State v. GordonState v. Gordon
Anthony Gordon (defendant) appeals from convictions for burglary, kidnapping, and sexual assault. He makes two challenges: first, the trial court wrongly enhanced his sentences under
Because defendant received a life sentence, we have jurisdiction under
FACTS
In the early morning of May 16, 1986, defendant was driving home from a bar. At the time, he was on parole for prior sexual assault and robbery convictions. He pulled up to the victim at a stop sign and asked if she “wanted to party.” Reporter’s Transcript (RT), Aug. 6, 1986, at 48. The victim invited him to her apartment for a beer because he appeared well-dressed and a “nice person.” Id. at 48-49. In the apartment, defendant and the victim talked for several minutes. Suddenly, defendant grabbed the victim, forced her from the couch to the floor, hit her several times with his fists, and sexually assaulted her. After the assault, defendant apologized and allowed the victim to put on her clothes. When he subsequently fell asleep on the couch, the victim escaped and called the police, who apprehended defendant.
At trial, defendant claimed that the victim consented to intercourse and he punched her when he awoke to find her rifling his wallet and demanding money. The jury did not believe defendant, finding him guilty of second degree burglary, kidnapping, and sexual assault. The trial judge also allowed the jury to find that defendant had used dangerous instruments during the felonies: his fists.
The court sentenced defendant to twenty-two years for second degree burglary, life imprisonment without possibility of release for twenty-seven years for kidnapping, and life imprisonment without possibility of release for twenty-seven years for sexual assault. The burglary and kidnápping sentences were concurrent. The court, however, imposed the sexual assault sentence consecutively to the sentences for burglary and kidnapping.
I. FISTS AS DANGEROUS INSTRUMENTS
The trial court enhanced defendant’s kidnapping and sexual assault sentences under
Defendant claims the trial judge erred by allowing the jury to consider whether his fists constituted dangerous instruments. He argues that as a matter of law fists cannot be dangerous instruments for enhancement purposes.
The statutory definition of “dangerous instrument” is
anything that under the circumstances in which it is used, attempted to be used or threatened to be used is readily capable of causing death or serious physical injury-
The state admits, however, that no Arizona case defines a fist as a dangerous instrument. Our cases address only whether an
object
constitutes a deadly weapon or dangerous instrument. In
State v. Bustamonte,
dealing with a pair of scissors, we held that if an instrument is not inherently dangerous as a matter of law, like a gun or knife, the jury can determine whether the defendant used the object in such a way that it became a “deadly weapon.”
In the present case, however, defendant used no object in perpetrating the crime, only his fists—part of his body. Indeed, the overwhelming majority of other jurisdictions hold that body parts do not constitute deadly weapons or dangerous instruments.
See
Annotation,
Parts of the Human Body, Other Than Feet, as Deadly or Dangerous Weapons for Purposes of Statutes Aggravating Offenses Such as Assault and Robbery,
The state urges us to adopt the minority rule allowing the jury to decide on a case-by-case basis whether a body part can be a dangerous instrument.
See Hollis v. State,
In the cases the state cites, the victims sustained serious physical injury or death,
1
but none of those cases involves statutory schemes that enhance punishment for assault causing “serious bodily injury,” even without use of a dangerous instrument or deadly weapon. Each of the statutes only permits enhancement for use of dangerous instruments or weapons.
2
Where differen
Our statute, however, specifically provides for enhanced punishment when the defendant assaults with a dangerous instrument
or
when he causes serious injury.
See
injury which creates a reasonable risk of death, or which causes serious and permanent disfigurement, or serious impairment of health or loss or protracted impairment of the function of any bodily organ or limb.
Because the Arizona statute increases the punishment for the crime if the defendant either uses a dangerous instrument or causes serious harm, no purpose exists for allowing the jury to find that body parts are dangerous instruments just because they caused serious bodily harm. 3
Further, allowing the jury to find fists a dangerous instrument without serious physical injury creates an undefined standard—a “not so serious physical injury” enhancement test. Some juries would find a body part was a dangerous instrument, even though no serious physical injury resulted, and others would not. Given that the statute already enhances punishment when the defendant causes serious physical injury, the jury would have little to guide it when determining whether a fist is a dangerous instrument. The cases suggest no other factors appropriate to differentiate between when a fist is a dangerous weapon and when it is not.
Finally, if fists can be dangerous instruments, then we must eventually hold that any body part can also be a dangerous instrument, depending on the circumstances. Allowing the jury to consider body parts as dangerous instruments confuses the essential elements of several crimes. For example, one cannot commit an assault without using, or threatening to use, an object or body part.
