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State v. Morrow9/18/2001
Assigned on Briefs June 27, 2001
The defendant entered a best-interest guilty plea in the Cocke County Criminal Court to one count of especially aggravated kidnapping, two counts of aggravated rape, and one count of criminal exposure to HIV. The trial court sentenced the defendant as a Range I standard offender to six years incarceration in the Tennessee Department of Correction for the criminal exposure to HIV conviction, as a violent offender to 24 years incarceration for the especially aggravated kidnapping conviction, as a violent offender to 24 years incarceration for one of the aggravated rape convictions, and as a multiple rapist to 24 years incarceration for the other aggravated rape conviction. The trial court ordered consecutive service of the sentences for an effective sentence of 78 years incarceration. On appeal, the defendant takes issue with the length of the sentences and the consecutive service imposed. Based upon our review, we affirm the sentences imposed.
Tenn. R. App. P. 3; Judgment of the Criminal Court is Affirmed.
James Curwood Witt, Jr., J., delivered the opinion of the court, in which Joseph M. Tipton and Robert W. Wedemeyer, JJ., joined.
OPINION
On March 15, 1999, TH, who at the time was a 16-year old high school student, was working alone at Tropical Pets in Greenville. Between 8:00 p.m. and 8:20 p.m., the defendant, Robert Morrow, came into the store and inquired about gerbils. He left when another customer came into the store, but he returned when the customer departed. The defendant approached TH from behind and held a gun to her head. When she tried to escape, the defendant became enraged; he slammed TH against the wall and screamed for her to open her mouth. When she complied, he stuck the gun in her mouth and threatened to kill her if she "tried that again."
The defendant immobilized TH with flexicuffs and forced her into his truck. He put a toboggan over her head and drove around for about 45 minutes. The defendant took TH to a cabin in a deserted area. He told her that if she did anything, "he'd cut and just leave ." Inside the cabin, the defendant again put a gun to her head and asked her if she knew "what was fixing to happen." TH replied that she just wanted to go home. The defendant cocked the gun, and TH began crying. Her crying angered the defendant, and he told her to stop.
The defendant removed the toboggan and flexicuffs and ordered TH to remove all her clothes except her bra and panties. He chained her hands together behind her back, put a tobacco stick between her ankles, and tied her feet apart. The defendant then tied a rope to her hands, already chained behind her back. The rope was thrown over a rafter in the cabin, and the defendant tightened the rope until TH was standing on her toes, partially suspended in air.
While tracing TH's suspended body with a knife, the defendant told TH that she was going to be his "sex toy" for awhile. He offered her the choice of performing fellatio on him for either five or ten minutes. If only for five minutes, the defendant would do anything he wanted with her body, but if for ten minutes, he would just touch her chest. TH chose ten minutes whereupon the defendant cut the rope suspending TH. With her arms and legs still tied, TH performed oral sex on the defendant. When he ejaculated, he ordered her to swish the semen around her mouth before swallowing it. When TH finished, her stomach was hurting "real bad like was going to puke." Afterwards, the defendant put TH in bed.
Despite that the defendant had assured TH that he would not touch her until the next day, he abruptly changed his mind. The defendant
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