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Akaran v. State5/4/2005
No. 4984
Before: Coats, Chief Judge, and Mannheimer and Stewart, Judges.
MANNHEIMER, Judge, concurring.
Allen Charlie Akaran was convicted of second-degree assault for attacking his girlfriend, S.P.. During this attack, Akaran bit S.P. in the face, leaving a scar across her brow and her nose. The State alleged, and the jury found, that this scar was a "serious and protracted disfigurement", and that therefore S.P.'s injury was a "serious physical injury" as defined in AS 11.81.900(b)(56)(B). Based on this finding, the jury convicted Akaran of second-degree assault rather than the proposed lesser offense of fourth-degree assault.
In this appeal, Akaran contends that S.P.'s scar was not sufficiently serious to qualify as "serious and protracted disfigurement". In other words, Akaran contends that the evidence presented at his trial is insufficient to support his second-degree assault conviction. For the reasons explained here, we conclude that S.P.'s scarring was both sufficiently "serious" and sufficiently "protracted" to qualify as a serious physical injury under AS 11.81.900(b)(56)(B).
In addition, Akaran argues that the trial judge should not have allowed the State to introduce evidence that Akaran had been convicted of assaulting S.P. on two prior occasions. Because Akaran claimed that he never bit S.P., and that her injury was inflicted by accident while he was struggling with her in self-defense, we conclude that the trial judge did not abuse her discretion when she allowed the State to present evidence of Akaran's two previous assaults on the same victim.
Accordingly, we affirm Akaran's conviction.
Underlying Facts
In December 2002, Akaran traveled to the village of Kotlik to visit his girlfriend, S.P.. Akaran and S.P. had known each other for four years, and they had two-year-old twins. (The twins lived with S.P. and her family.)
Akaran's visit to S.P. was unlawful. Six months earlier, in June 2002, Akaran was convicted of third-degree assault upon S.P., and, as a condition of his release, he was prohibited from having contact with S.P.. However, S.P. encouraged Akaran to visit Kotlik; in fact, she purchased his airplane ticket.
Initially, Akaran's visit went well. But trouble erupted after a few days. Akaran spent the afternoon of December 13th smoking marijuana and, that evening, he and S.P. shared a bottle of whiskey. By the early morning of December 14th, both Akaran and S.P. were quite intoxicated.
Because Akaran was so intoxicated, S.P. did not want Akaran to stay with her at her mother's house. Instead, S.P. told Akaran to stay with his uncle. This prompted an argument, because Akaran wanted to stay with S.P.. Akaran grabbed S.P. by the arm and told her that he wished to stay with her. When S.P. tried to push Akaran away, the two of them lost their balance and fell to the ground.
S.P. landed on her back, with Akaran on top of her. S.P. struggled to get Akaran off of her, but she was unsuccessful. At this point, Akaran bit S.P. on her face, injuring her nose and left eyebrow.
Another villager (a cousin of S.P.'s) heard the commotion and saw S.P. running from Akaran. Blood was flowing down S.P.'s face and onto her clothes. The cousin took S.P. to the local health clinic. Later, S.P. was flown to the hospital in Bethel for additional treatment in the emergency room.
S.P. had a three-to four-centimeter wound across her brow and nose. Because the wound was made by a human bite (and was therefore highly prone to infection), the doctors did not sew the wound closed with sutures. Rather, they secured the wo
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