West Valley v. Drawn

2025 UT App 198
CourtCourt of Appeals of Utah
DecidedDecember 26, 2025
DocketCase No. 20240763-CA
StatusPublished

This text of 2025 UT App 198 (West Valley v. Drawn) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Utah primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
West Valley v. Drawn, 2025 UT App 198 (Utah Ct. App. 2025).

Opinion

2025 UT App 198

THE UTAH COURT OF APPEALS

WEST VALLEY CITY, Appellee, v. ROMEO MARQUIS DRAWN, Appellant.

Opinion No. 20240763-CA Filed December 26, 2025

Third District Court, Salt Lake Department The Honorable Vernice S. Trease No. 221911572

Staci Visser, Attorney for Appellant Ryan Robinson and Corey D. Sherwin, Attorneys for Appellee

JUDGE DAVID N. MORTENSEN authored this Opinion, in which JUDGES RYAN D. TENNEY and JOHN D. LUTHY concurred.

MORTENSEN, Judge:

¶1 One day in the fall of 2022, Romeo Marquis Drawn was watching his son Jeremy’s little league baseball game. 1 Jeremy’s mother, Ruth, and her boyfriend, Ken, were also there. When Jeremy came up to bat, Ken encouraged him to keep his “eye on the ball.” Apparently taking offense, Drawn told Ken not to talk to his son, and a fight between the two men ensued. Ken walked away with a broken arm, and Drawn was charged with and convicted of assault with substantial injury. He appeals, asserting an ineffective assistance claim based on his trial counsel’s failure to properly address certain other-acts and character evidence that

1. We use pseudonyms when referring to nonparties in this opinion. West Valley v. Drawn

West Valley City introduced at trial. While we hardly endorse the approach taken by the prosecution, we nevertheless affirm.

BACKGROUND 2

¶2 Drawn had previously been in a relationship with Ruth, and they shared a son, Jeremy. One day in September 2022, Ruth and her boyfriend, Ken, went to the park to watch Jeremy’s little league baseball game. Drawn, who was also at the game, had never met Ken, and Ruth was worried about possible trouble between the two men. To mitigate at least some of that concern, Ruth and Ken sat apart from Drawn’s parents, Diana and Fred, who, in turn, were sitting apart from Drawn.

¶3 When Jeremy came up to bat, Ken encouraged Jeremy to keep his “eye on the ball.” Apparently taking offense, Drawn approached Ken and said, “Don’t talk to my fucking son.” Ken responded, “I don’t think you should be doing this to your son.” A few minutes later, Ken began walking over to the restroom. What happened next was disputed at trial. But under the facts the jury apparently accepted, Drawn approached Ken and asked, “What now tough guy?” Ken responded, “I’m not doing this with you.” Drawn then “jump[ed] on [Ken’s] back,” and the two men “went straight to the ground.” Observers intervened and broke up the fight.

¶4 Ruth called the police, and two officers arrived. One officer (Officer) was speaking with other witnesses when Drawn approached him. Drawn initially told Officer that Ken had

2. “On appeal, we review the record facts in a light most favorable to the jury’s verdict and recite the facts accordingly. We present conflicting evidence only as necessary to understand issues raised on appeal.” State v. Barlow, 2025 UT App 152, n.2, 579 P.3d 422.

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punched him in the forehead. Drawn subsequently changed his story, saying that he had tackled Ken after dodging a punch.

¶5 After giving their statements to the officers, Ruth and Ken were told that they “were free to go.” Ken thought his arm had been dislocated in the fight, so Ruth drove him to the hospital. An x-ray revealed that Ken’s arm was broken and he needed surgery. Drawn was then charged with assault with substantial bodily injury.

¶6 Early in the proceedings, an attorney (who did not represent Drawn at trial) filed a request for discovery on Drawn’s behalf. Among other things, the attorney requested that West Valley City (the City) “[p]rovide notice, pursuant to Rule 404(b) of the Utah Rules of Evidence, of [its] intent to present evidence of other crimes, wrongs, or acts as proof of motive, opportunity, intent, preparation, plan, knowledge, identity, or absence of mistake or accident.” The City did not provide any such notice before trial.

¶7 At trial, Ken, Ruth, Diana, Fred, and Officer testified consistently with the above. Aside from Fred, each witness testified to additional information that is relevant on appeal. The prosecutor asked Ken what he knew about Drawn through Ruth. Ken responded that Ruth had told him that Drawn was “unhinged.” Drawn’s trial counsel (Counsel) objected on hearsay grounds. The district court overruled the objection, concluding the statement was appropriate to establish why Ken and Ruth were not sitting next to Drawn at the game. Nonetheless, the court instructed the jury not to consider the statement for the truth of the matter asserted.

¶8 Ruth explained that she and Ken had been sitting apart from Diana and Fred at the game “in hopes of not upsetting” Drawn. In response to the prosecutor’s question about why she thought there could be an issue, Ruth stated, “Just based on history with [Drawn] and some anger problems, we just didn’t

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want to cause any confrontation, and so we decided to sit separately just to not tick him off in any way.” The prosecutor then asked Ruth whether Drawn had “said anything to [her] specifically that would cause [her] to fear that there would be a problem.” Ruth began to answer that Drawn had not said anything that day when Counsel objected based on rule 404(b)(1) of the Utah Rules of Evidence, which bars “[e]vidence of a crime, wrong, or other act . . . to show that on a particular occasion the person acted in conformity with the character.” The record of the ensuing sidebar is somewhat unclear, but the prosecutor appears to have agreed to “tailor” the question to address the concern raised by Counsel.

¶9 After the sidebar, the prosecutor asked Ruth whether Drawn had said anything to her “leading up to this baseball game that would give [her] a reason to think there would be a problem while [she was] at the game.” Ruth responded, “That day, no.” The prosecutor then asked, “What about prior to that day?” Ruth responded, “Oh, prior to that day, yes. He told me not to have any communications with [Diana] and [Fred], and neither should [Jeremy] . . . . [Drawn] also gave me fear of bringing any kind of man into my life that [Jeremy] would be around.” When the prosecutor asked Ruth to clarify what she meant, Ruth responded that Drawn “would just say things like, ‘Nobody should be in [Jeremy’s] life. It’s too early.’” At this point, Counsel objected on both rule 404(b) and relevance grounds. The prosecutor insisted that he was “not trying to dig up all of their prior history” and that he “just want[ed] to know why they didn’t come and sit together.” The court overruled the objection, apparently on the ground that Drawn’s statement could not be “a 404(b) bad act.” 3

3. The caselaw frequently—and, in our view, unfortunately— “refers to rule 404(b) evidence as ‘prior bad acts’ evidence.” State v. Main, 2021 UT App 81, ¶ 18 n.7, 494 P.3d 1056. In fact, the rule is limited to neither “prior” nor “bad” acts. See id. (cleaned up). (continued…)

20240763-CA 4 2025 UT App 198 West Valley v. Drawn

¶10 Diana testified that when Drawn approached Ken and told him not to talk to Jeremy, she started recording the encounter because of a prior incident in which Drawn had acted “aggressive[ly].” Counsel again objected based on rule 404(b). After a sidebar, the prosecutor agreed to rephrase the question in a way that would avoid the 404(b) issue. The prosecutor then asked Diana, “Without going into prior incidents, isn’t it true . . . that you took the phone out because you were worried [Drawn] might do something?” Diana responded, “Absolutely.”

¶11 Officer testified that Drawn told him that “the other involved parties . . .

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2025 UT App 198, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/west-valley-v-drawn-utahctapp-2025.