In re Clive C.

16 Misc. 3d 791
CourtNew York City Family Court
DecidedJune 26, 2007
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 16 Misc. 3d 791 (In re Clive C.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering New York City Family Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
In re Clive C., 16 Misc. 3d 791 (N.Y. Super. Ct. 2007).

Opinion

OPINION OF THE COURT

Mary E. Bednar, J.

The respondent has brought a motion to dismiss the instant petition. The following are my findings of fact and conclusions of law.

The Facts

On April 25, 2007 the presentment agency filed a petition alleging that “on or about, a date in December 1999” the respondent committed acts which were he an adult would have constituted the crimes of criminal sexual act in the first degree (Penal Law § 130.50 [3]), sexual abuse in the first degree (Penal Law § 130.65 [3]), sexual misconduct (Penal Law § 130.20 [2]), and sexual abuse in the third degree (Penal Law § 130.55). At the time of the alleged acts, the respondent was nine years old and the complainant was five.

The respondent has filed a motion to dismiss the petition. He argues that the time between his alleged acts and the filing of the petition constitutes a violation of his right to a speedy fact-finding and that the time period specified for the alleged acts is impermissibly broad. The respondent also asks that I dismiss the petition in the furtherance of justice. The presentment agency filed answering papers in which it opposes dismissal.

On June 7, 2007 I held a hearing to determine whether the seven-year delay between the alleged acts and the filing of the instant petition violated the respondent’s due process rights. At the hearing the complainant, Carl R, and the complainant’s mother, Magdalia R, testified for the presentment agency. The respondent did not present any evidence. After the hearing, I reserved decision.

Carl R testified that the respondent is his stepbrother by his mother’s marriage to the respondent’s father. In December 1999, Carl, his mother and his stepfather lived in the same household. The respondent lived with his mother and would visit Carl’s family about three times a year. These visits coincided with major holidays.

In December 1999, during one of these visits, Carl and the respondent were in a bathtub when the respondent told Carl to put his penis in his mouth. Carl refused.

The respondent took a yellow plastic knife and, while placing it against Carl’s neck, threatened to kill him and his family if [793]*793he didn’t do as told. The plastic knife was from a toy science kit that Carl and the respondent received for Christmas, and was used to cut open plastic bugs.

Following the threat, Carl put the respondent’s penis in his mouth, for about 10 seconds. Carl then went to the opposite side of the tub, and with his back to the respondent, played with his toys. The respondent pushed Carl down and put his penis in his butt for about five seconds. Carl testified that it felt “like pooping but the other way.” (Transcript, June 7, 2007, at 20, line 6.)

After the assault the respondent climbed out of the tub and left the bathroom. Carl testified that the bathtub incident took place around noon time on a Saturday while his mother was cooking a large breakfast in the kitchen and his stepfather was sleeping.

The next day Carl told the respondent that he was going to tell on him. The respondent said that nobody would believe him. The respondent then purposefully spilled milk on a new sofa and said that he wouldn’t get punished for spilling the milk.

Carl’s mother cleaned up the milk and the respondent didn’t get punished, which made the respondent seem invincible. Carl testified that he was frightened by the threat the respondent made in the bathtub, and that he pushed the incident out of his mind.

In 2004 Carl’s mother and stepfather separated, and the respondent stopped visiting. In December 2004 Carl’s mother told him that she had been sexually abused by an uncle when she was a child.

This revelation prompted Carl to write in his diary that he had been raped by his stepbrother. Carl told the court that he had been keeping journals since age four, but had never before written about the incident in the bathtub.

Two or three weeks after he wrote the journal entry about being raped, Carl’s mother found the journal and asked him about the incident. Carl told his mother what happened. Carl’s mother asked him to tell the respondent’s father about the incident, but when Carl and his stepfather met to talk about the sex abuse, Carl denied that anything happened. Carl’s mother kept after Carl to tell the truth and eventually he did. Carl testified that his denials were attributable to his fear of the threat made by the respondent in the bathtub. He also testified that during [794]*794the period that he kept quiet about the abuse, he planned to tell people about it when he turned 13.

After telling his mother the truth about the sex abuse Carl began once-a-week sessions with the director of his school’s after-school program, and they talked about the abuse. The sessions took place every Friday for a year from 2005 to 2006, until the after-school director took a new job. When the after-school director left, Carl told a teacher about the sex abuse and the teacher sent Carl to a guidance counselor. The guidance counselor called the police.

On cross-examination Carl testified that he wrote his journal entry about the sex abuse soon after his mother and stepfather had separated. When asked why he didn’t tell anyone about the sex abuse after the respondent stopped visiting, Carl said that he was still frightened by the respondent’s threat. The following exchange then occurred between Carl and defense counsel:

“Q: But Anthony
“A: Yes.” (Transcript, June 7, 2007, at 37, lines 3-6.)

The last time that Carl saw the respondent was after the separation. It was a holiday and Carl and the respondent played video games together.

Magdalia R. testified that Carl is her son. She is married to the respondent’s father, and they have a six-year-old child together.

Ms. R. told the court that in December 2005 she found Carl’s journal lying face down and open on a reading table while she was cleaning. She read the page the journal was open to which said that Carl had been “raped by Anthony.” (Transcript, June 7, 2007, at 47, line 21.)

When Ms. R. asked Carl about the journal entry he expressed anger that his mother had read his journal. Then he said that he had been touched by the respondent.

Ms. R. told the respondent’s father what Carl had said, and dropped Carl off at his workplace so that Carl could tell him what happened. But the respondent’s father told Ms. R. that Carl denied that anything happened with the respondent. Ms. R. then sat down with Carl and the respondent’s father, and Carl again denied that anything happened.

[795]*795Ms. R. searched Carl’s room for other diaries he may have written, and came across a journal entry in which Carl said he should have told the truth about being abused by the respondent. Ms. R. showed this journal entry to Carl, who said that the story about the sex abuse was true.

After this latest revelation, Ms. R. enrolled Carl in an after-school therapy program, which he attended between December 2005 and November 2006. It was sometime during this period that Ms. R. learned the full extent of the alleged abuse. Before this she believed that only touching had been involved.

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Related

Matter of Clive C.
2007 NY Slip Op 27262 (NYC Family Court, 2007)

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Bluebook (online)
16 Misc. 3d 791, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/in-re-clive-c-nycfamct-2007.