Court Opinion

ID: 9603436
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 02:06:14.900515+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:02:11.565214
License: Public Domain

Justice Meyer
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent from the majority’s conclusion that defendant is entitled to a new trial for error in allowing Ms. Davenport to testify that defendant committed a similar sexual attack upon her.
The majority’s analysis on this issue acknowledges that “this Court has been ‘very liberal in admitting evidence of similar sex crimes,’ State v. Greene, 294 N.C. 418, 423, 241 S.E. 2d 662, 665 (1978).” Having thus so stated, and having, of necessity, admitted *110to numerous striking similarities between the two crimes, the majority chooses in unprecedented fashion to gloss over these similarities and to concentrate rather on the differences in the two attacks, which differences it characterizes as “significant.” Our case law does not support this method of analysis.
Admittedly, an analysis to determine similarities necessarily entails a consideration of differences. Under our settled case law the focus is on the similarity of circumstances of the two crimes which tends to identify the defendant as the perpetrator of the crime for which he is being tried. If the evidence of the circumstances of the other crime or act reveals both striking similarities and “significant differences,” is it admissible? The answer is “yes,” if, on balance, the similarities tend to identify the defendant as the perpetrator of the crime which is the subject of the trial.
In Greene, defendant picked up the prosecuting witness, Ms. Rutherford, on the street, took her to a wooded area and raped her. Earlier that same day defendant, posing as a painter, gained entrance to the apartment of Ms. Elerick, forced her at knifepoint to remove her clothes, and attempted sexual intercourse with her. This Court held that:
Since both victims described defendant’s physical appearance and the clothing that he wore on the afternoon of 3 May 1976, evidence of the offenses committed against Ms. Rutherford would have been admissible in the case charging assault with intent to commit rape upon Mrs. Elerick for the purpose of establishing defendant’s identity as her assailant.
Id. at 423, 241 S.E. 2d at 665.
In State v. Freeman, 303 N.C. 299, 278 S.E. 2d 207 (1981), the prosecuting witness, Ms. Whitman, discovered the defendant standing nude in her bathroom. He committed several acts of oral sex upon her, raped her, and masturbated in front of her. Defendant challenged the admissibility of testimony by another witness, Ms. Walters, that defendant had been seen standing naked behind her house on more than forty occasions and that he would sometimes “abuse himself” in her presence. Justice Exum, writing for the majority, held that this evidence was admissible:
*111We think the testimony of Ms. Walters was probative of this question. It did tend to identify defendant as the perpetrator of the crimes against Ms. Whitman. This is so because the circumstances of the crimes charged and those of the offenses observed by Ms. Walters tend to show that both were committed by the same person. The victim, Ms. Whitman, testified that when she first observed her assailant he was standing naked in her bathroom. After he raped her he masturbated in her presence. Ms. Walters testified that she had on numerous occasions observed defendant on her premises in her presence standing naked and that on some of these occasions defendant would masturbate.
Id. at 302, 278 S.E. 2d at 209.
Had the Court in Freeman adopted today’s majority’s new test of “significant differences” a different result would have been compelled. However, the Freeman Court properly emphasized the similarities between the two crimes, ie., that defendant on both occasions appeared naked and masturbated.
In State v. Leggett, 305 N.C. 213, 287 S.E. 2d 832 (1982), defendant came out of a parking deck, accosted the eighteen year old prosecuting witness, Ms. Martin, on the street. Threatening her with a knife, he dragged Ms. Martin into an alley. He demanded that she “give [him] what [he] want[ed],” and that she have oral sex with him. Defendant lay on top of Ms. Martin, tried unsuccessfully to insert his penis into her vagina, and finally reached a climax while lying on top of her. A month after this incident, defendant came out from a parking lot and accosted fifteen year old Porshe Mosely on a street, dragged her behind some apartments and, holding a knife to her throat, exposed his penis, demanding that “if [she] didn’t give him some he was going to kill [her].” Defendant then began dragging Ms. Mosely to a nearby church field at which point she called to a friend for help and escaped. This Court, in an opinion authored by Justice Mitchell, held that Ms. Mosely’s testimony was admissible for purposes of identifying the defendant as the perpetrator of the attack against Ms. Martin, noting the following similarities: (1) In each case the perpetrator came from a parking area in the vicinity of a church and grabbed a teenage woman on the public streets; (2) in each case the perpetrator held a knife on the victim and proceeded to *112drag her to a secluded area from which he had more than one route of escape; and (3) the manner in which the perpetrator in each situation exposed himself to the young woman while holding a knife on her as well as the manner of his demands that they commit sexual acts with him were substantially the same. Id. at 224, 287 S.E. 2d at 839.1 The Court did not note differences, significant or otherwise, between the two attacks.
In the case sub judice, not only are the similarities between the two crimes more numerous than in Greene, Freeman, or Leggett, but they point unerringly to the fact that both crimes were committed by the same person. It is to these similarities, both in number and significance, to which this Court should more properly refer in determining whether Ms. Davenport’s testimony was properly admissible:
(1) The victims in both attacks were approximately the same age — i.e., Lisa Burton was 27 years old at the time of trial, and Ms. Davenport was 31 years old at the time of trial.
(2) The sexual attacks on both women occurred inside buildings which were under the control of the victims, in which the victims were alone at the time of the attacks, and in which the attacker entered without invitation.
(3) In both attacks, the attacker wanted or needed and, therefore, forced the victim to engage in oral sex prior to intercourse or attempted intercourse.
(4) In both attacks, the attacker used a knife as a weapon to gain control of the victims after the victims pushed him away.
(5) In both attacks, the attacker instilled the fear of death in his victims.
(6) In both attacks, the attacker sought the victims’ money.
(7) Both attacks occurred in Greensboro within less than a two month period.
*113I would vote to affirm defendant’s conviction.
Chief Justice BRANCH and Justice COPELAND join in this dissent.

. While the defendant in Leggett later admitted from the stand that he was then serving a sentence for the other crime, that circumstance was not considered in determining the admissibility of Ms. Mosely’s testimony.