State v. Crowell
| Citation | 2022 MT 112 N |
| Decision Date | 07 June 2022 |
| Docket Number | DA 19-0350 |
| Parties | STATE OF MONTANA, Plaintiff and Appellee, v. JOSEPH MICHAEL CROWELL, Defendant and Appellant. |
| Court | United States State Supreme Court of Montana |
For Appellant: Chad Wright, Appellate Defender, Kathryn Hutchison, Assistant Appellate Defender, Helena, Montana
For Appellee: Austin Knudsen, Montana Attorney General, Jonathan M. Krauss, Assistant Attorney General, Helena, Montana
Travis R. Ahner, Flathead County Attorney, John Donovan, Deputy County Attorney, Kalispell, Montana
¶1 Pursuant to Section I, Paragraph 3(c), Montana Supreme Court Internal Operating Rules, we decide this case by memorandum opinion. It shall not be cited and does not serve as precedent. The case title, cause number, and disposition will be included in our quarterly list of noncitable cases published in the Pacific Reporter and Montana Reports.
¶2 Joseph Michael Crowell (Crowell) appeals from his 2019 conviction on jury trial in the Montana Eleventh Judicial District Court, Flathead County, on the offense of Aggravated Assault, a felony. We affirm.
¶3 On June 9, 2015, Crowell and his girlfriend, Nicole Amber Smelt (Smelt), were temporarily staying with Smelt's adoptive mother, Linda Ravicher (Ravicher) in Kila Montana.[1] Smelt's three-year old daughter, A.B was already living with Ravicher pending adoption under a State child abuse/neglect placement. Ravicher told Smelt earlier that she and Crowell had three days to leave due to limitations on A.B.'s foster placement.[2]
¶4 After work on Monday, June 9, 2015, Ravicher picked up A.B from daycare and went home. The last thing she remembers was standing in the kitchen before dinner. At 9:10 p.m., a female called the Flathead County 911 Center from Ravicher's home number.[3] The dispatcher recalled at trial that it was "kind of hard to hear" the caller due to "a lot of screaming" and "heavy breathing." The caller shouted, "come quick" and screamed indecipherably. The 911 recording captured the sound of phone buttons being pressed; the female yelling, "Joe, please, Joe, no, Joe, please, Joe, please, Joe"; and a male uttering something in the background like "come on." The call then terminated at the source.
¶5 Upon arrival, responding sheriff's deputies found A.B. sitting in a highchair on the first floor, apparently watching cartoons. One of them later testified that A.B. was communicative and, in response to his question as to "what happened," said that "Mommy and Joe were in a fight." The deputies saw signs of a struggle upstairs-a broken-in bathroom door jamb with the striker plate on the floor, a broken bedroom bedframe, and a cordless telephone on the floor with the access panel and batteries laying nearby. The State introduced crime scene photographs depicting what the deputies saw upon their arrival at the home.
¶6 A neighbor (Judy), who had worked as an emergency room nurse, testified at trial that, after being summoned to the home of another neighbor, she observed Ravicher in distress, with "red marks on her arm," a "very swollen" blood-covered face, and a "very weak" pulse. She testified that Ravicher appeared to be suffering from head trauma, and was thus confused and unable to describe what had happened. Enroute to the landing area for emergency medical helicopter transport to the hospital, Ravicher complained of a severe headache, pain "all over," and twice vomited. Judy testified that, upon visiting her in the hospital the next day, Ravicher's face was "still quite swollen" with "very, very dark and purple [bruising] under her eyes." "She definitely had the raccoon eyes."[4]
¶7 A forensic interviewer testified at trial that he conducted a video-recorded interview of A.B. three days after the incident. The State presented the recording at trial. When questioned as to "what happened" with her Grandma, A.B. answered, inter alia, that "Mommy kicked her," "someone else [was] with Mommy," and that Grandma got kicked "more than one time." When asked, "[w]ho hit Grandma too," A.B. answered, "um, Mommy." The interviewer responded, "Mommy?" A.B. answered, "[y]eah, and Joe too." When asked, "you said that grandma had a red eye and that she got kicked and hit . . . who did that to her," A.B. answered, "um, Joe."[5] A.B. answered further, inter alia, that she saw Grandma "sleeping," saw Mommy say "Grandma, get up," A.B. cried "for Grandma," "waked her up," and that Grandma "then went somewhere else." At trial, defense counsel extensively challenged the interviewer, and made similar arguments to the jury, asserting that various interviewer questions were leading or suggestive in nature.
