Court Opinion

ID: 9612002
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 04:02:35.450029+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:28:46.940437
License: Public Domain

Fletcher, Presiding Justice,
dissenting in part.
Although I reluctantly conclude that the state is now required to prove force in an aggravated sodomy case as a logical extension of our recent decision in State v. Collins,11 disagree with the majority opinion’s unsupported conclusion that there was no evidence of force in this case. Therefore, I dissent.
We have repeatedly stated that “only a minimal amount of evidence” is required to prove the element of force in a rape case involving a child.2 The same standard should apply in aggravated sodomy cases involving child victims. The defendant’s own police statement meets that standard in this case; he told police that he had “pulled [his stepdaughter’s] panties down and licked her vaginal area.” In addition, the victim told a police detective and a friend that Brewer would take her hand and place it on his penis. Finally, the victim, who is classified as mildly impaired intellectually, testified that she was “kind of afraid” of her stepfather and told others that she had not said anything earlier because she was scared of him and afraid he would try to hurt her and her mother. Her trial testimony denying that her stepfather used force is not decisive, but merely raises a disputed issue of fact for the jury. Because the state presented sufficient evidence for a jury to find that the defendant used force to commit aggravated sodomy against his 11-year-old stepdaughter, the state should have the choice of retrying Brewer on the aggravated sodomy count in addition to having him sentenced on the aggravated child molestation count.
By ignoring that an adult is using force and intimidation when *609he pulls downs the underpants of a pre-teen girl, the majority has implicitly rewritten our rule that only a minimal amount of force is required to prove the element of force in sexual assault cases. If I had known at the time that I wrote the decision in Collins that we were going to abandon the long-time rule about the degree of force necessary, I would have advocated a different holding in that case. For as Justice Weltner stated in Cooper, which we overrule today, “Sexual acts directed to [a five-year-old] child are, in law, forcible and against the will.”3
Decided November 1, 1999.
Michael R. McCarthy, for appellant.
Kermit N. McManus, District Attorney, Stephen E. Spencer, Matthew A. Rankin, Assistant District Attorneys, for appellee.
James C. Bonner, Jr., Brenda J. Bernstein, Davis, Zipperman, Kirschenbaum & Lotito, Nicholas A. Lotito, amici curiae.

 Cooper v. State, 256 Ga. 631 (352 SE2d 382) (1987).

 270 Ga. 42 (508 SE2d 390) (1998).

 See, e.g., id. at 44-45.