Court Opinion

ID: 9518632
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 00:57:47.1097+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:29:40.872700
License: Public Domain

SULLIVAN, Judge,
dissenting.
I concur in the decision of the majority to review the merits of Browning's claim of sentencing error. I dissent, however, from the majority's affirmance of the sentences.
*1320The trial court did, as noted by the majority, give a lengthy statement with regard to balancing mitigating and aggravating factors. In the final analysis, however, it is clear that the court's sentences were the result of three aggravating factors: (1) the nature of the offense; (2) the age of the boy[s]; and (8) the age of the defendant.
One of the two boys here involved was age nine; the other was thirteen or fourteen. The age of the boys is clearly reflected in the felony classifications of the convictions, one a class B felony, the other a class C felony. Where, as here, the victim's age is a material element of the crime, it may not also constitute an aggravating circumstance. Tague v. State (1989) Ind., 539 N.E.2d 480; Stewart v. State (1988) Ind., 581 N.E.2d 1146. But see Stanger v. State (1989) lst Dist.Ind.App., 545 N.E.2d 1105, in which the court implied that under some circumstances age, although an element of the crime, might be "particularly aggravating". 545 N.E.2d at 1119. In Stanger, as in Tague and Stewart, there were other aggravating factors separate and apart from the age of the victim. Here, in my view, there are no other appropriate or cognizable aggrava-tors.
In specifying "the nature of the offense" it does not appear that the trial court was considering some particularly heinous circumstances surrounding the acts. Rather, it appears that the "nature of the offense", ie. the act of child molesting, was considered to be, in and of itself, an aggravating circumstance. We have previously held that an enhanced sentence is not justified by merely alluding to "the nature of the offenses and the background [of the defendant]." Hickman v. State (1989) 2nd Dist. Ind.App., 537 N.E.2d 64.
The majority refers to the "nature of the offense" as dealing with violation of the position of trust as between Browning and the boys. I have grave doubt that there was a relationship of trust involved in the commercial sex arrangement between Browning and the older boy. Be that as it may, there is an element of trust or of fear in virtually every sexual relationship between an adult and a child. To this extent, therefore, it is inherent in the crime itself and should not be considered as an aggravating factor. See Campbell v. State (1990) 4th Dist.Ind.App., 551 N.E.2d 1164 (Sullivan, J. dissenting); Linger v. State (1987) 4th Dist.Ind.App., 508 N.E.2d 56.
I wholly fail to see how the age of the defendant, here twenty-seven, is in and of itself an aggravating factor. The trial court did not place that factor in any particular context and we are left to our conjecture as to how, if at all, Browning's age justifies the twenty-six year sentence.
Because I find no adequately stated aggravating circumstance, I would reverse and remand with instructions to resentence the defendant. Day v. State (1990) Ind., 560 N.E.2d 641.