State v. Obeta

• Decision Date: 24 March 2011
• Docket Number: No. A10–1349.,A10–1349.
• Citation: 796 N.W.2d 282
• Parties: STATE of Minnesota, Appellant,v.Nathan OBETA, Respondent.
• Court: Minnesota Supreme Court

796 N.W.2d 282

STATE of Minnesota, Appellant,

v.Nathan OBETA, Respondent.

No. A10–1349.

Supreme Court of Minnesota.

March 24, 2011.

Syllabus by the Court

1. The court may exercise its inherent supervisory power to ensure the fair administration of justice to address a significant evidentiary issue of statewide impact.

2. In a criminal sexual conduct case in which the defendant argues that the sexual conduct was consensual, the district court has discretion to admit expert-opinion evidence on the typicality of delayed reporting, lack of physical injuries, and submissive conduct by sexual-assault victims when the district court concludes that such evidence is helpful to the jury and the opinion has foundational reliability.

Lori Swanson, Attorney General, John Choi, Ramsey County Attorney, Thomas R. Ragatz, Assistant County Attorney, St. Paul, MN, for appellant.Renée J. Bergeron, St. Paul, MN, for respondent.Caroline S. Palmer, Sara G. Thome, St. Paul, MN, for amicus curiae Minnesota Coalition Against Sexual Assault.Doug Johnson, Washington County Attorney, Sarah E. Kerrigan, Assistant County Attorney, Stillwater, MN, for amicus curiae Minnesota County Attorneys Association.

OPINION

DIETZEN, Justice.

Respondent Nathan Obeta was found guilty by a jury and convicted of first- and third-degree criminal sexual conduct, Minn.Stat. §§ 609.342, subd. 1(e)(i), and 609.344, subd. 1(c) (2010). On appeal, the court of appeals reversed Obeta's convictions based on the cumulative effect of several trial errors. State v. Obeta ( Obeta I ), No. A08–1419, 2009 WL 2596102 (Minn.App. Aug. 25, 2009), rev. denied (Minn. Nov. 17, 2009). On remand, appellant State of Minnesota requested a pretrial order from the district court allowing it to present expert-opinion evidence to rebut Obeta's defense that the sexual conduct with the complainant was consensual. The district court denied the State's request to admit this expert testimony at Obeta's second trial. The issue presented in this case is whether our decision in State v. Saldana, 324 N.W.2d 227 (Minn.1982), operates as a blanket prohibition against the admission of expert testimony about typical rape-victim behaviors to rebut a defendant's claim that the sexual conduct was consensual. Because we conclude that Saldana has been interpreted too broadly, we reverse the district court.

The parties do not dispute the facts of the alleged sexual assault as set out in the unpublished opinion from the court of appeals. Obeta I, 2009 WL 2596102, at *1–2. Briefly stated, Obeta and his friend met the complainant, M.B., and her friend for the first time on April 25, 2007, in Isanti, Minnesota. During the course of the evening, the police arrested Obeta's friend and impounded the car he was driving because its registered owner was not present.

After Obeta's friend was released from police custody, M.B. cajoled her ex-boyfriend into giving M.B. and the two men a ride to St. Paul. After spending the day collecting money for the impound lot fee, Obeta obtained the car from an impound lot near Isanti. M.B. asked Obeta if he would give her a ride home. Obeta agreed, but instead of driving her to her home in Isanti, Obeta drove M.B. and his friends to St. Paul. After dropping off his friends, Obeta parked the car in the parking lot of an apartment complex. M.B. testified that Obeta forced her to have sexual intercourse in the car.

Afterwards, M.B. went into an adjacent gas station to clean up in the bathroom. M.B. asked to use the phone, telling the attendant that she was stranded. M.B. failed to find a ride back to Isanti, so she went across the street and sat in a Taco Bell. Approximately two to three hours after the alleged assault, M.B. flagged down a patrolling police officer and reported that Obeta raped her. The police took M.B. to a hospital where a Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner (SANE) examined her.

At trial, Obeta admitted he had sex with M.B. but argued that it was consensual. During the trial, the State elicited testimony from the SANE nurse that M.B. did not suffer vaginal trauma, but that submissive behavior and lack of vaginal injury were not unusual in cases of sexual assault. The investigating police officer testified that, in her experience, most sexual assault victims delay reporting the crime. The jury found Obeta guilty of first- and third-degree criminal sexual conduct.

