COURT OF APPEALS DECISION DATED AND FILED May 6, 2009 David
R. Schanker Clerk of Court of Appeals |
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This opinion is subject to further editing. If published, the official version will appear in the bound volume of the Official Reports. A party may file with the Supreme Court a petition to review an adverse decision by the Court of Appeals. See Wis. Stat. § 808.10 and Rule 809.62. |
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Appeal No. |
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STATE OF WISCONSIN |
IN COURT OF APPEALS |
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DISTRICT II |
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State of
Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Jason L. Edmonson,
Defendant-Respondent. |
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APPEAL
from an order of the circuit court for
Before Brown, C.J., Snyder and Neubauer, JJ.
¶1 PER CURIAM. The State appeals from an order vacating the jury’s verdict finding Jason Edmonson guilty of false imprisonment during an incident in which he battered his fiancée. The only issue on appeal is whether the evidence was sufficient to sustain the jury’s verdict on that charge despite the not-guilty verdict on two counts of second-degree sexual assault and disorderly conduct. We conclude it was and reverse the order vacating the verdict and remand for sentencing on the false imprisonment conviction.
¶2 Whether the evidence presented to a jury is sufficient to
sustain its verdict is a question of law.
State v. Booker, 2006 WI 79, ¶12, 292
¶3 The five elements of false imprisonment require proof that
the victim was confined or restrained, that such confinement or restraint was
intentional, that the victim was confined or restrained without consent, that
the defendant had no lawful authority to confine or restrain the victim, and
that the defendant knew the victim did not consent and there was no lawful
authority to confine or restrain the victim.
¶4 Edmonson’s fiancée testified at trial that she and Edmonson fought one night at a bar and she did not return to their shared residence until 5:00 p.m. the next day. Edmonson was not home and she locked herself into the bedroom that night. She was woken the next morning by Edmonson’s knocking on her bedroom door. As she tried to get dressed, Edmonson pushed her back on the bed repeatedly. After she used the bathroom and returned to the bedroom, Edmonson pushed her onto the bed, pinned her against the headboard, and choked her. At another point during the three-hour encounter, she managed to get out of the bedroom and into the hallway only to have Edmonson grab her ankles and pull her back into the bedroom. She indicated that she sat in a chair in the bedroom because “he wouldn’t let me leave.” In his trial testimony, Edmonson acknowledged that his fiancée attempted to leave the room and that he blocked her.
¶5 This evidence is sufficient to satisfy all five elements of false imprisonment. More than once during the entire encounter Edmonson prevented his fiancée from changing her location. His own testimony acknowledges that he did so knowingly.
¶6 Edmonson argues that the only disputed element is consent and
that because the jury rejected the victim’s testimony that two acts of sexual
conduct were without her consent, it follows that her testimony that she was
confined or restrained without her consent was incredible. However, a jury, as ultimate arbiter of
credibility, has the power to accept one portion of a witness’s testimony and
reject another portion; a jury can find that a witness is partially truthful
and partially untruthful. O’Connell
v. Schrader, 145
¶7 Further, as the State points out, the not guilty verdicts on the sexual assault charges have no bearing on the sufficiency of the evidence to sustain the false imprisonment guilty verdict.
It has been universally held that logical consistency in the verdict as between the several counts in a criminal information is not required. The verdict will be upheld despite the fact that the counts of which the defendant was convicted cannot be logically reconciled with the counts of which the defendant was acquitted.
State v. Mills, 62
¶8 The trial court vacated the verdict because it deemed the
acts of restraint to have occurred during the battery. That the conduct satisfying the elements of
false imprisonment occurred incident to another crime does not mean the
additional crime of false imprisonment did not occur.
By the Court.—Order reversed and cause remanded.
This opinion will not be published. See Wis. Stat. Rule 809.23(1)(b)5.