State v. Clark, A06-1765.

• Decision Date: 13 September 2007
• Docket Number: No. A06-1765.,A06-1765.
• Citation: 738 N.W.2d 316
• Parties: STATE of Minnesota, Respondent, v. Courtney Bernard CLARK, Appellant.
• Court: Minnesota Supreme Court

738 N.W.2d 316

STATE of Minnesota, Respondent, v. Courtney Bernard CLARK, Appellant.

No. A06-1765.

Supreme Court of Minnesota.

September 13, 2007.

John M. Stuart, State Public Defender, Paul J. Maravigli, Assistant State Public Defender, Minneapolis, MN, for Appellant.

Lori Swanson, Attorney General, Susan Gaertner, Ramsey County Attorney, Thomas R. Ragatz, Assistant Ramsey County Attorney, St. Paul, MN, for Respondent.

Heard, considered, and decided by the court en banc.

OPINION

ANDERSON, Paul H., Justice.

Courtney Bernard Clark was convicted in Ramsey County for murdering Rodney Foster and attempting to murder Foster's girlfriend, B.B., while committing or attempting to commit aggravated robbery, kidnapping, and criminal sexual conduct. At Clark's trial, the state introduced over Clark's objection three recorded interviews between Clark and the police. In the first and second interviews, Clark denied involvement in the charged offenses. In the third interview, Clark admitted tying up Foster and B.B. and robbing Foster, and he stated that Foster died "by accident." During all three interviews, Clark denied having sexual relations with B.B. on the date in question. Clark's trial testimony was largely consistent with his statements during the third interview and directly opposed to the testimony of B.B., the state's primary witness. On appeal, Clark argues that the district court erred on several grounds when it admitted the recorded interviews and when it admitted, for substantive purposes, Clark's prior conviction for criminal sexual conduct. We affirm.

Appellant Courtney Bernard Clark was indicted in Ramsey County for the murder of Rodney Foster and attempted murder of Foster's girlfriend, B.B. Clark pleaded not guilty to all eight counts of the indictment.¹ Clark was subsequently tried before a Ramsey County jury, and B.B. was the state's primary witness.

B.B.'s Testimony

B.B. testified that she had only known Clark for a few days as of the date of Foster's murder—Saturday, July 16, 2005. Several days before that Saturday, Foster learned that Clark did not have a home and invited Clark to stay at Foster's apartment.² While spending time at Foster's apartment, Clark apparently observed Foster's drug dealer, "Taboo," packaging heroin for sale and selling heroin to Foster. Clark also spent time getting high with Foster and B.B. on drugs that Foster gave him.

B.B. and Foster were alone in the apartment and watching a movie in the living room early on Saturday when Clark, Foster's roommate, and the roommate's friend D.T. arrived at approximately 3 a.m. The roommate and D.T. left soon thereafter. Clark eventually asked Foster for some heroin. When Foster told Clark he did not have any, Clark became angry. At Foster's request, Clark then took a seat on the couch and continued to converse with Foster. B.B. testified that she fell asleep while Foster and Clark were talking.

B.B. awoke to see Clark standing over her with a gun, telling her to get on her stomach and put her hands behind her back. Clark then ordered Foster, who was lying on his left side, to get on his stomach. Clark bound B.B.'s wrists and feet, and at some point placed a sock in her mouth. B.B. was unable to see Foster but she deduced, based on comments Foster made to Clark, that Clark had also bound Foster's wrists. Clark then asked where the drugs and money were located. Foster told Clark he would find the items in Foster's bedroom. Clark went to Foster's bedroom and returned with drugs and money.

Sometime thereafter, Clark carried B.B. from the living room into the bathroom and left her on the bathroom floor in the dark. B.B. testified that she could hear Clark moving around the apartment searching through papers and clothes. After about three hours, she heard a muffled cry from Foster, who had apparently remained in the living room. Soon thereafter, Clark entered the bathroom briefly to reassure B.B. "that everything was going to be all right."

Clark returned to the bathroom several minutes later and said, "Foster, do you care if I fuck your bitch?" B.B. heard no response from Foster and Clark then said, "Did you hear that? * * * He doesn't care." Clark then dragged B.B. into Foster's bedroom where he placed her, still bound and gagged, on her back on an air mattress. Clark then partially removed his clothing and pulled B.B.'s pajama pants to her ankles, and vaginally raped her for approximately 10 minutes. When the rape was over, B.B. saw Clark carry a condom into the bathroom. She then heard him flush the toilet and turn on the water. Clark returned with a washcloth and scrubbed B.B.'s genital area. He then went back to the bathroom, ran some water, and returned with the washcloth again. After he washed B.B. a second time, Clark pulled up B.B.'s pants and dressed himself.

