Roderick Watkins v. State of Arkansas

Cite as 2020 Ark. App. 506
ARKANSAS COURT OF APPEALS
Reason: I attest to the accuracy
and integrity of this document
Date: 2021-07-19 13:14:02
Foxit PhantomPDF Version: DIVISION I
9.7.5 No. CR-20-189

RODERICK WATKINS Opinion Delivered: November 4, 2020

APPELLANT APPEAL FROM THE CLEBURNE
COUNTY CIRCUIT COURT
V. [NO. 12CR-18-263]

STATE OF ARKANSAS
APPELLEE HONORABLE TIM WEAVER,
JUDGE

AFFIRMED

BART F. VIRDEN, Judge

Roderick Watkins appeals his conviction of four counts of second-degree sexual

assault contending that the Cleburne County Circuit Court erred by admitting the

testimony of witness Linda Dill. We affirm.

I. Relevant Facts

On November 21, 2018, Watkins was charged with four counts of second-degree

sexual assault of four minor children, AE, RJ, KO, and ZT. Watkins filed a motion in limine

seeking to prevent the State from presenting the testimony of Watkins’s neighbor, Linda

Dill. Watkins asserted that Dill’s testimony regarding Watkins’s interaction with an

unidentified child were not related to the allegations against him, and her testimony would

be both irrelevant and inadmissible character evidence. After a hearing on the motion, the

court agreed that Dill’s testimony was “of a different character” and more prejudicial than

probative. The State pursued the matter further and requested that the court revisit the issue
if Dill could identify the child she saw Watkins with. The court agreed, and the trial

proceeded.

At the October 3, 2019 trial, multiple witnesses testified that Watkins, an elder in

their church whom they considered an authority figure and a mentor, sexually abused them

or touched and massaged them on their feet, legs, buttocks, back, and chest. ZT testified

that when he was a teenager, Watkins touched him on his buttocks twice. The first time,

in November 2010, Watkins touched ZT’s buttocks over his clothes at a football game,

with his father sitting near him in the stands. The second time, when he was seventeen years

old, Watkins touched ZT’s buttocks under his clothes while they and others were gathered

at a church member’s house to watch a basketball game.

KO testified that her father occasionally preached in Watkins’s church and that she

and her family had a friendly relationship with Watkins. She stated that Watkins was

physically affectionate and that he mentored her spiritually. KO explained that “if he told

me to do something, I would have done it.” In 2009, when she was nine years old, Watkins

touched her on her vaginal area while she sat on his lap with a blanket over them. Other

people, including her parents and sister, were in the room. AO, KO’s sister, testified that

Watkins also rubbed her vaginal area while she sat in his lap with a blanket over them. She

explained that first he rubbed her back and legs, then he “reached down my pants and started

rubbing my private area, my vagina.” Again, other people were in the room when the abuse

occurred, and AO explained that Watkins even conversed with her father as he was sexually

abusing her “as if nothing was wrong.” AO also stated that she considered Watkins a mentor.

AE, a thirteen-year-old boy who also attended the same church testified that Watkins

had been a mentor to him and had babysat him. AE testified that once, while he was
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watching a movie at Watkins’s apartment, Watkins ran his hand up his leg and touched his

penis. AE stated that before this incident, Watkins had rubbed his back, feet, and legs.

CJ, who was seventeen at the time of the trial, testified that Watkins had been like a

grandfather to him, they took trips together, and he had slept at Watkins’s house many

times. CJ stated that six or seven years before the trial Watkins sexually abused him. CJ

testified that Watkins began by rubbing his feet and legs and then worked his way up to his

genitals, at which point CJ pushed Watkins’s hands away. CJ stated that he had seen Watkins

put his hands inside his cousin RJ’s shorts and rub his back “more than ten times.” MJ, CJ’s

sister, stated that she, too, had been abused by Watkins, who had put his hand on her thigh

under her dress while she was a passenger in his car and that he had put his hand over her

underwear close to her vaginal area. When she was ten or eleven years old, Watkins had

come into the bathroom when she was showering, opened the curtain, and watched her in

the shower while he shaved. She also testified that she had seen Watkins rub RJ’s feet, legs,

and back under his shirt.

RJ testified that his family and Watkins attended the same church and that before his

sexual abuse was known, they had a close relationship. RJ explained that Watkins was like

a grandfather to him and that he saw Watkins about twice a week when they lived in Heber

Springs, often at Watkins’s home. RJ stated that he had helped Watkins clean, do chores,

and maintain the apartment complex Watkins lived in and that he had frequently slept at

Watkins’s house. RJ explained that he could not remember before the age of ten, but that

the first instance of abuse occurred around then. RJ described Watkins’s abuse, explaining

that at first, Watkins would rub his back, then “creep downward” and “[a]t some point, he

touched me underneath my clothes.” Watkins touched his buttocks, penis, and testicles. RJ
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stated that the incidents blended together, and “it was hard to differentiate one from the

other.” RJ explained that he did not know he was being abused at the time, and he believed

the behavior was normal.