¶8 The next day, Crowell was arrested alone in Ravicher's car in Cowlitz County, Washington, after a high-speed chase following an attempted traffic stop. In the ensuing driving under the influence investigation (DUI), Crowell submitted to a breath test that indicated a 0.275 blood-alcohol content. Shortly after his arrest on various Washington charges, i.e., stolen vehicle possession, eluding police, assault on a peace officer (three counts), malicious mischief, and DUI, Crowell participated in a jailhouse interview conducted by a Cowlitz County sheriff's deputy. In regard to the Kila incident, [6] the deputy testified that he noticed that Crowell had a swollen right hand, which Crowell acknowledged and attributed to a work accident. The deputy stated that Crowell initially gave a different story, but eventually acknowledged having an argument with Ravicher the night before and that he "freaked out" and pushed her with two hands over the kitchen table as she was demanding that he leave and attempting to call 911. He said Crowell told him that Ravicher then fell off the table, hit her head and face hard on the hardwood floor, and that he apparently "knocked her out." Crowell said that he then walked over to her and said, "why do you have to be such a bitch?" Crowell told the deputy that he was aware that police were on the way and that he and Smelt thus left immediately in Ravicher's car.
¶9 On July 13, 2015, the State charged Crowell with aggravated assault, i.e., purposely or knowingly causing serious bodily injury to Ravicher. On July 15, 2015, the District Court issued an arrest warrant on the Information, but the State did not immediately serve the warrant on Crowell due to his incarceration in Washington.[7] Upon his subsequent discharge of a 33-month prison term on his Washington convictions in March 2018, the State served the previously issued Montana arrest warrant on Crowell and extradited him back to Montana for trial, which then occurred in January 2019.[8] At the close of the State's case-in-chief, Crowell moved for judgment as a matter of law that the State failed to present evidence sufficient to sustain a conviction on the elements of aggravated assault. The District Court denied the motion and Crowell then testified in his defense.
¶10 Inter alia, Crowell testified that he was present in the home during the assault and was aware that Ravicher wanted him and Smelt gone from her home. He said that he and A.B. were well acquainted and had a good relationship. He stated that A.B. knew him as "Joe" and did not ever seem confused about who he was. He testified that, after he and Smelt returned home that night, he briefly spoke with A.B. and Ravicher before going outside for a few minutes. He asserted that, when he came back around 9:00, he saw Ravicher laying "facedown" on the floor, Smelt "stomping on the back of her head," and A.B. screaming in her kitchen highchair. He acknowledged that, "[a]s far as I know," A.B. had a "direct line of sight" to where the assault occurred.
¶11 Crowell testified that, after Smelt left the room and went upstairs, he saw Ravicher sit up, and then get up and sit in a chair with a bleeding cut on her head. He stated that he then went upstairs where he saw the "busted" door and Smelt, who was "screaming" in a "bloodcurdling" manner while holding and punching numbers on the telephone. He said he later saw the phone on floor after "the batteries fell out." Crowell testified that he and Smelt returned downstairs where he saw Ravicher still sitting in a chair with "blood . . . running down her face." He said that he and Smelt then drove away in Ravicher's car via a route intended to "to avoid law enforcement." Smelt did not testify at trial.
¶12 Following closing arguments and deliberation, the jury returned a "guilty" verdict. The District Court later imposed a fifty-year prison term, with credit for time served in Montana before sentencing. The court gave him no credit, however, for any time served in Washington following his arrest on Washington charges. Crowell timely appeals.
¶13 Crowell asserts that the District Court erroneously denied his motion for judgment as a matter of law at the close of the State's case-in-chief. He asserts that the State failed to present evidence sufficient to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that he, rather than Smelt's alleged stomping on her head, was the cause of serious bodily injury to Ravicher.[9] In support of that assertion, Crowell first asserts that A.B.'s statements to the responding sheriff's deputy and forensic interviewer, identifying Crowell as the perpetrator of the assault, were unreliable child hearsay. He asserts second that his "drunken" post-arrest admissions to the Washington deputy, that he violently pushed Ravicher onto the kitchen table causing her to fall and hit her face and head hard on the hardwood floor, were "too unreliable" to prove...
To continue reading
Request your trial