The court of appeals reversed Obeta's conviction for cumulative error and remanded for a new trial. Obeta I, 2009 WL 2596102, at *5–6. As part of this cumulative error, the court held the district court erred in admitting the testimony from the SANE nurse and the police officer regarding typical rape-victim behaviors because our decision in State v. Saldana, 324 N.W.2d 227, 229–30 (Minn.1982), prohibits such testimony. Obeta I, 2009 WL 2596102, at *3.

At a pretrial hearing on remand to the district court, the State sought to admit expert testimony on the subject of rape myths and typical rape-victim behaviors. The State presented testimony from Jeanne Martin, the director of the Victim Services Program for Dodge, Filmore, and Olmsted Counties, and Dr. Patricia Frazier, a professor of psychology at the University of Minnesota, and offered into evidence two recent journal articles by British researchers.

Both Martin and Dr. Frazier testified about typical behaviors of victims during and after a sexual assault. They said that it is uncommon for victims to fight aggressively against their rapist. They testified that most people who are sexually assaulted receive no physical injuries; that when they are injured, the most common injury is bruising on the thighs or arms from where the victim was held down; and that vaginal injuries are unusual. They further explained that people who are sexually assaulted often delay reporting their attack.

Dr. Frazier also provided specific information about rape myths. She testified that rape myths are “beliefs about what rape is and what rape victims are” and “beliefs about how rape victims should be or should act.” According to Dr. Frazier, “studies that look at rape myths show that they are common” and that “people who endorse more rape myths are less likely to believe a victim, more likely to hold the victim responsible, less likely to hold the perpetrator responsible, and less likely to convict a defendant.” Dr. Frazier concluded her direct testimony with the following exchange:

[STATE]: [I]s it your opinion from the research that you've done that the factors we've discussed—the delayed reporting, the lack of resistance, lack of injury, and the calm affect—is it your opinion that those factors impact the jury in its deliberation, or certainly can?

[FRAZIER]: Yes.

[STATE]: Is it your opinion that the general public lacks information or an informed knowledge about the range of behaviors that a person might experience after a sexual assault?

[FRAZIER]: Yes.

The State offered two articles examining a mock-juror study by British researchers Drs. Louise Ellison and Vanessa Munro. See Louise Ellison & Vanessa E. Munro, Turning Mirrors into Windows?: Assessing the Impact of (Mock) Juror Education in Rape Trials, 49 Brit. J. Criminology 363 (2009); and Louise Ellison & Vanessa E. Munro, Reacting to Rape: Exploring Mock Jurors' Assessments of Complainant Credibility, 49 Brit. J. Criminology 202 (2009). The researchers in the mock-jury study manipulated the evidence presented during the mock trial to study jurors' reactions to the sexual-assault victim's delayed reporting, flat affect on the witness stand, and lack of physical injury. Ellison & Munro, Reacting to Rape, supra, at 204–05. Additionally, the researchers provided jurors with educational information about typical rape behaviors through either expert testimony or a jury instruction. Id.

Drs. Ellison and Munro examined the deliberations of the groups that did not receive any educational information to determine whether the mock jurors subscribed to rape myths. Ellison & Munro, Reacting to Rape, supra, at 206. They found that mock jurors' “commitment to the belief that a ‘normal’ response to sexual attack would be to struggle physically was, in many cases, unshakeable.” Id. Additionally, jurors harbored “strong, but unfounded, convictions that vaginal tissues are easily torn, that pelvic muscles can be rigidified at will and that intercourse without trauma only occurs where a woman is aroused, which, in the jurors' minds, was wholly inconsistent with rape.” Id. at 207. The study also yielded support for the proposition that jurors view delayed reporting as indicative of a fabricated report, although the jurors were receptive to the idea that a victim may delay reporting for other reasons. Id. at 209–10.

The district court denied the State's motion to admit the proffered expert testimony. The court made no findings about the proffered testimony but instead explained that it was denying the motion, in part, because of current Minnesota case law on the admission of expert testimony regarding typical rape-victim behaviors. The State appealed the order to the court of appeals and, while that appeal was pending, we granted the State's petition for accelerated review.

I.

Initially, we must decide whether the State's pretrial appeal of the district court's order denying its request to offer expert testimony on typical rape-victim behaviors should be reviewed by the court. The State argues that the district court's order precluding it from offering expert testimony on typical rape-victim behaviors will have a critical impact on its ability to prosecute Obeta. Essentially, the State urges that we overturn our decision in State v. Saldana, 324 N.W.2d 227 (Minn.1982), and allow such expert testimony to help explain certain facts in the case that are relevant to the issue of consent, such as delayed reporting of the incident, lack of physical injuries, and submissive behavior during the alleged assault.

In Minnesota, we...