See
We also consider the deterrent objective of §§ 13-105(8) and 13-604.02(A). The legislature specifically intended that courts treat paroled felons who commit offenses with dangerous instruments or cause serious physical injury more harshly than paroled felons who do neither. The state asks us to allow juries to treat both types of paroled felons alike. If we do, then felons might as well use a dangerous instrument. We are unwilling to circumvent the legislative objective on this issue.
We hold the trial court erred by allowing the jury to find that defendant’s fists were dangerous instruments. Because defendant used no object except his fists in committing the assault, and because he did not inflict serious bodily harm with his fists, the trial court should not have enhanced his punishment under
II. PROPRIETY OF CONSECUTIVE SENTENCES
The trial court imposed
concurrent
sentences on the burglary and kidnapping counts. However, the judge ordered the sexual assault sentence served
consecutively
to.the burglary and kidnapping sentences. Defendant argues that these con
An act or omission which is made punishable in different ways by different sections of the laws may be punished under both, but in no event may sentences be other than concurrent.
(Emphasis added.) The question before us, then, is whether the burglary, kidnapping, and sexual assault here constituted an act or multiple acts.
A. The Facts
Before analyzing the legal tests for determining what constitutes an act, we must review the facts in greater detail. The victim invited defendant into her apartment. Their conversation was friendly at first, but defendant’s “mood changed.” RT, Aug. 6, 1986, at 54. According to the victim, she was “sitting on the couch, and [defendant] grabbed [her], forced [her] down on the floor,” held her and hit her in the face with his fist. Id. Defendant “finished beating [her] in the face, grabbed [her] by the neck and was strangling [her].” Id. at 58. He let go of the victim and “was standing like on top of” her, and while she was still “laying flat on the floor,” told her to take her clothes off, which she did “the best [she] could.” Id. at 59-60. While the victim was in the same position, he then raped her. Id. at 60-61. After defendant had finished the sexual assault, he “let [her] get up and get dressed. And he got dressed also [and] ... was apologizing to me ... and he was asking me not to call the cops and turn him in.” Id. at 62.
Count two of the indictment charged defendant with having “kidnapped [the victim] ... with the intent to inflict ... a sexual offense on her” and count five of the indictment charged defendant with the crime of “sexual assault, a class 2 felony, by engaging in sexual intercourse with [the victim], without her consent.”
B. The Legal Test
1. Arizona
This court uses the identical elements test to determine whether a constellation of facts constitutes a single act, which requires concurrent sentences, or multiple acts, which permit consecutive sentences.
State v. Tinghitella,
by eliminating the evidence supporting the elements of one charge and then determining whether the remaining evidence supports the elements of the other charge.
State v. Vaughn,
Even a cursory review of precedent illustrates the point. In
Vaughn,
we upheld consecutive sentences for murder and armed robbery because the evidence showed that the victim was aware of the robbery before his death.
Analytically, these results follow, but we question the rationality of a rule that permits consecutive sentences for the killer who shoots the victim from the front but not for the killer who shoots the victim in the back. The problem is that no crime involves “an act.”
4
Like other human
This analytic difficulty has plagued both this court and others.
5
We dealt with the identical elements test in
State v. Noble,
We recognize that in some cases a kidnapping is merely incidental to or inherent in the nature of additionally charged crimes. [Citations omitted.] For instance, because the kidnapping statutes require only confinement without consent or legal authority, a defendant cannot commit child molestation, sexual assault or robbery without also committing a kidnapping. SeeA.R.S. § 13-1301(2) . Whether moving a victim a slight distance to facilitate commission of another crime is sufficient to support a separate act and, thus, support consecutive sentences, is a more difficult issue which we decline to address today. Here, movement was more than incidental to or inherent in the nature of the sexual [offense].
Id.
at 287 n. 2,
2. Approaches followed in other states
In a case involving a statute similar to
We find the Bums application of a “merely incidental” type analysis wholly unsatisfactory. Because the Bums analysis centers only on the defendant’s subjective intent, it allows a defendant who robs or assaults to hold his victim for a lengthy period of time. As long as the defendant does not form the intent to kidnap, the court cannot punish him any more severely than the defendant who kidnaps and quickly commits the ultimate crime. In any event, Noble effectively rejects the Bums standard.
New York has taken a middle ground between
Burns
and
Noble.
In
People v.
merger doctrine [that] is intended to preclude conviction for kidnapping based on acts which are so much the part of another substantive crime that the substantive crime could not have been committed without such acts and ... independent criminal responsibility may not fairly be attributed to them.
