State v. Brooks
| Decision Date | 15 November 1978 |
| Docket Number | No. 4391,4391 |
| Citation | 586 P.2d 1270,120 Ariz. 458 |
| Parties | STATE of Arizona, Appellee, v. Richard Arland BROOKS, Appellant. |
| Court | Arizona Supreme Court |
John A. LaSota, Jr., Atty. Gen., William J. Schafer III, Chief Counsel, Criminal Division, Stanley L. Patchell, Asst. Chief Counsel, Asst. Attys. Gen., Phoenix, for appellee.
Ross P. Lee, Maricopa County Public Defender, John Foreman, Deputy Public Defender, Phoenix, for appellant.
Defendant Richard Arland Brooks appeals his conviction and sentence for child molestation, a violation of A.R.S. § 13-653. Taking jurisdiction pursuant to 17A A.R.S., Supreme Court Rules, rule 47(e)(5), we affirm the judgment of the Superior Court.
Defendant was indicted for two counts of child molestation allegedly committed upon two young boys in separate incidents. Prior to trial, defendant entered into a plea agreement with the state whereby he pled guilty to Count II of the indictment, child molestation perpetrated upon one of the children, an eight year old boy. The Honorable Sandra D. O'Connor accepted defendant's plea after personally questioning him and finding that he knowingly, intelligently and voluntarily entered it, as mandated by 17 A.R.S. Rules of Criminal Procedure, rule 17.2 1 and rule 17.3. 2 Judge O'Connor also expressly found a factual basis for the plea pursuant to 17 A.R.S., Rules of Criminal Procedure, rule 17.3. Defendant was sentenced to serve not less than five nor more than fifteen years in the Arizona State Prison and filed a timely notice of appeal.
Defendant first argues on appeal that his guilty plea must be vacated as involuntary because there was no evidence indicating that he understood intent to be an essential element of the crime of child molestation.
To be considered voluntary in a constitutional sense, a plea must represent an intelligent admission by the defendant that he committed the offense. Henderson v. Morgan, 426 U.S. 637, 96 S.Ct. 2253, 49 L.Ed.2d 108 (1976). This is not possible unless the defendant received "real notice of the true nature of the charge against him, the first and most universally recognized requirement of due process." Smith v. O'Grady, 312 U.S. 329, 334, 61 S.Ct. 572, 574, 85 L.Ed. 859, 862 (1941), cited by Henderson v. Morgan, supra.
An essential element of the offense of child molestation under § 13-653 is that the acts involved be "motivated by an unnatural or abnormal sexual interest or intent with respect to children." State v. Berry, 101 Ariz. 310, 313, 419 P.2d 337, 340 (1966); See also State v. Stinson, 105 Ariz. 174, 461 P.2d 472 (1969).
At no time during Judge O'Connor's questioning of defendant prior to her acceptance of his guilty plea did she inquire into his motivation for the offense. The only dialogue between the Judge and defendant relevant to this issue concerned the physical actions that constituted the crime:
(Discussion off the record.)
Although the Superior Court did not itself ascertain whether defendant understood that intent is a requisite element of child molestation, this Court recently found such an act by the court unnecessary. State v. Johnson, 120 Ariz. 21, 583 P.2d 1341 (1978). The defendant in Johnson admitted committing acts of physical penetration upon his three year old daughter. We held that these acts by their very nature demonstrated that defendant was "motivated by an unnatural or abnormal sexual interest or intent with respect to children." 120 Ariz. 21, 22, 583 P.2d 1341, 1342. Thus, under the facts of Johnson, we found no need for the defendant to be explicitly informed of the motivation element of child molestation in order to establish his guilty plea as voluntary.
