State v. Charles

• Decision Date: 11 May 1995
• Docket Number: No. 62062-8,62062-8
• Citation: 126 Wn.2d 353,894 P.2d 558
• Court: Washington Supreme Court
• Parties: The STATE of Washington, Petitioner, v. Louis CHARLES, Respondent.

Page 353

126 Wn.2d 353

894 P.2d 558

The STATE of Washington, Petitioner, v. Louis CHARLES, Respondent.

No. 62062-8.

Supreme Court of Washington En Banc.

May 11, 1995.

Jeffrey C. Sullivan, Yakima County Pros., Bruce Hanify, Deputy, Yakima, for petitioner.

Paul J. Wasson, Spokane, for respondent.

PER CURIAM.

The State petitions for review of a Court of Appeals decision reversing Louis Charles' second degree rape conviction on the ground that the trial court erred in failing to give Charles' proposed instruction on third degree rape. The State contends that the evidence presented at trial did not support such an instruction. We agree and reverse the Court of Appeals.

The information accused Charles of committing second degree rape by engaging in sexual intercourse with S.S. by forcible compulsion. At trial, Charles and the victim, S.S., testified to strikingly different versions of the events on the night of the crime.

S.S. said that she saw Charles sitting on the hood of a car parked outside her friend's house. When she asked Charles what he was doing, he got off the car and grabbed her around the shoulders. He then walked her past two houses and pushed her onto her back on the ground behind a bush. He took off her shoes, tee shirt, and socks, and partially removed her jeans and underpants. She pleaded with him to stop, struggled, scratched him, and may have hit him once. He then forcibly engaged in vaginal and oral intercourse with her. S.S. eventually managed to run away.

When the police arrived a few minutes later, one of the officers saw Charles sitting nearby. S.S. identified Charles as the man who raped her. After being informed of his rights, Charles said he did not hit "her". Later, Charles denied raping S.S. and said he had not had intercourse with anyone that night.

The doctor who examined S.S. at the hospital testified that there were fresh bruises on her arms consistent with having been squeezed around her arms. There were also abrasions on her knees, bruises on her shins, and blades of grass in her vagina.

Charles testified that he offered S.S. a beer when she approached him. She then mentioned that she was upset that she spent all her money and had none for her children. He offered her $20 "for a quick one". S.S. initially turned him down, but then agreed and told Charles not to tell anyone. They found a place where she laid down Charles' jacket and her tee-shirt to cover the ground. He then helped her remove her clothes, and tried to have sex with her. Though he was too drunk to complete the act, he gave her the promised $20. She then ran away.

Defense counsel proposed an instruction on third degree rape as a lesser included offense and excepted to the court's failure to give this instruction. The jury found Charles guilty of second degree rape. The Court of Appeals reversed, solely on the ground that there was sufficient evidence to support an instruction on third degree rape.

This holding conflicts with State v. Fowler, 114 Wash.2d 59, 67, 785 P.2d 808 (1990) and State v. Speece, 115 Wash.2d 360, 363, 798 P.2d 294 (1990). ¹ A lesser included offense instruction is proper only if each element of the lesser offense is necessarily included in the charged offense and "there is sufficient evidence to support an inference that the lesser crime was committed." State v. Speece, supra at 362, 798 P.2d 294; see State v. Fowler, supra at 67-68, 785 P.2d 808; State v. Harris, 121 Wash.2d 317, 849 P.2d 1216 (1993). Also, as we further explained in Fowler and Speece, "[i]t is not enough that the jury might simply disbelieve the State's evidence." State v. Fowler, supra at 67, 785...