State v. Davies
350 So. 2d 586 (1977)
Premium Feature
Subscribe to Lexplug to listen to the Case Podcast.
Rule of Law:
Evidence of a defendant's flight, concealment, or attempt to avoid apprehension is relevant to show consciousness of guilt and is admissible, even if such evidence also tends to prove the defendant committed another, separate crime.
Facts:
- In the early morning, A. J. Davies was at a nightclub where he propositioned a woman for sex, and she refused.
- When the woman and her friends left the club, Davies followed them into an alley.
- Davies grabbed the woman by the neck, threatened her friends by stating he would 'blow her head off' while reaching into his waistband, and began to choke her.
- The woman resisted and Davies choked her until she lost consciousness.
- When police arrived and shined a light on him, Davies fled the scene by jumping a fence and running through alleys.
- About 30 minutes later, Davies went to the home of a former girlfriend, Jerry Ann, uninvited, and entered her bedroom carrying the board she used to block her back door.
- When friends at the house told Davies he had to leave, he tried to shove them into the kitchen.
- Davies then threatened them by saying, 'I have a .25' while reaching into his pants, which prompted one of the friends to shoot him.
Procedural Posture:
- The State of Louisiana charged A. J. Davies with attempted aggravated rape in a state trial court.
- A jury found Davies guilty as charged.
- The trial court entered a judgment of conviction and sentenced Davies to forty-five years imprisonment at hard labor.
- Davies, as defendant-appellant, appealed his conviction and sentence to the Supreme Court of Louisiana, the state's highest court.
Premium Content
Subscribe to Lexplug to view the complete brief
You're viewing a preview with Rule of Law, Facts, and Procedural Posture
Issue:
Does evidence of a defendant's actions hours after a crime, which constitute a separate criminal offense, become inadmissible as improper 'other crimes' evidence if it is offered to show the defendant's continuous effort to avoid apprehension?
Opinions:
Majority - Sanders, C.J.
No. Evidence of a defendant's flight and continued efforts to avoid apprehension is relevant to show consciousness of guilt and is therefore admissible, even if it reveals other criminal conduct. The court reasoned that 'flight' is not limited to the immediate act of leaving the crime scene but also includes continued concealment and actions taken to evade arrest. The defendant's entry into the third party's house and his resistance to leaving were part of his continuous effort to avoid apprehension following the initial attempted rape, making the testimony about that incident admissible to prove his consciousness of guilt for the original crime.
Concurring - Tate, J.
No. While the evidence was properly admitted, it was not relevant as evidence of flight. The incident at Jerry Ann's home was a separate, collateral matter. However, the evidence was tenuously relevant and admissible for another reason: the defendant's claim to have a gun at the second location helped corroborate the victim's testimony that he had also threatened her with a gun. Though improperly admitted as rebuttal, its admission did not constitute reversible error.
Concurring - Calogero, J.
No. The evidence was relevant and admissible, but not because it showed flight. The testimony about the defendant's conduct at his former girlfriend's house was not evidence of another crime and was relevant because his statement about possessing a gun tended to corroborate the victim's testimony from the primary offense. The majority's characterization of this separate, bizarre incident occurring hours later as part of the defendant's 'flight' is incorrect.
Analysis:
This case expands the evidentiary concept of 'flight' to include actions taken well after the crime and at a different location, so long as they can be construed as part of a continuous effort to evade justice. This broad interpretation allows prosecutors to introduce potentially prejudicial 'other crimes' evidence under the guise of showing consciousness of guilt. However, the multiple concurring opinions signal judicial disagreement, suggesting that the scope of this rule is contested and that future courts might be more inclined to limit the flight doctrine or require an alternative basis for admissibility, such as corroboration.