In so holding, this Court distinguished the fact situation in Johnson from that in Henderson v. Morgan, supra. The defendant in Henderson was never apprised that one element of second degree murder, to which he pled guilty, was intent to cause death. The U.S. Supreme Court found it impossible to conclude that Henderson's plea was voluntary under the circumstances for two reasons. First, although a jury would almost inevitably have inferred the required intent element of second degree murder from the objective evidence of multiple stabbings offered in the case, a jury would not have been required to draw that inference. Partly because of Henderson's extraordinarily low intelligence, a jury could have accepted defense counsel's theory of manslaughter. Thus, unlike the situation in Johnson, the acts in Henderson did not by their very nature establish the intent element of the crime.
Additionally, the Court found that Henderson's plea was involuntary because nothing in the record indicated that he had the necessary intent. " * * * (H) e made no factual statement or admission necessarily implying that he had such intent." 426 U.S. 639, 646, 96 S.Ct. 2253, 2258, 49 L.Ed.2d 108, 115.
We have held that a court is not required to advise a defendant of each specific element of an offense to which he is pleading guilty, absent the special circumstances of Henderson v. Morgan, supra. State v. Ohta, 114 Ariz. 489, 562 P.2d 369 (1977); State v. Devine, 114 Ariz. 574, 562 P.2d 1072 (1977); See also, State v. Reynolds, 25 Ariz.App. 409, 544 P.2d 233 (1976). The facts of the instant case to not admit to the special circumstances of Henderson. Obviously, defendant does not claim that his admitted touching of the child was privileged by a parent-child or doctor-patient relationship, nor was it in any way authorized by the boy's parents. It is, therefore, difficult to conceive of a jury placing an innocent construction on the acts admitted by the defendant. Thus, as in Johnson, supra, defendant's acts by their very nature manifest that he was motivated by an unnatural or abnormal sexual interest or intent with respect to children.
Moreover, the extended record contains statements and admissions which "necessarily imply" that defendant's acts were committed with the requisite abnormal sexual intent. The whole tenor of defendant's testimony at his presentence hearing demonstrates that he recognized that he had problems which included an unnatural attraction to children, that his acts involving children were criminal, and that he was undergoing psychological counseling for the purpose of rehabilitation. The presentence report prepared...
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Pima County Juvenile Appeal No. 74802-2, Matter of
...is that the acts involved be motivated by an unnatural or abnormal sexual interest with respect to children. State v. Brooks, 120 Ariz. 458, 460, 586 P.2d 1270, 1272 (1978); State v. Berry, 101 Ariz. 310, 313, 419 P.2d 337, 340 (1966). In those cases, we were interpreting A.R.S. § 13-653 (t......
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State v. Bible
...sexual interest or intent with respect to children." Id. at 95, 612 P.2d at 1058 (emphasis added); see also State v. Brooks, 120 Ariz. 458, 461, 586 P.2d 1270, 1273 (1978) (finding acts "by their very nature manifest" the required motivation); State v. Johnson, 120 Ariz. 21, 22, 583 P.2d 13......
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May v. Ryan
...(Ariz. Ct. App. 2015), vacated by State v. Holle (Holle II ), 240 Ariz. 300, 379 P.3d 197 (2016). See, e.g. , State v. Brooks , 120 Ariz. 458, 460, 586 P.2d 1270, 1272 (1978) ; State v. Madsen , 137 Ariz. 16, 18, 667 P.2d 1342, 1344 (Ariz. Ct. App. 1983) ; State v. Anderson , 128 Ariz. 91, ......
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State v. Holle
...at 252. Nonetheless, our courts continued to treat sexual interest as an “essential element” of the offense. State v. Brooks, 120 Ariz. 458, 460, 586 P.2d 1270, 1272 (1978) ; see State v. Madsen, 137 Ariz. 16, 18, 667 P.2d 1342, 1344 (App.1983) ; State v. Anderson, 128 Ariz. 91, 92, 623 P.2......
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Cognitive Restructuring Through Law: a Therapeutic Jurisprudence Approach to Sex Offenders and the Plea Process
...may be accepted even though defendant does not admit guilt if court is careful to ascertain there was a factual basis); State v. Brooks, 586 P.2d 1270, 1272 (Ariz. 1978) (upholding guilty plea in child molestation case despite absence of explicit statement by defendant that acts were motiva......