Court Opinion

ID: 9660216
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 22:07:53.065681+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:14:16.537961
License: Public Domain

BUTTS, Justice,
concurring.
I concur in the judgment. Yet, there is a matter left untouched by the majority opinion. Simply because mistake of fact may be a defense to a variety of prosecutions in Texas, must a trial judge be obliged to submit an instruction on mistake of fact to a jury, given suitable evidence of the issue, in a case such as the instant one? Or might the judge properly refuse to submit the defensive issue to the jury? The majority opinion states: “Had appellant introduced [sufficient evidence of] this defense to the acts of intercourse relied upon the State to convict, appellant would have been entitled to an instruction on defense of mistake of fact.”
Texas has followed the majority law of this nation in statutory rape cases, Tex.Penal Code Ann. § 21.09 (Vernon Supp.1981), when mistake of fact is presented as a defense.
“Where the offense is in having connection with a child under the age of consent, belief on the part of the defendant that she was over the age of consent, and that, therefore, consent on her part would prevent the act from being criminal, cannot be shown. Connection with a child under the age of consent being criminal, one who has connection with a female which would, in any event, be unlawful, must know at his peril whether her age is such as to make the act a rape.”
Edens v. State, 43 S.W. 89 (1897) (omitting authorities cited, many from other jurisdictions). The Edens court quoted Bish.St. Crimes, § 490:
“While ... no one is ever punishable for any act in violation of law whereto, without his fault or carelessness, he was impelled by an innocent mistake of facts, this rule does not free a man from the guilt of his offense by reason of his believing, on whatever evidence, that the girl is above the statutory age. His intent to violate the laws of morality and the good order of society, though with the consent of the girl, and though in a case where he supposes he shall escape punishment, satisfies the demands of society, and he must take the consequences.”
Manning v. State, 43 Tex.Cr. 302, 65 S.W. 920 (1901) does not deviate from the same reasoning. Regarding the rape of a child, the Model Penal Code 213.6(1) provides: “When the criminality depends on a child’s being below the age of 10, it is then, and only then, no defense that the actor believed the child to be older.” That Code would permit a bonafide and reasonable mistake as to the age of the child to be recognized as a defense, mistake of fact, if the child is above the age of ten.
In the instant case the prosecutrix’s chronological age was twenty-five. Unre-*940futed and striking evidence showed her mental age to be “six to eight years at the most.” The inescapable conclusion is that she, no more than a child of those tender years, did not possess the capable know-ledgeability and judgment to resist the act of sexual intercourse.
Because the portion of the instant offense dealing with mental defect dwells within the “consent” part of the rape statute, Tex. Penal Code Ann. § 21.02(b)(4) (Vernon Supp.1981), it is argued this indicates that any defense of lack of consent, including mistake of fact, may be raised at trial. It may well be that the Legislature and not the courts should address the question.
The doctrine of mistake of fact or honest belief should have no application to this character of offense. The age-old rule in statutory rape cases should apply when the female’s mental age is proven to be that of a mere child.