State v. Hubbard

708 So. 2d 1099, 1998 WL 45009
CourtLouisiana Court of Appeal
DecidedJanuary 27, 1998
Docket97-KA-916
StatusPublished
Cited by43 cases

This text of 708 So. 2d 1099 (State v. Hubbard) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Louisiana Court of Appeal primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
State v. Hubbard, 708 So. 2d 1099, 1998 WL 45009 (La. Ct. App. 1998).

Opinion

708 So.2d 1099 (1998)

STATE of Louisiana
v.
Clarence P. HUBBARD.

No. 97-KA-916.

Court of Appeal of Louisiana, Fifth Circuit.

January 27, 1998.

*1101 Laurie A. White, Louisiana Appellate Project, New Orleans, for Defendant/Appellant Clarence Hubbard.

Paul D. Connick, Terry M. Boudreaux, Ellen S. Fantaci, District Attorney's Office, Parish of Jefferson, Gretna, for Plaintiff/Appellee State.

BOWES, Judge.

Defendant, Clarence Hubbard, appeals his conviction for aggravated rape under La. R.S. 14:42.

Following defendant's plea of not guilty, the trial court heard and denied the defendant's motions to suppress his statement and his identification by the victim. After trial, the jury found the defendant guilty as charged, and he was subsequently sentenced to life in prison without benefit of parole, probation, or suspension of sentence.

EVIDENCE AND TESTIMONY

The following facts were developed from trial testimony.

Ms. L. Johnson testified that on February 14, 1996, at about 11:00 p.m., she went to the Brown Bomber Bar on O'Conner Street in Gretna. She had one beer, played some video poker, and at about 11:45 p.m. left the bar to go across the street to her cousin's apartment. As she reached the stairs leading to the apartment, she was approached from behind by the defendant whom she had seen earlier at the bar. The defendant held a knife to the back of her neck and dragged her outside behind the apartments. The defendant forced Ms. Johnson to perform oral sex on him, then ordered her to pull her pants down and, still holding the knife on her, "had sex" with her. The defendant told her "Bitch, I'm going to suck your titties until they bleed." Ms. Johnson testified that while he was "doing it" to her, the defendant bit her nipples.

The defendant had a knife to her head during the entire encounter; he also told her that he would kill her and her children. The encounter took place on the grass.

After he raped her in the vagina, the defendant ordered Ms. Johnson to turn around so that he could "do her in the back," and at that point she pushed him down and ran. She testified that she is not sure if he ejaculated into her, and did not recall if she told Officer Cuzzort that he had. Ms. Johnson went to her cousin's house, put on some pants, and went to the Brown Bomber to call the police. She described her attacker to the police, including his clothing and the fact that he had a knife. At the time of the identification, defendant was the only person to be identified, and she had no doubt that he was the perpetrator, wearing the same clothes he had on at the time of the attack.

Officer Starrlet Cuzzort, a police officer in the Gretna Police Department, testified that in the early morning hours of February 15, 1996, she responded to an aggravated rape call. She met the victim, Ms. Johnson, outside of the Brown Bomber Bar. Officer Cuzzo testified that when she first saw the victim she saw blood on her shirt and jacket. The victim was crying at the time. Officer Cuzzort asked the victim if she was injured and the victim lifted her t-shirt, and exposed both breasts, the nipples of which were split, swollen, torn, and bleeding. Ms. Johnson told the officer that she had been accosted in the stairwell of her relative's house and subsequently raped by a man who held a knife to her throat. Ms. Johnson described the perpetrator as a black male, about 5'5", skinny, wearing an Army type jacket, armed with a folding brown handled knife, with very few teeth. Officer Cuzzo broadcast the description to Gretna headquarters and they put it out on the air for responding units to search the area for the suspect.

*1102 Ms. Johnson also led Officer Cuzzo to the scene of the rape. Officer Cuzzo noticed that in the area where the victim told her the rape took place, the grass was all "smushed down." The grass was not flattened in other parts of the yard. Officer Cuzzo took pictures of the scene. She then identified items taken from the defendant after he was brought to police headquarters, including a green jacket and a knife. A rape kit was also completed by the victim, as well as by the defendant, who combed his own pubic hairs in the presence of the officer. Photographs of the scene, as well as of the defendant taken on the night of the incident, were admitted into evidence. On cross-examination, Officer Cuzzort stated that the victim had told him that the defendant had ejaculated into her vagina.

Officer Russell Blanchard, of the Gretna Police Department, testified that after hearing the description of a rape perpetrator over the radio, he was canvassing the area and observed a suspect who matched the broadcast description. He stopped the man, the defendant, and advised him of what he was stopped for and conducted a pat-down search of the man's outer clothing. Officer Blanchard found a knife with a wood grain handle in the pocket of the defendant's coat. Officer Blanchard then transported the defendant to the Gretna Police headquarters.

Detective William Cambre of the Gretna Police Department testified that he met Officer Cuzzo and the victim at police headquarters at approximately 1:10 a.m. on February 15, 1996. He testified that at that time he told Ms. Johnson that there was a possibility that the person that committed rape against her may be in custody, and that he wanted her to view the suspect and tell Det. Cambre if the person in custody was the same man who raped her. Det. Cambre also testified that he didn't do anything that would suggest that she should pick this suspect as the perpetrator. He confirmed that the victim had given a very accurate description of the perpetrator before any identification was made. Ms. Johnson viewed the defendant from the other side of a two-way mirror and immediately identified him as the perpetrator of the rape. Det. Cambre took the victim to the hospital and collected the rape kit performed on her and transported it and her clothing back from the hospital. He also collected blood samples from both parties for testing.

Upon returning from the hospital, Det. Cambre took a statement from Ms. Johnson. Ms. Johnson told him that because of the pain she was going through with her nipples, she did not know if the perpetrator had ejaculated inside of her. Det. Cambre also took an oral statement from the defendant, in which the defendant stated that he had met the victim at the Brown Bomber but had not had sex with her.

Ms. Bonnie Duborg, a forensic scientist with the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office, testified that she tested both the defendant's and the victim's blood. The defendant and the victim in this case had the same type blood with different subtypes. Ms. Duborg testified that the victim's subtype is found in about 10% of the general population. She testified that blood found on the defendant's jacket collar was in consistent with the defendant's subtype, but was consistent with the victim's subtype; however, she could not say with certainty that it was the victim's blood. She also testified that she examined the rape kits, and found no evidence of spermatozoa or seminal fluid from the vaginal slides. She testified however, that such negative finding does not indicate that intercourse did not take place. Approximately six percent of the black population, and 10 percent of the general population, have the same blood type and subtype as that of the victim.

Charles Krone, a forensic scientist with the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office, testified that he examined the combed pubic hairs from both the victim and the defendant in this case.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
708 So. 2d 1099, 1998 WL 45009, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-hubbard-lactapp-1998.