State v. Hudnall

• Decision Date: 10 June 1987
• Docket Number: No. 22763,22763
• Citation: 293 S.C. 97,359 S.E.2d 59
• Court: South Carolina Supreme Court
• Parties: The STATE, Respondent, v. Michael Lee HUDNALL, Appellant. . Heard

Page 59

359 S.E.2d 59

293 S.C. 97

The STATE, Respondent, v. Michael Lee HUDNALL, Appellant.

No. 22763.

Supreme Court of South Carolina.

Heard June 10, 1987.

Decided Aug. 3, 1987.

Deputy Chief Atty. Elizabeth C. Fullwood, of S.C. Office of Appellate Defense, Columbia, for appellant.

Attorney Gen. T. Travis Medlock, Asst. Attys. Gen. Harold M. Coombs, Jr., and Amie L. Clifford, Columbia, and Sol. Charles M. Condon, Charleston, for respondent.

GREGORY, Justice:

Appellant was convicted of two counts of first degree criminal sexual conduct and sentenced to two concurrent twelve-year terms. We reverse.

The victim in this case is appellant's three-year-old daughter by his former wife, Frances Hudnall. The sexual abuse was reported by Mrs. Hudnall following a bitter domestic dispute that ultimately ended her marriage to appellant. Mrs. Hudnall contacted a domestic relations lawyer regarding the alleged incident but she did not take the child for a medical examination until the Department of Social Services became involved in the case. The medical examination revealed no physical abnormalities to corroborate the allegations.

Because the victim was three years old at the time of trial, her testimony was taken by videotaped deposition. See S.C.Code Ann. § 16-3-1530(G) (1985). Appellant contests his daughter's competency to testify and claims the trial judge erred in qualifying her on the basis of the videotaped competency examination. We agree.

Qualification of a witness is within the trial judge's discretion and his ruling will be reversed only for an abuse thereof. State v. Hardee, 279 S.C. 409, 308 S.E.2d 521 (1983); State v. Green, 267 S.C. 599, 230 S.E.2d 618 (1976). The test to determine a minor's competence to testify is whether the child is aware of right and wrong and understands the probability of punishment for lying. State v. Green, supra.

Upon viewing the videotape of the child's competency examination, we are convinced this child could not be held morally accountable for telling a lie. Her responses to questioning indicate she is incapable of distinguishing right from wrong, truth from falsehood, or reality from make-believe. We find the trial judge abused his discretion in qualifying this witness.

Moreover, the trial judge should have presided during the competency examination of a witness of such tender years rather than determine her competence merely upon a viewing of the videotape. A judge's presence lends a courtroom-like atmosphere to better evaluate the witness's ability to appreciate the consequences of his or her testimony. The unstructured manner in which the examination here was conducted and the poor technical quality of this videotape provided an inadequate substitute upon which to find the witness competent.

Next, appellant contests the admissibility of certain expert testimony. Dr. Schuh, a pediatrician, testified over appellant's objection regarding common characteristics exhibited by child victims of sexual abuse including nightmares, masturbation, and sexual behavior with others. Appellant contests the use of this evidence because it had no probative value to establish an element of the crime.

The evidence in question is similar to the battered woman's syndrome evidence we recently held admissible in State v. Hill, 287 S.C. 398, 339 S.E.2d 121 (1986). This case, however, is distinguishable from Hill because here the evidence was introduced to show whether in fact the crime had occurred. In Hill, the battered woman's syndrome evidence was offered merely to explain the psychological feasibility of the defendant's claim of self-defense in the face of her seemingly inconsistent behavior in remaining with a man who repeatedly abused her. We held evidence of the battered woman's syndrome is relevant to the defendant's state of mind but does not constitute a defense in itself.

Cases from other jurisdictions are consistent with this distinction in admitting or refusing evidence of this type. In People v. Bledsoe, 36 Cal.3d 236, 203 Cal.Rptr. 450, 681 P.2d 291 (1984), the court held expert testimony regarding rape trauma syndrome inadmissible because it was used not to rebut misconceptions about the behavior of a rape victim but to show that the rape had in fact occurred. The court concluded this evidence was not reliable to prove the crime of rape because the indicators of rape trauma syndrome were not devised to determine the truth of the events...