State v. Andres C.

Citations

• 208 Conn. App. 825

Syllabus

Convicted of the crimes of sexual assault in the third degree and risk of injury to a child, the defendant appealed to this court. The defendant's conviction stemmed from his sexual abuse of the minor victim, his niece. Before trial, the court granted the state's motion to allow the introduction of uncharged misconduct evidence, specifically, evidence regarding the defendant's sexual abuse of the victim's cousin, D. At trial, the victim testified, inter alia, that she maintained certain journals, which related to her abuse, and the court declined to allow the defendant access to the journals. The prosecutors assigned the task of reviewing the journals for exculpatory material, which were handwritten in Spanish, to a bilin- gual investigator in their office. The court indicated that it would conduct an in camera review of any materials that might be exculpatory, and defense counsel did not challenge this procedure. Held: 1. The defendant could not prevail on his claim that the trial court improperly admitted uncharged misconduct evidence. a. This court declined to review the defendant's claim that the trial court erred in permitting the state to present uncharged misconduct evidence regarding the sexual abuse of D to show his propensity for such acts, because the court ultimately admitted this evidence for a limited purpose, namely, as an explanation for the victim's delayed disclosure of the abuse, and not to establish the defendant's propensity to commit such acts. b. The trial court properly denied the defendant's motion to strike the testimony regarding the uncharged misconduct evidence after the prose- cutors declined to call D as a witness: the evidence was admitted only for the purpose of explaining the victim's delay in disclosing her own sexual abuse by the defendant, the evidence did not have only minimal probative value as the victim testified that she delayed disclosing her abuse after she learned of the defendant's abuse of D and observed the subsequent