State v. Wells

697 So. 2d 658, 1997 La. App. LEXIS 1661
CourtLouisiana Court of Appeal
DecidedJune 18, 1997
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 697 So. 2d 658 (State v. Wells) 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. Wells, 697 So. 2d 658, 1997 La. App. LEXIS 1661 (La. Ct. App. 1997).

Opinion

11 MARVIN, Chief Judge.

Lynn Ray Wells, originally charged with forcibly raping his girlfriend’s 21-year-old daughter, appeals his conviction by a jury of attempted forcible rape, claiming the evidence is insufficient to establish that he had specific intent to rape the victim, an essential element of the attempted offense. La. R.S. 14:42.1, 14:27. Though not required to do so to preserve the sufficiency issue for appellate review, Wells filed a motion for post-verdict judgment of acquittal in the trial court, which was denied. La.C.Cr.P. arts. 821, 920; State v. Green, 28,994 (La.App.2d Cir. 2/26/97), 691 So.2d 1273.

Wells’ second assignment of error concerning his adjudication as a second felony offender was not briefed and is deemed abandoned. URCA Rule 2-12.4; State v. Lewis, 577 So.2d 799 (La.App. 2d Cir.1991), writ denied. Wells does not complain of his sentence to 13 years at hard labor.

Finding the evidence sufficient to convict and no errors patent, we affirm.

ELEMENTS OF OFFENSE

An attempted forcible rape is committed when the offender has the specific intent to commit forcible rape, defined below, and does or omits an act for the purpose of and tending directly toward the accomplishing of his object, regardless of whether he would have actually accomplished his purpose under the particular circumstances. La. R.S. 14:27; State v. Doby, 540 So.2d 1008 (La.App. 2d Cir.1989), writ denied; State v. Bryant, 607 So.2d 11 (La.App. 2d Cir.1992), writ denied. Specific intent is present when the circumstances indicate that the offender actively desired the prescribed criminal consequences to' follow his act or failure to act. § 10(1).

Forcible rape is defined as vaginal or anal sexual intercourse which is deemed to be [660]*660without the victim’s consent because the victim is prevented from resisting the act by force or threats of physical violence under circumstances where |2the victim reasonably believes that such resistance would not prevent the rape. § 42.1. As with other types of rape, emission is not necessary and any vaginal or anal penetration, however slight, is sufficient to complete the crime. § 41.

The presence or absence of specific intent is a question of fact, to be resolved by the trier of fact on the basis of inferences which may reasonably be drawn from the circumstances of the incident and the defendant’s conduct. This court reviews a finding of specific intent under the standard of Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 99 S.Ct. 2781, 61 L.Ed.2d 560 (1979), by asking whether the evidence, when viewed in the light most favorable to the prosecution, allows a rational trier of fact to find that the requisite intent was established beyond a reasonable doubt. Doby, Bryant, cited supra.

FACTS

At the time of the offense in April 1995, the 39-year-old Wells had been living with Mercy Thomas, the victim’s mother, Mercy’s 21-year-old daughter Ericka, and Ericka’s three-year-old son for several years. Wells and Mercy Thomas shared the back bedroom of the home. Ericka occupied the front bedroom. A third bedroom intended for Erie-ka’s son had not yet been furnished, and the boy slept in one of the other two bedrooms, with either his mother or his grandmother.

On the night of April 29, 1995, Mercy and her grandson were asleep in the back bedroom when Wells awoke Ericka in the front bedroom around 10:00 p.m. to obtain the telephone or pager number of Erieka’s former boyfriend, from whom Wells desired to buy illegal drugs. Ericka gave Wells the information he requested and went back to sleep after hearing Wells conversing with her former boyfriend outside the home around 10:30.

A few hours later, between midnight and 1:00 a.m. on April 30, Wells returned to Ericka’s bedroom and awoke her again by placing his hand over her |3mouth and a kitchen knife to her throat, telling her to “pull her pants down” and saying, “Don’t scream, don’t move, [or] else I’m going to kill Mercy and your son.” Ericka did as she was told without attempting to resist Wells, explaining to the jury that she knew he was armed with a knife and she feared that he would harm her and perhaps her mother and her son if she did not comply.

Once Ericka was partially undressed, Wells pulled his pants down and got on top of her, placing the knife at his side while keeping his hand over her mouth. Ericka testified that Wells tried to insert his penis into her vagina but did not succeed because she was “dry” and his penis was not fully erect. Wells licked her vagina one time “so he could make it wet” and again tried to put his penis into her vagina “but it wouldn’t go in, once again.” He then told her to “play with” his penis using her hand, which she did. Notwithstanding her manual stimulation, his penis still did not become fully erect and his third attempt to place it into her vagina also failed. Wells then told Ericka to “suck” his penis. She refused, telling him she “didn’t do that” and asking him why he was “doing this” to her. Wells then seemed to “realize what he was doing,” according to Ericka, and ceased his efforts, telling her to get dressed and to go with him to her mother’s bedroom.

Ericka’s mother and son were asleep in the back bedroom when Ericka entered the room with Wells, who carried the knife at his side. The television and radio in the back bedroom were both turned up loud, notwithstanding Mercy’s testimony that both had been turned off when she and her grandson went to sleep that night. After Ericka awakened her mother, Wells said, “Mercy, I raped Ericka.” Wells apologized to Ericka and her mother and briefly detained them in the back bedroom, where he threatened to kill himself, before allowing them to leave the house around 1:30 a.m.

When police arrived at the house between 2:00 and 3:00 a.m., after interviewing Ericka at the hospital, Wells had confined himself to the back |4bedroom of the house and refused to come out, telling the officers that he “was not coming out alive” and that he “was not going back to jail,” according to the Shreve[661]*661port Police Department’s hostage negotiator who arrived at the house around 3:15 that morning. Some six hours later, about 9:45 a.m., Wells calmly surrendered to police, who then searched the home, finding two knives and a handgun in the back bedroom and a blood-stained pillowcase on the bed in Ericka’s bedroom.

The stains on the pillowcase were scientifically tested and compared with blood samples taken from Wells and from Erieka, who did not realize she had been cut with the knife until others noticed some superficial “red marks” or “scratch marks” on her neck after the attack. The state’s expert in serology, DNA analysis and blood spatter analysis testified that the blood on the pillowcase matched Ericka’s blood, and explained that the stains were consistent with the victim having been asleep with her head on the pillow and receiving minor cuts to her neck when the attacker placed the knife to her throat.

The doctor who examined Erieka at the hospital found no visible signs of trauma in or around her vagina and no evidence of semen in the vaginal washings and tissue swabs taken for microscopic examination.

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Related

State v. Taylor
709 So. 2d 883 (Louisiana Court of Appeal, 1998)

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Bluebook (online)
697 So. 2d 658, 1997 La. App. LEXIS 1661, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-wells-lactapp-1997.