State v. Artis
| Decision Date | 27 August 2021 |
| Docket Number | L-19-1267 |
| Parties | State of Ohio Appellee v. Lee Artis, Jr. Appellant |
| Court | Ohio Court of Appeals |
Julia R. Bates, Lucas County Prosecuting Attorney, and Alyssa Breyman, Assistant Prosecuting Attorney, for appellee.
Lawrence A. Gold, for appellant.
DECISION AND JUDGMENT
{¶ 1} Appellant, Lee Artis Jr., appeals the October 9 2019 judgment of the Lucas County Court of Common Pleas sentencing him to an aggregate term of 17 years in prison. For the following reasons, we affirm.
{¶ 2} In April 2018, Artis was indicted on three counts of rape in violation of R.C. 2907.02(A)(2), all first-degree felonies. The charges arose from sexual assaults on D.V., who was between 13 and 15 years old during the timeframes alleged in the indictment. Count 1 related to penile penetration of the anus, count 2 related to digital penetration of the vagina, and count 3 related to penile penetration of the vagina. Initially, Artis retained attorney R. Lee Roberts Jr. ("Roberts") to represent him. Later, attorneys Anthony McGeorge and Richard Roberts Sr. ("Richard") also entered appearances on Artis's behalf.
{¶ 3} The case was tried to a jury in July 2019. At trial, the state presented the testimony of Detectives David Morford and Rebecca Kincaid of the Toledo Police Department ("TPD"); D.V.'s mother, M.E. ("mother"); sexual assault nurse examiner ("SANE"), Amanda Brigode; D.V.'s "cousin," Ericka Jennings; and D.V. In his defense, Artis presented the testimony of his girlfriend, Blanca Saldivar, and the video deposition of Dr. Warren Metherd. The following facts were established at trial.
{¶ 4} The state's first witness was Detective Morford, the TPD detective who extracted data from mother's cellphone. He testified that the data-extraction report admitted as state's exhibit No. 19 was the report he created by using an extraction tool called Cellebrite on a phone owned by mother, after getting mother's consent to the extraction. To obtain the data in state's exhibit No. 19, Morford performed a logical extraction of the data on the phone. Morford explained that a logical extraction pulls information that is physically present on the device being examined. A logical extraction does not include any information that is deleted from the device before Cellebrite extracts the data. After extracting data from mother's phone, Morford did not open the phone to compare the information in state's exhibit No. 19 to the data actually on the phone because, he explained, doing so would cause changes to the phone's operating system and he had no reason to believe that the Cellebrite device was not working properly.
{¶ 6} Morford was the only witness on the first day of trial. The next morning, before the trial reconvened, the state put on the record that it had offered Artis a plea bargain the night before, after the jury heard testimony including the incriminating text messages. It offered to let Artis plead to one count of rape with an agreed-upon prison term of five years, which Artis rejected. Roberts confirmed that Artis did not want to take the plea. The court verified with Artis that he had discussed the offer with his attorneys and explained the total potential sanctions Artis faced if convicted, after which Artis said that he wanted to reject the state's offer. So, the trial continued.
{¶ 7} When the trial resumed, mother testified that she had known Artis for approximately ten years and that he was a "very good friend * * *." She denied ever having a sexual relationship with Artis. Her children, including D.V., knew Artis and got along well with him. Mother said that Artis "did a lot of picking [D.V.] up and tickling her and playing with her * * *." In 2015, when the state alleged that Artis's abuse of D.V. began, Artis was coming to mother's house two or three times a week and it was not unusual for Artis to be at the house when mother was not there. However, when mother was not home, Jennings-who lived with mother-was. Jennings is an adult who is not related to mother and D.V., but she and D.V. think of each other as cousins.
{¶ 8} D.V. testified that Artis-a "close family friend" whom she had known since she was a young child-began abusing her when she was approximately 13 years old. Before the abuse began, D.V. liked Artis and thought of him as an uncle.
{¶ 9} D.V. said that Artis would come to her house when mother was not home and that Artis would "try to get me to follow him, like he try to get me to go with him, and when he did, like he would try to touch me." When this happened, D.V.'s younger siblings would usually be in another room watching television or playing with Artis's cellphone.
{¶ 10} D.V. recounted several incidents of Artis's inappropriate behavior with her. The first incident, which related to the anal rape charge, happened in one of D.V.'s prior homes. She and Artis were in the kitchen, which D.V. described as "like a narrow hallway." D.V. stood facing the counter and Artis stood behind her. Artis "kept trying to like touch * * *" D.V. while she told him no. She said that Artis was trying to keep her in the kitchen. Eventually, Artis pulled down his and D.V.'s pants, and his "private" "touched" her. She clarified that Artis's penis touched her "butt" and that it "went in a little bit because it gave me like a shock." After this happened, D.V. got away from Artis and went to her room. She said that Artis told her "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to do that." D.V. said that she did not initially tell anyone about this encounter because she was "scared of the output of what would have happened."
{¶ 11} The second incident happened at Artis's house. D.V. and one of her sisters stayed the night with Artis and his girlfriend, Saldivar, so that Saldivar could take them on an outing the next day. D.V. slept on one of the couches in the living room, and her sister slept on the other. During the night, D.V. woke to Artis attempting to remove her pants. D.V. "told him no because my little sister was right there." D.V. was able to stop Artis from removing her pants, and Artis did not do anything else to D.V. that night.
{¶ 12} Next, D.V. generally described Artis's behavior toward her when she lived at another of her former homes. This conduct formed the basis of the digital rape charge. She said that Artis would come to the house when mother was not home and would distract her younger siblings with his cellphone. According to D.V., while the other children played on the phone, To clarify the type of touching Artis was doing, the prosecutor asked D.V. the following series of questions:
{¶ 13} The final incident that D.V. described was the incident that precipitated her disclosure of the abuse to mother. Artis came to the house after work on a weekday. He gave Jennings some money so that she would take D.V.'s younger siblings to the store. D.V. was lying in bed and just waking up when Artis came into her room. She said that Artis sat on the edge of her bed and "kept trying to touch" her, but that Jennings walked into the room and told Artis that he should not be in there. Regardless, Artis stayed in the room after Jennings left. After leaving D.V.'s room, Jennings took...
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