State v. Aldridge
| Decision Date | 30 May 1984 |
| Docket Number | No. 83-KA-1199,83-KA-1199 |
| Citation | 450 So.2d 1057 |
| Parties | STATE of Louisiana v. Tommy ALDRIDGE. |
| Court | Court of Appeal of Louisiana — District of US |
Ossie Brown, Dist. Atty., Baton Rouge, for plaintiff-appellee.
Loren Kleinpeter, Baton Rouge, William J. Guste, Jr., Atty. Gen., State of La., New Orleans, for defendant-appellant.
Before LOTTINGER, EDWARDS and ALFORD, JJ.
Tommy Aldridge was charged with second degree battery, tried by judge alone, and found guilty of simple battery. He was given a suspended sentence of six months imprisonment and placed on one year unsupervised probation, subject to certain routine conditions not pertinent here. 1
Aldridge appeals his conviction, alleging as his one assignment of error that the trial judge "committed error in not considering the evidence of self-defense and/or justification for the battery inasmuch as the preponderance of the evidence clearly established the same." Our review of the record convinces us otherwise, and we accordingly affirm.
Aldridge committed the offense on November 19, 1982, the Friday before the 55-21 victory over Florida State which sent LSU to the Orange Bowl, 2 when, after two brief encounters and a profane repartee, he sent Tommy Curry, the victim, "flying into the stereo box" with a backhand punch that hospitalized Curry for two days with a fractured skull and caused partial loss of hearing in his right ear. Needless to say, Curry missed the game.
The State's version of the events immediately preceding the ill-fated punch is based upon the testimony of the victim and four of his friends and understandably differs from that of the defendant's.
Curry, a sophomore at L.S.U. at the time and member of the Kappa Sigma Fraternity, had gone with some of his fraternity brothers to Fred's Bar & Grill, a Baton Rouge establishment catering mainly to the local college students. He was standing on the dance floor with his friends circled around him when someone from behind splashed a drink on his neck. He turned around to see who it was, exclaiming under his breath, "Who was that asshole?"
Ed Wall, one of his fraternity brothers and ostensible peacemaker during the entire episode, pointed out Aldridge, but told Curry to forget about it because Aldridge was "just horsing around" with a couple of girls. He had seen Aldridge throw the drink at one of the girls he was with, miss and hit Curry.
Curry glanced over at Aldridge's group, standing about ten feet away. Aldridge apparently took this to be a confrontational stare, for he came over to Curry and said, Curry replied, "Well, I got this drink spilled on me." Wall testified Aldridge was belligerent and appeared to be drunk. Aldridge and Curry exchanged words, and then Aldridge started shoving Curry around. Wall and Al Morris, Curry's fraternity big brother, stepped in to separate them. Wall grabbed and held Aldridge until the bouncers came and broke them up. Wall attempted to smooth things over with Aldridge and things appeared to settle down. Everyone returned to his own group of friends.
Wall testified that one of Aldridge's female companions came over to apologize for the trouble (an apology which the young lady denied at trial ever making). Aldridge came over again and said, "If you have anything to say to me say it to me and not to her." Curry leaned over and whispered to Wall, "This guy's an asshole." Aldridge turned to Curry and said, "What did you say?" Curry backed down, "I didn't say anything." Aldridge insisted, Curry denied, "No, I didn't, I wasn't talking about you." Aldridge kept insisting until Curry finally agreed. "Okay, yes, you are an asshole." Curry turned back to the girl standing next to him, and that's when Aldridge sent him "flying into the stereo box."
Pandemonium broke loose. According to Al Morris,
According to Aldridge, however, Curry and his buddies were the aggressors, not he. He testified that he unintentionally hit Curry with an empty cup after missing an over-the-shoulder hook shot into a nearby trash can. The music was loud, so he hollered out an apology, which Curry either didn't hear or ignored, for he kept staring at him. Aldridge went over to apologize, but the Kappa Sigs were belligerent and threatening. Several of them cursed him, so he left. He denied shoving anybody during the first encounter.
He returned a few minutes later to apologize again. Somebody shoved him, and somebody else said, "You'd better leave before we kick your ass." A crowd started forming. Outnumbered and nervous, he...
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