sexual activity, sexual contact, or sexual intercourse, as those terms are defined by § 5-14-101.” Under Ark. Code Ann. § 5-14-101, these terms include some form of physical action and are defined as: (1) “Deviate sexual activity” means any act of sexual gratification involving: (A) The penetration, however slight, of the anus or mouth of one person by the penis of another person; or (B) The penetration, however slight, of the labia majora Or anus of one person by any body member or foreign instrument manipulated by another person; * * * (8) “Sexual contact” means any act of sexual gratification involving the touching, directly or through clothing, of the sex organs, or buttocks, or anus of a person or the breast of a female; (9) “Sexual intercourse” means penetration, however slight, of the labia majora by a penis;. . . In this case, Mr. Short attempted to introduce evidence from the day in question that A.L. had made several comments to Mr. Short and Mr. Willfond about wanting to “lose her virginity” and wanting to have sex with either or both of them. The question then becomes whether this evidence involves “evidence of the victim’s prior sexual conduct” as defined by the statutes, or whether it involves some other type of behavior. The majority attaches the term “sexual conduct” to A.L.’s actions here, but again, “sexual conduct” under the rape-shield statute involves some form of physical touching as defined in Ark. Code Ann. § 5-14-101. As such, statements made by a person regarding wanting to engage in these types of conduct are not the same as actually engaging in the conduct itself. This discussion is purely academic in this case, however, because I agree with the trial court’s exclusion of this evidence on grounds of relevancy. A.L., due to her age, could not consent to engage in sexual relations with Mr. Short, and whether she spoke of her interest in doing so is of no import because this was a strict-liability crime. However, my concern with the majority opinion is prospective regarding how this case will be applied to other rape or sexual misconduct cases involving victims who are not minors. A possible application of this decision will be that an alleged victim’s sexually suggestive comments and behavior, other than those defined as “sexual conduct” in the rape-shield and related statutes, will be excluded improperly under the rape-shield statute as “sexual conduct.” Whether this type of evidence could be excluded under another term in the statute or on grounds of relevancy is a separate question, and one not at issue here. However, this behavior is not “sexual conduct” as it is defined under our statutes, and it should not be addressed under the rape-shield statute as such.