15 Conn. App. 289 | Conn. App. Ct. | 1988
Pursuant to General Statutes § 54-96, the state appeals from the granting of the defendant’s motion to dismiss for failure of the state to allege with adequate particularity the date and time of the offenses charged.
Following his arrest on September 5, 1985, the defendant was charged by short form information with
On January 8,1987, the state filed a long form information charging the defendant in four counts. The first three counts charged sexual assault in the second degree in violation of General Statutes § 53a-71. The fourth count charged sexual assault in the fourth degree in “violation of § 53a-71.”
On January 14, 1987, the defendant filed a motion to dismiss for failure of the state to file an adequate information or bill of particulars. The defendant argued that in order to prepare his defense, including a possible alibi defense, the state must particularize the charges by disclosing to him the precise date and time of each alleged violation. The state responded that it was unable to provide the defendant with the exact dates of the alleged offense because the victim, who is mentally retarded, could only identify a twenty-five week period within which the assaults took place.
In granting the defendant’s motion, the trial court concluded that “the time frame alleged, of almost six months, does impose upon [the] defendant a burden of
This issue of whether, in a sexual assault prosecution in which the defendant claims the defense of alibi, the state must inform him of the exact date and time at which the crime occurred has been fully discussed in two recent opinions of this court. State v. Mancinone, 15 Conn. App. 251, 545 A.2d 1131 (1988); State v. Saraceno, 15 Conn. App. 222, 545 A.2d 1116 (1988). In those cases, we found that the state does not have a duty “to disclose information which the state does not have,” particularly under circumstances in which there is no indication that the state could provide more exact information. State v. Saraceno, supra, 236 (victim a young child with limited capacity to recall exact dates). “ ‘[A]s long as the information provides a time frame which has a distinct beginning and an equally clear end, within which the crimes are alleged to have been committed, it is sufficiently definite to satisfy the requirements of the sixth amendment to the United States constitution and article first, § 8, of the Connecticut constitution.’ ” State v. Mancinone, supra, 257 (information alleged that the offense occurred between August 1982, and November 1984), quoting State v. Saraceno, supra, 237 (information alleged that the crimes occurred on various dates between August 1980, and August 1983); see also State v. Evans, 205 Conn. 528, 534 A.2d 1159 (1987) (crime alleged to have occurred in the afternoon or early evening on one of the last two weekends in July, 1984); State v. Laracuente, 205 Conn. 515, 534
There is error, the judgment is set aside and the case is remanded for further proceedings according to law.
The state did not file a bill of particulars and the defendant’s motion was never acted upon by the court.
The statute section cited in the fourth count of the state’s long form information is evidently a typographical error and should read § 53a-73a.