State v. Scanlon

982 A.2d 1268, 2009 R.I. LEXIS 127, 2009 WL 3833971
CourtSupreme Court of Rhode Island
DecidedNovember 17, 2009
Docket2007-330-C.A
StatusPublished
Cited by18 cases

This text of 982 A.2d 1268 (State v. Scanlon) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Rhode Island primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
State v. Scanlon, 982 A.2d 1268, 2009 R.I. LEXIS 127, 2009 WL 3833971 (R.I. 2009).

Opinion

OPINION

Justice FLAHERTY,

for the Court.

I

Sometime after midnight on March 2, 2003, Janet S. 1 left Buddy’s, a bar in Woonsocket. Janet, an admitted drug addict and prostitute, had spent most of the previous afternoon and evening consuming drugs, including cocaine, as well as a prodigious amount of alcohol. 2 She was, in her own words, “wasted” and having trouble walking. Despite her condition, Janet was on her way home to meet one of her drug suppliers, from whom she intended to procure a “seventy piece,” an amount of cocaine that costs $70. 3

As Janet made her way along Arnold Street, a vehicle, possibly a Jeep Cherokee or a Ford Bronco, slowed to the curb and a man asked her if she “wanted to party.” Janet understood that to mean that she would have sex with the man for money, or use drugs with him, or both, and so she got into the truck. Once inside, she and the driver quickly agreed that she would provide him with sexual services in exchange for $40. Although she did not initially recognize the driver, Janet later remembered that about two months before March 2, 2003, she had been hired for sex by the same man in exchange for $40. Also, Janet remembered that although the driver drove the same truck on that earlier occasion, she said the vehicle’s color had been changed. She was, however, unable to recall whether the vehicle was red or gray on March 2, 2003. After Janet got into the vehicle, the driver proceeded to the Sovereign Bank on Social Street in Woonsocket where he withdrew $100 from the automatic teller machine (ATM).

Once the couple left the Sovereign Bank, however, Janet’s fortunes took a decided turn for the worse. Because she suddenly felt “weird” and desired to just go home, Janet asked the driver to drive her to her home rather than party. She directed the driver to take a left toward Providence Street. Instead, however, the driver took a sharp right toward Blackstone Street, and he suddenly became enraged at Janet. Just as suddenly,, the driver began to stab Janet with a screwdriver in the head, face, and neck. As he assaulted her, the driver pressed Janet’s head to the seat and yelled at her to “shut up you whore you,” also calling her a “no good crack head whore.”

Eventually the assailant brought the truck to a stop among several abandoned mills in northwestern Woonsocket. He continued to persistently prod the screwdriver into Janet’s head, face, and neck— which were now bleeding profusely — and he ordered her to remove the money from her pocket. Janet complied. Next, the driver ordered Janet to remove her cloth *1271 ing. She took everything off except her socks.

The driver penetrated Janet digitally, all the while berating and threatening her. Eventually the driver ceased these actions, reached across Janet to open the passenger’s door, and then literally kicked her out of the truck into the cold, snowy March night, wearing nothing but her socks.

Unfortunately, this was not the end of Janet’s troubles that night because the driver followed her out of the truck. Although she struggled to resist her assailant, the man threw Janet down on the ground and sexually assaulted her again. Then, the assailant dragged her over to the truck and forced Janet to get on her knees in the snow and perform oral sex on him. Throughout this entire encounter, the driver continued to punch Janet with his fists. He also pulled the hair out of her scalp, and repeatedly stabbed her with the screwdriver. Finally, the attacker grabbed her right arm, yanking it back with enough force so that she could feel her shoulder snap.

The assailant turned a deaf ear to Janet’s pleas to return at least some of her clothes as a protection against the cold and snow. After threatening to kill her if she talked to the police, he left the scene. Janet crawled into the middle of the road, where a passing motorist saw her and called the police. Officer George McMann of the Woonsocket Police Department arrived in the mill area between 2 a.m. and 2:20 a.m. to find Janet bleeding and sitting naked in the middle of Singleton Street. Janet told the officer that she had been raped and battered.

Janet was taken by rescue to Landmark Medical Center emergency room. Daniel Asiedu, M.D., conducted a physical examination of Janet on March 2, 2003. He noted that Janet had “bruises and bleeding on the center of her scalp” and “lacerations and marks on her right cheek and her right side of her neck,” along with bruising of her knees and shins. The doctor’s examination also revealed that her right arm was dislocated from her shoulder, requiring pain medication and the use of a sling.

Although she initially was reluctant to do so, Janet made a statement to police shortly after she arrived at the hospital. In her statement, Janet said the driver sexually assaulted her by forcing her to perform oral sex and by forcibly penetrating her digitally. Significantly, however, she said she never had vaginal intercourse with her assailant. 4

As to the identity of her assailant, on March 2, 2003, Janet told the officers that the driver was a blond white male. Initially, she did not remember that the driver had stopped at the Sovereign Bank ATM on Social Street. When the officers suggested the driver could be a John T., 5 Janet responded affirmatively that he was the one who committed the sexual assaults against her. In her later testimony, Janet admitted that she first told the officers that John had assaulted her because she thought it was he, and that she “just wanted it over.” But, when the officers later showed Janet a photo array containing John’s photograph, Janet did not identify him. Instead, she told the officers that she had been attacked by a younger, heavier man who did not wear glasses.

*1272 It was not until April 2003 that Janet remembered that her attacker had stopped at the Sovereign Bank on Social Street and that he had withdrawn $100. She then realized that the bank surveillance camera may have photographed him as he withdrew his money. She notified the police, who quickly learned that a withdrawal had been made at 12:55 a.m. on March 2, 2003, from the Sovereign Bank ATM from an account linked to defendant, Timothy Scanlon. A photo of the individual making the withdrawal was obtained and that photograph was included in a new photo array shown to Janet. After reviewing the array, Janet instantly picked out defendant, Timothy Scanlon, as the man who sexually assaulted her.

On April 15, 2003, Mr. Scanlon was arrested. He spoke with police, and denied that he attacked Janet. The defendant volunteered to provide a sample of his DNA; a later analysis proved that his DNA matched that extracted from Janet by anal and vaginal swabs.

Further investigation by the police revealed that on April 10, 2003, Mr. Scanlon sold a 1988 GMC Jimmy to Dennis Fleu-rant of Privilege Auto Parts in Woonsocket for use as scrap metal. Mr. Fleurant described the vehicle as gray or silver, with some blue.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
982 A.2d 1268, 2009 R.I. LEXIS 127, 2009 WL 3833971, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-scanlon-ri-2009.