Many states have also found it difficult to determine what crimes may be charged when a “single act” constitutes two or more distinct and separate offenses. Indeed, a distinct split of authority exists pertaining to the prosecution of kidnapping in crimes also involving rape, robbery, and similar offenses.
See
Annotation,
Seizure or Detention for Purpose of Committing Rape, Robbery, or Similar Offense as Constituting Separate Crime of Kidnapping,
represent two general and opposing views. One view is that the seizure or detention of the victim, with any accompanying movement, is necessarily sufficient to constitute the separate crime of kidnapping____ [T]he fact of a forcible removal, and not the distance of the forcible removal, [constitutes] the separate crime of kidnapping. The other view, quite logically, is that the seizure or detention alone is not necessarily sufficient to constitute the separate crime of kidnapping. Here, the courts reasoned that movements merely incidental to the commission of a rape, robbery, or similar offense, and which did not substantially increase the risk of harm ... necessarily present in the rape, robbery, etc., did not constitute the separate crime of kidnapping.
Id. at 701 (emphasis added) (footnotes omitted).
Insofar as prosecution is concerned, Arizona seems committed, though with little analysis, to the first view.
See State v. Pickett,
Indeed, it is difficult to find cases that provide a recognized analytical framework with which to draw a bright line between a single act and multiple acts in situations where the restraint imposed on the victim in the ultimate crime necessarily involves the technical commission of a kidnapping. To hold that consecutive sentences are possible in all such cases circumvents the obvious legislative intent that a single act that violates multiple criminal statutes may be punished only under one of the statutes.
We believe, however, that two of the concepts found in the cases are useful in applying and improving the
Tinghitella
identical elements test. In determining whether consecutive sentences may be imposed for kidnapping and rape, as in this case, the court should consider whether the perpetrator’s conduct in seizing or detaining the victim put the victim to a different or additional risk of harm than that inherent in the ultimate offense. If so, then the seizure or detention has been more than incidental to the ultimate crime and is more likely to be a separate act. This court has no desire to give a criminal a discount card to commit as many crimes as he or she may desire, secure in the belief that he will receive only concurrent sentences. Thus, if the perpetrator’s conduct with regard to the seizure or detention preliminary to the
If, on the other hand, the defendant’s conduct in the commission of the preliminary crime did not increase the risk of harm to the victim, and if, under the facts, the defendant could not commit the ultimate crime without committing the lesser, then the facts would favor a finding that only a single act exists and that
3. Resolution
Neither the parties nor the cases suggest an entirely satisfactory construct with which to interpret the statute. Nevertheless, we must give meaning to the statute prohibiting consecutive punishment. Absent a legislative provision of an analytical framework or statutory definition of an act that we can sensibly apply to
Thus, we will continue to apply
Tinghitella
and judge a defendant's eligibility for consecutive sentences by considering the facts of each crime separately, subtracting from the factual transaction the evidence necessary to convict on the ultimate charge—the one that is at the essence of the factual nexus and that will often be the most serious of the charges. If the remaining evidence satisfies the elements of the other crime, then consecutive sentences may be permissible under
We apply these principles to the facts before us. Defendant received concurrent sentences for burglary and kidnapping and a consecutive sentence for sexual assault. Defendant had entered the victim’s home, where he committed the ultimate crime of sexual assault. In convicting him of burglary, the jury must necessarily have found that he entered or remained in the house with intent to commit the sexual assault.
See
We turn then to the consecutive sentences imposed for kidnapping and sexual assault. Again, simply applying the identical elements test, defendant is eligible for consecutive sentences because he first grabbed the victim, threw her to the floor, and held her, thus committing the kidnapping, and then while holding her, committed the sexual assault. Defendant could not have committed the sexual assault, the ultimate crime, without restraining the victim’s movement. Once again we must determine whether defendant added to the victim’s risk of harm. Defendant went beyond
CONCLUSION
Fists and other body parts are not “dangerous instruments” for enhancement under
Under the facts of this case,
We have searched the record for fundamental error, as
We affirm defendant’s convictions, but must remand for resentencing in accordance with this opinion. The sentences for kidnapping and sexual assault may be consecutive to each other, but must be concurrent with the burglary sentence.
Notes
.
E.g., Hollis,
.
See
. Evidently, the assault that preceded the rape in the present case did not of itself cause serious bodily harm. Defendant was also charged with aggravated assault for causing serious bodily harm but the state dismissed that charge, RT, Aug. 6, 1986, at 5.
. We note that
. For whatever benefit it may bring by way of provoking thought on the subject, we note the distinction between the identical elements test, which focuses on the facts of the transaction and the conduct of the defendant in determining what is "an act” under