State v. Crafter

Citations

• 198 Conn. App. 732

Syllabus

Convicted, after a jury trial, of the crime of assault in the first degree, the defendant appealed to this court. The defendant's conviction stemmed from an incident in which she lacerated the victim numerous times with a knife. D, who was dating the victim, and M, who was dating the defendant, engaged in a violent fistfight. As they were fighting, the defendant came out of her house and approached the scene holding a ten inch knife. The victim, upon seeing the defendant, pleaded with the defendant to leave D and M alone. In response, the defendant told the victim to ''shut the fuck up'' and poked her on the forehead with the knife. The victim, fearing that the defendant was going to severely injure D, attempted to grab the knife from the defendant, and a fight for the knife ensued, during which the victim sustained lacerations to her face, thumb and back, which resulted in permanent scarring. At trial, following the close of the state's evidence, the trial court denied the defendant's motion for a judgment of acquittal. Held: 1. The evidence presented at trial was sufficient for the jury to find beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant intended to cause serious physical injury to the victim: the jury reasonably could have inferred the defen- dant's intent to cause serious physical injury to the victim from her use of a large, ten inch knife to inflict numerous lacerations on the victim, which resulted in permanent scarring, and from her behavior following the incident, which exhibited a consciousness of guilt; moreover, evi- dence presented at trial of the defendant's interaction with D on the day before the incident, in which D punched the defendant, permitted the jury to infer that, when the defendant came out of her house with a knife, she intended to seriously injure D and that, when the victim requested that she leave D and M alone and foiled her plan to harm D by attempting to grab the knife, the defendant directed her anger toward the victim, and, althou