Hunt v. State, No. 2002-CA-01302-COA.
| Decision Date | 06 January 2004 |
| Docket Number | No. 2002-CA-01302-COA. |
| Citation | 877 So.2d 503 |
| Parties | Clint Trace HUNT a/k/a Clint Hunt a/k/a Clinton Trace Hunt, Appellant, v. STATE of Mississippi, Appellee. |
| Court | Mississippi Court of Appeals |
Chester D. Nicholson, Gail D. Nicholson, Gulfport, attorneys for appellant.
Office of the Attorney General by Scott Stuart, attorney for appellee.
Before SOUTHWICK, P.J., MYERS and CHANDLER, JJ.
SOUTHWICK, P.J., for the Court.
¶ 1. Clint Hunt appeals from the denial of his request for a new trial. In 1995 Hunt was convicted of rape. In 2001, he filed for post-conviction relief based on newly discovered evidence. His evidence was from a previously unknown witness who testified at his 2002 hearing that she had been a close friend of the victim.
¶ 2. The new witness stated that she and the victim would during the time period at issue frequently go to various bars and clubs to socialize. She had been with the victim at a bar at about the date of the claimed rape. The victim pointed out a man who looked like Hunt as someone whom she wanted to meet. She went up to the man and started a conversation. The new witness also stated that later the victim knew Hunt's name, details about his background, and where his mother lived and worked. At the trial, the victim had denied ever going to bars, as she was engaged and was soon to be married. She testified that Hunt, whom she claimed never to have seen before, had forced his way into her apartment.
¶ 3. This newly discovered evidence supported in significant ways the claim that Hunt made at his first trial that he had met the victim at a bar and later that evening had consensual sex with her. It even reveals a possible motive for a fabrication, which is that the new witness saw a man leaving the victim's apartment. That unexpected event may have caused the charge of rape immediately to be made to prevent the victim's fiancé from learning of consensual sexual activity with another man. According to the new witness, the victim did not appear agitated by the rape that she claimed had just happened. The new witness also stated that the victim did not report the rape at that time, but waited about a week before doing so.
¶ 4. A prior relationship and a possible motive for lying certainly may prove incorrect. However, the evidence at the initial trial was strictly a battle of credibility between Hunt and the prosecuting witness. Since the new evidence provides substantial support for Hunt's explanation of events, we find that he is entitled to have his conviction set aside and be given a new trial.
ORIGINAL APPEAL
¶ 5. Almost six years ago, we reviewed Hunt's conviction on direct appeal and found no reversible error. Hunt v. State, 706 So.2d 262 (table), 95-KA-00889 (Miss.Ct.App. Jan. 27, 1998) (). In order to put the present appeal in context, we reproduce here the statement of facts from that opinion and also our 1998 review of an issue that is central to this argument concerning newly discovered evidence.
¶ 6. [1998 opinion.] Clint Trace Hunt has appealed his conviction of rape returned by a jury in the Circuit Court of Forrest County. He raises four issues in this appeal, three of which attack the finding of guilt and one attacking the sentence as being unduly severe. We find none of these issues to have merit. We, therefore, affirm the conviction and judgment of sentence.
Facts
¶ 7. The State's proof indicated that Hunt came to his victim's apartment in Hattiesburg in the early morning hours [of December 16, 1993], and knocked on her door, claiming he was trying to find a friend who resided at the complex. After using several subterfuges in an attempt to be voluntarily admitted to the apartment, Hunt finally forced his way in and raped his victim. Scientific evidence was presented by the State that linked DNA material found on the victim's clothing to Hunt with a match testified to be one in five hundred million.
¶ 8. Hunt, testifying in his defense, claimed that the sexual encounter had, in fact, occurred two days earlier when the two had met in a local bar and had engaged in consensual intercourse in his vehicle. He claimed that he knew the prosecuting witness only by a fictitious first name she had used during their encounter, and that he had picked her up from the apartment parking lot on instructions she gave him before she left the bar. He claimed never to have been in the victim's apartment or even to have seen the woman before or after their encounter in the bar.
¶ 9. The jury returned a verdict of guilty but declined the opportunity to set Hunt's sentence at life. The trial court set the sentence at forty-five years, and because Hunt was also adjudicated to be a habitual offender under section 99-19-81 of the Mississippi Code of 1972, the judgment ordered the sentence to be served without the possibility of parole.
