Colombo v. State

78 A. 595, 25 Del. 28, 2 Boyce 28, 1910 Del. LEXIS 66
CourtSupreme Court of Delaware
DecidedOctober 17, 1910
DocketNo. 2
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 78 A. 595 (Colombo v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Delaware primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Colombo v. State, 78 A. 595, 25 Del. 28, 2 Boyce 28, 1910 Del. LEXIS 66 (Del. 1910).

Opinion

Woolley, J.

delivering the opinion of the court:

George Colombo, the plaintiff in error, was charged by indictment with the crime of rape upon one Mary Lefkowicy, and upon trial was found guilty. After judgment and sentence, he obtained from this court a writ of error, in support of which he filed an assignment of errors containing eight specifications.

First. Prior to the admission of the testimony which is specified as error under the first assignment, Dr. Wales was produced as a witness for the state and testified, without objection, that shortly after the arrest of the prisoner he examined the prosecutrix, who was a child of tender years, and found her hymen ruptured and inflamed, and that this condition indicated either a partial or complete penetration of the female organ by some foreign body.

Dr. De Lacour, having been produced as a witness for the state and having testified that she had examined the private parts of the prosecutrix, was asked to describe their condition. Upon objection, Dr. De Lacour was withdrawn pending the recall of the prosecutrix, who, having previously testified that the prisoner had effected an entrance into her body, was asked if any one other than the prisoner had so entered her. Upon objection by the prisoner, it was urged for the state that the evidence was admissible in con[30]*30nection with the testimony of Dr. Wales, in respect to the child’s ruptured and inflamed hymen, as tending to prove that if no one other than the prisoner had entered her, it must have been the prisoner who created that condition, and that evidence which restricted to the prisoner acts of sexual intercourse with the prosecutrix, was proper and necessary to make relevant the testimony to be given by Dr. De Lacour, that the child was infected by a venereal disease contracted by sexual intercourse.

The court overruled the objection and admitted the answer, which upon exception, constitutes the prisoner’s first assignment of error. The substance of the answer of the prosecutrix was that no one other than the prisoner had ever entered her.

It therefore appears that the testimony of the prosecutrix that the prisoner was the only man who had improperly known her, was admitted as supplementary to the testimony of Dr. Wales and as preliminary to the testimony of Dr. De Lacour. As Dr. Wales had testified that the hymen had been ruptured by a foreign body, it was in our opinion proper and material to admit testimony, which, if true, would tend to prove by exclusion, that the rupture of the hymen was caused by a penetration effected by the prisoner. As Dr. De Lacour was produced to show an infected condition of the private parts of the prosecutrix, by which sexual intercourse was intended to be proven and one element of the crime of rape thereby established, it was necessary, in order to make material the testimony of the physician, to admit testimony that restricted sexual intercourse to the prisoner, so as to negative the possibility of the prosecutrix haying contracted the disease from some one else. People v. Duncan, 104 Mich. 460, 62 N. W. 556.

We are of opinion that the evidence was properly admitted in connection with the testimony of Dr. Wales, as well as in preparation for the testimony of Dr. De Lacour, and therefore find no error shown by the first assignment.

Second and Third. Dr. De Lacour, having been recalled, was directed to describe the condition of the private parts of the prosecutrix. Upon objection by the prisoner, it was urged for the state that the testimony was offered to prove an infected condition of the female organs, caused by sexual intercourse, and thereby to [31]*31prove first a penetravit, and second that the prosecutrix contracted the disease from the prisoner, who, upon further proof, would be shown to have been infected with the same disease. The court overruled the objections to this and to another question that related to the manner in which the disease was acquired, which upon exceptions constitute together the prisoner’s second and third assignments of error. The substance of the answers is that the witness examined the private parts of the prosecutrix in the last week in May following the month of March, in the early part of which the crime is alleged to have been committed, and found her suffering from syphilis in its secondary stage, conveyed to her by sexual intercourse, anywhere from six weeks to three months before.

Sexual penetration of the prosecutrix by the accused is a necessary element of the crime of rape, to establish which the prosecution must prove sexual intercourse, which includes and means sexual penetration. Sexual intercourse may be proved either by direct evidence, when the case admits of it, or by circumstantial evidence, when the case requires it, showing a situation or condition, from which the act of penetration is deduced as a necessary inference. Proof of marks of violence or injury to the private parts of a prosecutrix is uniformly admitted as evidence of circumstances from which sexual intercourse may be inferred and by which sexual penetration may be established; so proof of the presence of a venereal disease in the private parts, together with proof that the particular disease could not have been so contracted except by sexual intercourse, is likewise proof of sexual penetration, and constitutes evidence proper to be submitted to a jury. It is to the admission of testimony of this latter character that the prisoner has excepted, yet we can see no distinction between an injury to the private parts resulting from violence, as proof of a penetravit, and a venereal disease that may be contracted only by entrance, as evidence of a penetration. The authorities support each proposition alike, and in principle, make no distinction between them. Sigerella v. State, 1 Boyce, 157, 74 Atl. 1081; Brauer v. State, 25 Wis. 413; State v. Carnagy, 106 Iowa 483, 76 N. W. 805; Taylor v. State, 111 Ind. 279, 12 N. E. 400; White v. Commonwealth, 96 Ky. 180, 28 S. W. 340; Lam Yee v. [32]*32State, 132 Wis. 527, 112 N. W. 425; 33 Cyc. 1487; Underhill on Crim. Ev. 413.

In the case of Lam Yee v. State, 132 Wis. 527, 112 N. W. 425, the prosecutrix testified to the penetration by the prisoner, in support of which there was testimony that a short time after the date of the offense, the prosecutrix was found to be afflicted with a venereal disease of a character and stage indicating that it was communicated to her at about the date of the offense. To counteract the effect of this testimony the accused testified that he had no such disease.

In ruling on an objection to the argument of counsel, the court said, in substance, that if the evidence of the prosecutrix that the prisoner had intercourse with her be true, and the evidence that she was infected with a venereal disease, contracted at about the time of the intercourse, likewise be true, it is proper for the jury to infer that the prisoner was afflicted with the same disease at the time of the abuse. Upon exception to this statement of the trial court, the Supreme Court, on writ of error, “considered that no error was committed in respect to the matter. The purpose of the evidence as to the girl’s condition was to show circumstantially that she had been abused by some male person. It was legitimate for that purpose.

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Bluebook (online)
78 A. 595, 25 Del. 28, 2 Boyce 28, 1910 Del. LEXIS 66, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/colombo-v-state-del-1910.