Clark next turned B.B. onto her stomach on the air mattress. From this position B.B. could see Foster's feet protruding from a laundry bag on the floor, which caused her to panic. Clark then told B.B. that Foster was dead and said, "Now it's time for the grand finale." Clark proceeded to kneel over B.B. and to place and hold a plastic bag over her head. He told B.B. to breathe and "[j]ust let go." Although B.B. was still bound and gagged, she was able to free her left hand and tear the bag off her face, at which point Clark became angry and swore at her. A minute or so later, Clark stood up, looked out the windows, and started snorting heroin. Shortly thereafter, he offered B.B. some crack cocaine by removing the gag and placing a lighted crack pipe to her mouth. After B.B. smoked the pipe, Clark replaced the gag, rebound her wrists, and rolled her up in some bed sheets.

B.B. observed Clark try without success to throw Foster's body out the bedroom window. Clark then dragged the body out of the bedroom. B.B. ultimately heard a door in the apartment shut, then Foster's vehicle—a white, SUV-type truck—being started and a squealing of tires. Five to seven minutes later, Clark returned to the apartment. He unwrapped B.B. and unbound her feet and hands. He then forced B.B. to leave the apartment with him and threatened to kill her mother and children. At the time Clark made these threats, he was holding B.B.'s driver's license, which listed the address where her mother and children resided.

When B.B. entered the apartment building hallway with Clark, she saw a neighbor she recognized. As she passed this neighbor, B.B. mouthed the words "Help me." The neighbor kept walking, and B.B. followed Clark out of the apartment building. Some people whom B.B. recognized were sitting on the front stairs of the building. She made eye contact with one of them as she followed Clark to Foster's truck, which was parked in the building's driveway. A neighbor then came out of the building and followed Clark and B.B., and as B.B. reached the truck, the neighbor grabbed B.B.'s arm and said to Clark, "She doesn't look like she wants to go with you." B.B. then turned and ran back into the building. B.B. testified that she ran through the building's second and third floor hallways and knocked on every apartment door as she ran by, not waiting to see if anyone would answer. She was ultimately admitted into a third floor apartment, and one of the apartment's occupants called 911.

Other Witnesses for the State

A Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner (SANE nurse) who examined B.B. in the early afternoon on July 16 testified that she found bloody discharge on B.B.'s cervix, suggesting an injury consistent with rough or forced sexual intercourse. A woman who was staying with her daughter in Foster's apartment building at the time of the murder testified that she saw B.B. leaving with Clark and mouthing the words "Help me." The woman's daughter testified that she and several other persons were gathered on the front steps of the apartment building when she saw Clark and B.B. emerge on the morning of July 16. The daughter said that she told Clark to let B.B. go. She also said that she saw Clark leave the scene in a white truck.

A forensic scientist from the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension testified that Clark's DNA was not found on evidence seized from the crime scene, including washcloths, bed sheets, a condom wrapper found in the bedroom, semen stains on the pants B.B. was wearing before and after the rape, and B.B.'s driver's license. The scientist also testified that Clark's DNA was not found on biological samples taken from B.B. by the SANE nurse.

Several witnesses testified that they saw Clark in the Lake Harriett area of Minneapolis on the morning of the next day— Sunday, July 17. One of these witnesses saw Clark in a parking lot near the Lake Harriett concessions building, looking lost or confused. This witness observed Clark standing about 30 yards from a white truck, which was the only vehicle in the parking lot at that time. Another witness, who resided in the area, testified that Clark drove a white SUV into his driveway and onto the yard of a neighbor. While the witness was talking with Clark, the neighbor emerged from her house and said that she had called the police. Clark then sped from the scene in the SUV. One of Clark's cousins testified that Clark visited her that Sunday, and he was driving a white truck that she had never known him to drive. The cousin noticed that Clark had "a nice amount of money"—more than she had ever seen Clark carry.

A Washington County police officer testified that one week later, in the early morning hours of July 24, Clark was arrested after he drove a station wagon in the wrong direction on a highway exit ramp and then failed to pull over for the police. Clark ultimately crashed into some large cement barriers and was taken to the Ramsey County Law Enforcement Center.

A Minneapolis police officer testified that during the evening of July 24, the police responded to a radio call indicating that a body had been discovered near some railroad...