State of Tennessee v. Robert C. Butler

Knoxville, Tennessee defendant wrongfully convicted on sexual assault charge.



Robert Butler, age 34, was charged with sexually assaulting an 18-year-old student enrolled in one of the sociology classes he taught at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville, Tennessee.



Butler, who is black, let the student take an examine in his office a day earlier than the rest of the class because she was leaving to travel home. After taking the exam the student accused Butler of forcing her to engage in oral sex and then raped her.



On October 7, 1976, Jean Hudson, a student at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville, took a sociology test in the office of the defendant, the course instructor. The test had been scheduled for the following day for the whole class, but by previous arrangement Ms. Hudson was allowed to take it early to permit her to accompany her brother to Memphis to visit their parents.



Upon concluding the examination, Ms. Hudson asked Butler about one question, and Butler then engaged her in a discussion, telling her that he enjoyed talking with his students and having them participate in various unspecified experiments. After several minutes of this general conversation during the course of which Butler had been asking Ms. Hudson about her opinions on various matters, he asked her how she would react if a black male approached her and said "let's screw," to which Ms. Hudson replied that she would find such behavior offensive without regard to the man's race. Thereupon, Butler invited his student to participate in an experiment of an undefined nature with him, to which she agreed.



The prosecutrix testified that Butler placed two chairs in a closet in his office and had Ms. Hudson sit in one while he closed the door and sat in the other. In the dark he told Ms. Hudson to perform fellatio, which she refused to do, believing that the experiment was designed to study her response in such a situation. This belief was dispelled, however, when the appellant announced that he was "into violence" and produced a sharp object which he said was a knife and which he held against the victim's neck, threatening to cut her throat if she did not cooperate. After several minutes of fellatio, the appellant made Ms. Hudson stand up while he removed her jeans and panties, then had her sit on his lap so that he was able to have intercourse. Ms. Hudson braced her hands against the wall at about shoulder level during this latter part of the ordeal.



Butler ultimately relaxed, opened the door and released his victim, according to her unrefuted testimony. Ms. Hudson put her clothes back on, retrieved her purse and books from the desk in the office and walked to the office door, at which point the appellant intercepted her and held his foot against the door, blocking it as she started to open it to leave. He asked her why she didn't stick around for him to get her reaction to his "experiment," but she responded by using both hands to pull the door open. She did not run as she escaped, fearful that Butler would chase her, but she chose the longer route out of the building so as to avoid the possibility of being entrapped in a stairwell near the instructor's office.



Upon returning to her dormitory room, Ms. Hudson disclosed these facts to her roommate, at whose urging Ms. Hudson contacted the university police. An officer took the prosecutrix to the university hospital, where she was examined and released. On separate occasions she told that policeman and a second officer who handles rape cases for the university what had happened. Each recounting of the events was highly consistent with the others. Detective Phillips testified that she observed a discoloration on Ms. Hudson's neck while the victim was talking to her.



Petitioner's theory was that the sexual relations had been consensual. He himself did not testify. The only witness for the defense was a graduate student who testified that, when she had seen Petitioner an hour or so after his encounter with the victim, he was behaving normally.



Defendant pleaded not guilty, but admitted that he had sex with the student.



Butler testified in the first case but did not testify. The only positive evidence adduced by the defense was testimony by a woman who was in class with Butler from 4:00 to 5:15 p. m. on the day in question, roughly one and one-half to two hours after the conduct in question. This witness testified that while in her presence Butler behaved normally.



(Key Word: Exoneration)

The first trial ended in a mistrial.



Butler was found guilty and was found guilty and was sentenced to life in prison.



On post-conviction Butler claimed that the failure of defense counsel to present the testimony of the doctor who had examined the victim at the University Hospital after the rape, coupled with counsel's failure to have Petitioner testify as a witness in his own behalf, after announcing to the jury on voir dire that Petitioner would testify, constituted ineffective assistance of counsel. Both the doctor, as a witness for the State, and Petitioner had testified at the first trial. The majority of the Court of Criminal Appeals therefore concluded that counsel's "significant change in strategy" at the second trial "constituted a deficiency in performance that resulted in prejudice to the Petitioner on the issues of guilt or punishment."



The judgment of the Court of Criminal Appeals setting aside the judgment of conviction and remanding for a new trial was reversed by the Tennessee Supreme Court. Butler's petition for post-conviction relief was dismissed.



Butler the filed an application for a writ of habeas corpus pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2254 in the United States District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee. The Federal District Court judge granted Butler's pray for relief.



The State of Tennessee appealed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit which affirmed.



Defendant's conviction was nullified by the Federal District Court and the State failed to retry Butler.

Butler probably did not get good representation at trial and the testimony against him may have been untrue. The alleged victim was white and Butler was black, which likely had a big impact on the jury that convicted him.