Cook v. State, CR
| Citation | 284 Ark. 333,681 S.W.2d 378 |
| Decision Date | 21 December 1984 |
| Docket Number | No. CR,CR |
| Parties | James Robert COOK, Appellant, v. STATE of Arkansas, Appellee. 84-108. |
| Court | Arkansas Supreme Court |
William R. Simpson, Jr., Public Defender by Deborah R. Sallings, Deputy Public Defender, Little Rock, for appellant.
Steve Clark, Atty. Gen. by Velda P. West, Asst. Atty. Gen., Little Rock, for appellee.
Appellant was found guilty of kidnapping under Ark.Stat.Ann. § 41-1702 and sentenced as an habitual offender to thirty years imprisonment. § 41-1702 provides:
(1) A person commits the offense of kidnapping if, without consent, he restrains another person so as to interfere substantially with his liberty with the purpose of:
(a) holding him for ransom or reward, or for any other act to be performed or not performed for his return or release ...
The single argument on appeal is the evidence at trial did not support a charge of kidnapping under § 41-1702, because a substantial interference with the victim's liberty was lacking and the restraint was of such short duration that it would not be encompassed by the statute.
The facts are: as the victim was getting into her car the appellant appeared at her side. He ordered her into the car at gunpoint and demanded a ride out of town, which she refused. She was threatened and struck several times, but she continued to refuse. At one point the appellant's pistol discharged, evidently by accident, with the bullet passing through the windshield. After about ten or fifteen minutes the appellant got out of the car and walked away.
We have not previously addressed this element of the kidnapping statute but a review of other jurisdictions leads us to conclude it is the quality and nature of the restraint, rather than the duration, that determines whether a kidnapping charge can be sustained.
This issue often arises in cases where another offense, such as rape or robbery, is accompanied by a greater restraint of the victim than ordinarily occurs in the commission of the other crime. Among these cases a restraint for only ten minutes has been held to be sufficient to constitute kidnapping. See Sinclair v. U.S., 388 A.2d 1201 (D.C.1978) and cases cited. In Sinclair, the victim was forced to accompany the defendant for about ten minutes, during which the victim was robbed. The court found the evidence sufficient to constitute kidnapping in addition to robbery, reasoning that by removing the victim in a vehicle, the defendant took him out of the view of friends and acquaintances and exposed him to greater danger and lessened the risk of detection.
In two recent cases involving kidnapping alone, the courts found the evidence sufficient to sustain the charges where the restraints involved were less than five minutes. Commonwealth v. Burkett, 370 N.E.2d 1017, 5 Mass.App. 901 (1977); Rodriguez v. State, 646 S.W.2d 524 (Tex.App. 1 Dist.1982). In Burkett the court declined to find error in the refusal of an instruction for attempted kidnapping. The court said:
As permitted by that section both indictments included an allegation that the defendant "without lawful authority, did forcibly ... confine the victim, with the intent to cause him to be secretly confined against his...
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Chism v. State
...for one or more of the purposes specified in the statute. Jackson v. State, 290 Ark. 160, 717 S.W.2d 801 (1986); Cook v. State, 284 Ark. 333, 681 S.W.2d 378 (1984). Those include inflicting physical injury or engaging in sexual intercourse, deviate sexual activity or sexual contact with the......
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State v. Timms, 85,729.
...consent) where the defendant forced himself into the victim's car and struggled with her briefly before leaving. In Cook v. State, 284 Ark. 333, 681 S.W.2d 378 (1984), the court found that the defendant substantially interfered with the victim's liberty despite the short duration of the eve......
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Hickey v. State, 2010 Ark. 109 (Ark. 3/4/2010)
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