Hillard v. Commonwealth

158 S.W.3d 758, 2005 WL 384778
CourtKentucky Supreme Court
DecidedApril 22, 2005
Docket2002-SC-0702-MR
StatusPublished
Cited by11 cases

This text of 158 S.W.3d 758 (Hillard v. Commonwealth) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Kentucky Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Hillard v. Commonwealth, 158 S.W.3d 758, 2005 WL 384778 (Ky. 2005).

Opinions

COOPER, Justice.

Appellant, Kevin Ray Hillard, was convicted by an Ohio Circuit Court jury of one count of unlawful transaction with a minor in the first degree, KRS 530.064(1), a Class B felony, for knowingly inducing A.W., age fifteen, to engage in illegal sexual activity; and one count of unlawful transaction with a minor in the third degree, KRS 530.070(1)(a), a Class A misdemeanor, for knowingly giving an alcoholic beverage to N.M., age seventeen. He was sentenced to twenty years in prison for the felony conviction and to twelve months in the Ohio County Detention Center and a $500.00 fine for the misdemeanor. He appeals to this Court as a matter of right, Ky. Const. § 110(2)(b), asserting reversible error in the following respects: (1) insufficiency of the evidence to sustain either conviction; (2) exclusion of evidence of the victim’s sexual history; (3) juror misconduct when a prospective juror failed to answer questions propounded during voir dire; and (4) prosecutorial misconduct consisting of (a) the issuance of extrajudicial subpoenas to require two witnesses to appear at the prosecutor’s office for ex parte interviews; (b) intimidation of a defense witness by threatening to charge the witness with perjury; (c) failure to provide discovery of notes taken during a witness interview that were used during cross-examination of the witness at trial; and (d) use of those notes to introduce into evidence the unsworn statements of the witness. The Commonwealth concedes that the evidence was insufficient to convict Appellant of the offense of unlawful transaction with a minor in the third degree. Thus, we vacate the conviction and sentences imposed for that offense. Finding no other reversible error, we affirm the conviction and sentence imposed for unlawful transaction with a minor in the first degree.

I. SUFFICIENCY OF THE EVIDENCE.

KRS 530.064(1) provides, inter alia:

A person is guilty of unlawful transaction with a minor in the first degree when he knowingly induces, assists, or causes a minor to engage in illegal sexual activity....

On the night of June 29-30, 2001, Appellant, who was then at least twenty-nine years of age,1 hosted a party at his residence in Beaver Dam, Ohio County, Ken[761]*761tucky, that was attended by A.W. and N.M., both minors, and four or five other persons who were adults. A.W. testified at trial that while he and Appellant were in a bathroom, Appellant offered to pay him twenty dollars if he would “fist” Appellant. A.W. agreed and removed a condom from his pocket and placed it over his fist. Appellant bent over the bathtub and pulled down his pants. A.W. then inserted his fist into Appellant’s anus. According to A.W., Appellant asked him to hit him and call him names while performing this act. Another witness testified that Appellant later boasted to her that A.W. had “fisted” him and that it “felt great.”

Since KRS 580.064(1) does not further identify “illegal sexual activity,” except to exclude offenses involving minors defined in KRS Chapter 581 (pornography) and KRS 529.030 (promoting prostitution in the first degree), inquiry into other sections of the penal code is required in order to determine whether “fisting,” as performed by A.W., was an “illegal sexual activity.” See Young v. Commonwealth, 968 S.W.2d 670, 672 (Ky.1998).

The Commonwealth posits that the conduct described by A.W. violated KRS 529.020 (prostitution), which proscribes “engag[ing] or agree[ing] or offer[ing] to engage in sexual conduct with another person in return for a fee.” However, for purposes of KRS Chapter 529, “sexual conduct” is defined as “sexual intercourse or any act of sexual gratification involving the sex organs.” Neither a fist nor an anus is a “sex organ.” See State v. Anthony, 179 Or. 282, 169 P.2d 587 (1946) (instruction properly differentiated between victim’s anus and sexual organ); cf. KRS 510.010(1) (differentiating between an anus and a sexual organ by defining deviate sexual intercourse as “any act of sexual gratification involving the sex organs of one person and the mouth or anus of another”). Nor was the conduct described by A.W. “sexual intercourse.” Although KRS 510.010(1) includes “penetration of the anus of one person by a foreign object manipulated by another person” within the definition of “deviate sexual intercourse,” and KRS 510.010(8) includes the “penetration of the sex organs of one person by a foreign object manipulated by another person,” within the definition of “sexual intercourse,” KRS 510.010(9) defines “foreign object” as “anything used in the commission of a sexual act other than the person of the actor.” (Emphasis added.) We further note that the jury instruction on unlawful transaction with a minor in the first degree did not include payment of a fee as an element of the offense but did include AW.’s age, which is an element of that offense but is not an element of the offense of prostitution. It is, however, an element of the offense of promoting prostitution in the first degree, which, as noted supra, is specifically excluded from illegal sexual activity constituting unlawful transaction with a minor in the first degree.

However, the conduct described by A.W. did violate KRS 510.130(1), which provides that a person commits the offense of sexual abuse in the third degree when:

(a) He subjects another person to sexual contact without the latter’s consent.
(b) In any prosecution under this section, it is a defense that:
1. The other person’s lack of consent was due solely to incapacity to consent by reason of being less than sixteen (16) years old; and
2. The other person was at least fourteen (14) years old; and
3. The actor was less than five (5) years older than the other person.

A.W. was fifteen years of age, thus statutorily incapable of consent, KRS 510.020(3)(a), and Appellant was more than five years older than A.W. Thus, the issue [762]*762becomes whether “fisting” constitutes “sexual contact.”2

KRS 510.010

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Related

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567 S.W.3d 615 (Court of Appeals of Kentucky, 2019)
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Commonwealth v. Peters
353 S.W.3d 592 (Kentucky Supreme Court, 2011)
Woolfolk v. Commonwealth
339 S.W.3d 411 (Kentucky Supreme Court, 2011)
Moorman v. Commonwealth
325 S.W.3d 325 (Kentucky Supreme Court, 2010)
Hillard v. Commonwealth
158 S.W.3d 758 (Kentucky Supreme Court, 2005)

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Bluebook (online)
158 S.W.3d 758, 2005 WL 384778, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/hillard-v-commonwealth-ky-2005.