State v. Rodrigue

441 So. 2d 1274
CourtLouisiana Court of Appeal
DecidedNovember 22, 1983
Docket83 KA 0256
StatusPublished
Cited by13 cases

This text of 441 So. 2d 1274 (State v. Rodrigue) 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. Rodrigue, 441 So. 2d 1274 (La. Ct. App. 1983).

Opinion

441 So.2d 1274 (1983)

STATE of Louisiana
v.
Robert J. RODRIGUE.

No. 83 KA 0256.

Court of Appeal of Louisiana, First Circuit.

November 22, 1983.
Rehearing Denied December 22, 1983.

*1276 James Alcock, Asst. Dist. Atty., Houma, for plaintiff and appellee.

Joseph R. Raggio, Baton Rouge, for defendant and appellant.

Before LOTTINGER, EDWARDS and ALFORD, JJ.

ALFORD, Judge.

Defendant, Robert J. Rodrigue, was charged by grand jury indictment with the crimes of aggravated kidnapping in violation of LSA-R.S. 14:44 on Count 1 and aggravated crime against nature in violation of LSA-R.S. 14:89.1 on Count 2. Defendant was tried by a twelve-person jury, found guilty as charged on both counts, and sentenced to life imprisonment at hard labor without benefit of probation, parole or suspension of sentence on Count 1, and fifteen (15) years at hard labor on Count 2, to run consecutively with the sentence received on Count 1. Defendant now appeals his convictions and sentences, alleging 16 assignments of error, and briefing 12 assignments of error in three arguments. The defendant has expressly abandoned four of his assignments of error and we will not consider them in this opinion. Rule 2-12.4, Uniform Rules—Courts of Appeal. Additionally, after a short outline of the facts, we will address defendant's assignments in the three argument format suggested by defendant's brief.

Although the testimony is sometimes directly in conflict, it appears certain that on September 21, 1979, Linda Reeves, a resident of Mississippi who was in Houma only temporarily, had just concluded a shopping trip to the local mall. At this point, Linda was to be home in about a half-hour to help her mother cook supper for her stepfather. As she proceeded through an intersection, the defendant allegedly hollered from his 18 wheel truck (without the float) that Linda's car was smoking. Concerned because it was her stepfather's car, Linda crossed the intersection and turned on to Coteau Road where she pulled the car over on the shoulder of the road. The defendant pulled up behind her. After he inquired as to the car's condition, Linda testified that without *1277 warning or provocation, the defendant grabbed Linda's hair, began slapping her, and forced her into the cab of his truck. Shoving Mrs. Reeves into the sleeping compartment of the cab, the defendant then tied her hands and feet with some kind of wire. Subsequent to this, the testimony of Mrs. Reeves is that the defendant tore open her blouse and pulled her pants down; at this point, the defendant got behind the wheel and drove for a few miles. (The defendant testified he stopped at a school nearby).

After striking the victim several more times and cussing the female gender in general, the defendant then forced Linda to perform oral sex upon him. Although she testified the defendant threatened many times to kill her, Linda thought because she sympathized with his marital problems the defendant released her after it became dark with the threat to kill her if she told anyone what he had done. Linda drove back to her mother's trailer where she immediately took a shower and left with her mother-in-law to return to Mississippi. Linda's mother testified that she noticed marks and abrasions on Linda's arms and ankles, testifying that these marks appeared to be the result of something tied too tightly that had cut into the skin. Later, Linda's step-father called the local sheriff's office. The investigators arrived a short time after Linda departed for Mississippi. Subsequently, the defendant was indicted by the grand jury and unanimously convicted after deliberations of only 19 minutes. Defendant then filed this appeal.

ARGUMENT NO. 1

(Assignments of Error Nos. 6, 7, 10, 11, 12 and 13)

By this argument, defendant alleges that the prosecution failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt each and every element of the crimes with which defendant was charged, that is, the crimes of aggravated kidnapping and aggravated crime against nature.

The proper standard of appellate review for sufficiency of evidence is whether, after reviewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution, any rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt. Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 99 S.Ct. 2781, 61 L.Ed.2d 560 (1979); State v. Moore, 432 So.2d 209 (La. 1983). Aggravated kidnapping occurs when the offender forcibly seizes and carries a person from one place to another with the intent to force the victim, or some other person, to perform a sexual act, or acts, for the advantage of the offender as a condition of the release of the person seized. State v. Sonnier, 402 So.2d 650 (La.1981). Sexual gratification constitutes "something of apparent value" for the purposes of the statute defining aggravated kidnapping. Id.

LSA-R.S. 14:44 defines aggravated kidnapping and provides as follows:

§ 44 Aggravated kidnapping
Aggravated kidnapping is the doing of any of the following acts with the intent thereby to force the victim, or some other person, to give up anything of apparent present or prospective value, or to grant any advantage or immunity, in order to secure a release of the person under the offender's actual or apparent control:
(1) The forcible seizing and carrying of any person from one place to another; or
(2) The enticing or persuading of any person to go from one place to another; or
(3) The imprisoning or forcible secreting of any person.
Whoever commits the crime of aggravated kidnapping shall be punished by life imprisonment at hard labor without benefit of parole, probation, or suspension of sentence.

An examination of the record before us on appeal reveals that the victim was forced by defendant into his truck and was pushed by him into the compartment in the truck behind the two front seats. He slapped her repeatedly, tied her hands together and tied her feet behind her with some kind of wire. Defendant then drove to a site some distance away and forced the victim to commit an act of oral sex upon him. The record *1278 further reveals that the victim identified her attacker as defendant at an in-court identification and had previously picked out his picture as her attacker as well as having previously identified him at a line-up. She further testified that defendant kept saying he was going to kill her. The victim's mother corroborated the victim's testimony that she had been tied at her wrists and ankles by testifying that her daughter's skin at her arms and ankles looked like it had been "tied real tight and cut into the skin." Defendant testified in his own behalf, saying that a sexual encounter with the female victim did take place at the time and place so determined but with the consent of the victim and that the act was one of sexual intercourse with consent. Further, he stated that the victim had entered his truck of her own accord and freely accompanied defendant down the highway to the spot where the incident took place.

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Bluebook (online)
441 So. 2d 1274, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-rodrigue-lactapp-1983.