¶ 10. [We omit our discussion of issues concerning a pretrial lineup, a jury instruction, and the severity of the punishment.]
¶ 11. Hunt's third issue attacks the weight of the evidence supporting his conviction. The thrust of his argument is that his version of the events was more credible than the one related by the victim. Such matters are left to the jury, as the trier of the facts, to resolve. On appeal, we must view the evidence in the light consistent with the verdict of guilt. Strong v. State, 600 So.2d 199, 204 (Miss.1992). Only if we are convinced that a manifest injustice has occurred, are we authorized to reverse. Burrell v. State, 613 So.2d 1186, 1191 (Miss.1993).
¶ 12. The jurors heard both versions, and by their verdict, indicated that they accepted as true the version related by the victim. Her story was neither incredible, improbable, nor substantially impeached. The victim's testimony, standing alone, is enough to sustain a conviction of rape. Barker v. State, 463 So.2d 1080, 1082 (Miss.1985). This issue is without merit.
[End of 1998 opinion]
¶ 13. We affirmed in 1998 as to the weight of evidence, since we found that the jury was entitled to choose the victim's version of events over that offered by Hunt. If the new evidence makes a potentially significant shift in favor of Hunt in the relative plausibility of each explanation of what occurred, then the evidence may require a new trial.
¶ 14. Since we affirmed the conviction on direct appeal, Hunt needed to seek leave from the Supreme Court prior to filing for post-conviction relief. Miss.Code Ann. § 99-39-7 (Supp.2003). He filed and such leave was granted by the Supreme Court on April 25, 2001.
NEW EVIDENCE
¶ 15. Hunt offered newly discovered evidence which he claims establishes that no crime was committed. This evidence is in the form of testimony at the post-conviction relief hearing or affidavits of Sabrina Pitts, Norma Morgan, and Joy Martinolich. None of these individuals testified at Hunt's 1995 trial. The victim did not appear at the hearing, and there was a statement from the prosecution that she could not be found.
¶ 16. We will refer to the person who charged Hunt with rape as the "victim," and we will not name her in the opinion. A jury determined that she was a rape victim and that conclusion was affirmed on appeal. Unless later court action overturns the conclusion, she is entitled neither to have her name made public in a court opinion nor to have her characterization as a victim removed.
Sabrina Pitts
¶ 17. Sabrina Pitts was the most significant newly discovered witness.
¶ 18. Both the victim and her husband (married after the events involved in Hunt's prosecution) mentioned Pitts during their testimony at the original trial. The victim was asked on cross-examination whether anyone else lived in the apartment. The response was to name Pitts as someone who would visit her apartment, would try to get her to go places with her, but "I always tried to get rid of her because she was really not my type of person to be hanging around." The man whom the victim had married by the time of trial was also asked about Pitts. He described her as a "loner" who was searching for someone "she could bond with." There was no suggestion by either witness that Pitts and the victim were particular friends or had socialized together. Instead, both were dismissive of her as a person and as an acquaintance. When Pitts was first interviewed years later, she told a much different story.
¶ 19. Pitts had first been interviewed in May 1999, when a private investigator hired by Hunt's family contacted her. A transcript of the interview appears as part of the record as does an affidavit that Pitts signed after the interview.
¶ 20. Pitts at the 2002 hearing on whether a new trial should be ordered discussed events involving her and the victim that occurred in December 1993. She stated that she and the victim had known each other for about two years, were best friends, had daily contact, and had frequented Hattiesburg bars together practically every weekend. Her testimony apparently included an assertion that Pitts had dated the brother of the victim's fiancé. Certainly this testimony describes a much different relationship between Pitts and the victim than that described at the trial.
¶ 21. The details that Pitts related of the social activities were also much different than had been suggested by the victim and her husband at the 1995 trial. Pitts said that she and the victim went to two taverns, Senor Frogs and Ropers, almost every weekend. Pitts began to describe an encounter that her friend had at one of the bars with a man, but the trial judge ruled the testimony inadmissible unless Pitts could positively identify the person as Hunt. She apparently could not do so at the 2002 hearing, though the transcript is somewhat unclear.
¶ 22. Also included in the record is a transcript of the 1999 interview with Pitts conducted by a private investigator. At that time...
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