Opinion
No. CR02-177575
September 9, 2006
MEMORANDUM OF DECISION
The petitioner, Justin Scott Davis, was convicted by a jury on November 19, 2003 of one count of risk of injury to a minor, in violation of Connecticut General Statutes § 53-21(2), which carried a maximum penalty of ten years of incarceration with a one-year mandatory minimum sentence. On December 19, 2003, the trial court imposed a sentence on the petitioner of ten years of incarceration, suspended after serving four years and fifteen years of probation with various conditions. It is this sentence the petitioner seeks to have reviewed.
In October 2002, the maximum sentenced increased to twenty years of incarceration. The petitioner committing risk of injury to a minor in November 2001.
The facts of this case are as follows:
In November 2001, L., then thirteen years old, wasplaying basketball in her backyard in Bridgeport with her brother, B. The defendant, who lived on the same street as L., joined in the game. B. went indoors to get drinks, leaving L. and the defendant alone outdoors. While B. was gone, the defendant, who was standing on or near the porch attached to the back of L.'s apartment building, directed her to "come here." After she complied, the defendant reached into her pants, inside her underwear, and placed his finger in her vagina for approximately two seconds. After doing so, the defendant told L. that she "could take a lot for a little girl." The following day, L. told her cousin what had happened and soon thereafter reported the incident to her mother, to a counselor and to a female police officer.
State v. Davis, 90 Conn.App. 263, 264-65, 876 A.2d 1265 (2005) (footnote omitted). Counsel for the petitioner argued before the Division that the petitioner's sentence is excessive, given the conduct involved of putting his hands in the victim's pants. Counsel also argued that the sentence does not take into account the petitioner's family support and that he had completed one year of college. The petitioner addressed the Division and complained that his trial counsel stated that teens at seventeen or eighteen years old are impulsive and thus implied that he was impulsive in committing the offense, when, instead, he should have said that the petitioner was innocent.
Counsel for the State countered that the victim was thirteen years old at the time of the offense and the petitioner was eighteen. She was a shy and introverted child who had difficulty in social situations. The petitioner was a family friend who took advantage of her. The State also noted that the sentencing Court balanced aggravating and mitigating factors in sentencing the petitioner and reached an appropriate sentence.
Pursuant to Connecticut Practice Book § 43-23 et seq., the Sentence Review Division is limited in its scope of review. The Division is to determine whether the sentence imposed "should be modified because it is inappropriate or disproportionate in the light of the nature of the offense, the character of the offender, the protection of the public interest and the deterrent, rehabilitative, isolative and denunciatory purposes for which the sentence was intended." The Division is without authority to modify sentences except in accordance with the provisions of Connecticut Practice Book § 43-23 et seq. and Connecticut General Statutes § 51-194 et seq.
In the present case, the sentencing Court noted that it could not ignore the jury's verdict and the traumatic impact of the crime on the victim. The sentencing judge carefully considered the seriousness of the crime, and weighed all relevant aggravating and mitigating circumstances relevant to the petitioner's case, including his family support and educational background. In fashioning the appropriate sentence he stated as follows:
I would say, however, that the periods of time that have gone through my mind on this matter have really fluctuated in listening to everybody here and I am trying to come up with a sentence that would be certainly not satisfactory to either side. One side wants the full penalty, and the other wants no penalty at all. The Court cannot formulate a sentence here that anybody would be happy, and the Court certainly wouldn't be happy here.
But the Court is going to do what it believes is in the best interest of all, and in the interest of society, and interest of justice for this type of crime.
See Sentencing Transcript dated December 19, 2003, pages 40-41.
Consequently, after reviewing the record in its entirety, the Division finds that given the fact that the petitioner faced a sentence of ten years of incarceration, the sentence imposed on the defendant on December 19, 2003 was appropriate and not disproportionate. It complied with the provisions of Connecticut Practice Book § 43-23 et seq.
THE SENTENCE IS AFFIRMED.