Court Opinion

ID: 9763622
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 02:50:46.36226+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:29:46.839241
License: Public Domain

OPINION ON APPELLANT’S MOTION FOR REHEARING
The record reveals that the panel opinion erroneously held that certain testimony was admitted into evidence. The evidence was not admitted before the jury; thus, we grant rehearing to reconsider appellant’s sixth ground of error.
Appellant argues that evidence adduced outside the presence of the jury from the complainant that sex bothered her “private parts” should have been admitted “for the •reason that the connotation left by Dr. Walton with his testimony was that the victim’s private parts were irritated because sex was forced upon her, all of which was highly prejudicial and inflammatory to a jury since it came from a medical doctor.”
At trial, the complainant positively identified the appellant as the man who attacked her, knocked out two of her teeth, beat her, tied her up, raped her, then choked her until she was unconscious. The complainant’s doctor testified that two hours after the rape, he observed that the complainant had been beaten severely and had been choked. There was a marked irritation of the vaginal introitus, to the degree that there “would be ... a great deal of pain along with it.”
Outside the presence of the jury, the defense attorney questioned the complainant concerning her sexual activities:
“Q. All right. With that predicate in mind, you have had — you are active sexually, are you not, or you were prior to October 9, 1972, is that not correct?
A. I don’t know what you mean by that.
Q. You had sex a lot?
A. Not a lot.
Q. You would pick up men in your bar, and carry them—
A. Not true.
Q. Not true?
A. Not true.
Q. Did you pick up — while Dorothy Nettles had that place, did you pick up a shoe salesman and ask him to take you to his motel room, and then come back the next day and show Dorothy Nettles the new shoes that you got?
A. No, sir.
*506Q. You never did that?
A. I got some shoes, yes. He gave everybody in the bar we went to a pair of shoes. But I was not living there at that time. And I went on to my home.
Q. Ma’am, I didn’t ask you — do you know what I am talking about, the incident I’m talking about?
A. He took two girls from there besides me.
Q. Ma’am, did you ask him to take you to this motel room—
A. No, sir; no, sir.
Q. Who were the other two women that he took?
A. I don’t know, two girls that I knew out there.
Q. Ma’am, who were the two girls that you knew?
A. Well, I didn’t know them that well.
Q. You don’t even know their names?
A. One of them’s name was Sue. And the other one was — I can’t even remember her name. That’s been five or six years ago. They are not even here now.
Q. Ma’am, while you were — while Dorothy Nettles was out at the bar, did you proposition a man by the name of Kelley Peters?
A. No.
Q. And when he refused you, you threw a shuffleboard — or pool table equipment all over the room and left?
A. No, sir.
Q. Did you — are you accustomed and used to walking up to men and grabbing them by their private parts, while you were in that bar?
A. Good heavens, no.
Q. Didn’t you do that on various occasions with Don Davis?
A. No, sir. I do not like that boy.
Q. Why, because he wouldn’t go to bed with you?
A. That’s not worth answering.
Q. Is that true or not?
A. It certainly is not true — ”
The defense attorney then asked the following questions which are now contested on appeal,
“Q. Does sex bother you — or did sex bother you before October 9th, in the sense that it would irritate your private parts—
A. No.
Q. I beg your pardon?
A. In which way do you want me to answer that?
Q. Did it irritate your private parts?
A. I don’t remember telling any doctor that.
Q. I’m asking whether it did or not, whether it did or not, ma’am?
A. What’s that got to do with this?
Q. Ma’am, would you just answer my question?
THE WITNESS: Do I have to?
THE COURT: Yes.
A. Well, yes.
Q. (By Mr. Hirsch): Every time you had sex, it bothered you, didn’t it, irritated your private parts?
A. Yes.”
Assuming that the excluded evidence in this case was relevant to a contested issue in the case, we conclude that its exclusion was certainly harmless error in light of the evidence that the intercourse was forcible. As further evidence that she was forced to submit to intercourse with appellant, there is the evidence that she was beaten severely, sustaining injuries to her neck, ribcage, and losing two teeth. She also suffered marked irritation to the vaginal introitus to the degree that she was in a great deal of pain.
The appellant’s motion for rehearing is denied. The judgment is affirmed.