RJ’s father, Joseph, also testified that his family and Watkins attended the same

church and that his family had been very close with Watkins. Joseph stated that Watkins

was an authority figure and like a grandfather to RJ and that RJ had frequently spent time

alone with Watkins, helping him with chores around Watkins’s apartment, including

painting and gardening. Joseph testified that RJ had been in therapy for behavioral issues

since he was around seven or eight years old. About a year before the trial, after Watkins

was “disfellowshipped” from the church, RJ told his parents that Watkins had sexually

abused him. Joseph explained that he had never seen Watkins abuse RJ but that he recalled

having seen Watkins scratch RJ low on his back, his legs, inside his thighs and arms, and

“down his back and into his shorts of underwear. I never saw it as too far but just

questionable.” Marissa Pett, also a member of the same church, testified that in August 2016,

when RJ was around thirteen years old, she saw Watkins absentmindedly running his hand

up and down RJ’s inner thigh. RJ’s aunt testified that she had seen Watkins rub and touch

RJ under his shirt.

During the witnesses’ testimony, the State informed the court that Dill stated she

would recognize the child she saw with Watkins in the apartment across from her, and she

described him as having a slight build, dark hair, and glasses. Dill was taken to the witness

room, and she identified RJ among the people gathered there as the child she had seen with

Watkins at her apartment complex. Watkins responded that Dill did not witness anything

criminal; thus, her testimony was prejudicial and did not have probative value. The State
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asserted that Dill’s testimony would describe the same type of grooming and preparatory

conduct that the previous witnesses had described. The court ruled that Dill was a fact

witness, and her testimony was permissible if she did not speculate and only described what

she saw. Dill took the stand and testified that she did not attend church with Watkins, but

they lived in the same apartment complex. Dill recalled that around March or April 2017,

she saw Watkins painting an apartment with a slim, dark-haired boy with glasses, about five

feet tall and around eleven years old. Dill identified RJ as the same boy she had seen in the

apartment with Watkins. She explained that Watkins and the boy were painting apartment

number eleven across the hall, when she saw Watkins “kissing his head, and hugging him

real tight, massaging him. The next thing I noticed was he was running his hand up his shirt.

I thought it was kind of odd. Mr. Watkins saw me, and he shut the door.”

Watkins moved for a directed verdict, arguing that the testimony was “vague,” and

there was no indication of sexual gratification when the contact occurred. The circuit court

denied the motion.

Both Watkins and his wife, Rebecca, testified that though he had been physically

affectionate, he had never sexually abused any children. Watkins denied that he had been

“disfellowshipped” from the church for sexually abusing children, explaining that he was

disfellowshipped because he “did not accept counsel well enough” and had engaged in

“brazen conduct.” At the close of all evidence, Watkins renewed his motion for a directed

verdict, and the circuit court denied the motion. The jury convicted Watkins of four counts

of second-degree sexual assault and sentenced him to twenty years on each count. This

appeal followed.

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II. Discussion

On appeal, Watkins argues that the circuit court erred in denying his motion to

exclude Dill’s testimony because the testimony was not probative of criminal conduct, and

it was highly prejudicial to him. We disagree.

Challenges to an evidentiary ruling are reviewed under the abuse-of-discretion

standard. Hortenberry v. State, 2017 Ark. 261, 526 S.W.3d 840. The abuse-of-discretion

standard is a high threshold that does not simply require error in the circuit court’s decision

but requires that the circuit court act improvidently, thoughtlessly, or without due

consideration. Id. Additionally, an evidentiary decision will not be reversed absent a showing

of prejudice. Hicks v. State, 2017 Ark. 262, 526 S.W.3d 831.

Relevant evidence is evidence that has a “tendency to make the existence of any fact

that is of consequence to the determination of the action more or less probable than it would

be without the evidence.” Ark. R. Evid. 401. As a general matter, all relevant evidence is

admissible. Ark. R. Evid. 402. Although relevant, evidence may be excluded if its probative

value is substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice, confusion of the issues,

or misleading the jury, or by considerations of undue delay, waste of time, or needless

presentation of cumulative evidence. Ark. R. Evid. 403.

A person commits second-degree sexual assault if the person is eighteen years old or

older and engages in sexual contact with another person who is less than fourteen years of

age and not the person’s spouse, or if the person engages in sexual contact with a minor and

is the minor’s guardian, temporary caretaker, or a person in a position of trust or authority

over the minor. Ark. Code Ann. § 5-14-125(a)(4)(A)(iv), (b)(1) (Supp. 2019). “Sexual

contact” means any act of sexual gratification involving the touching, directly or through
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clothing, of the sex organs, buttocks, or anus of a person or the breast of a female. Ark.

Code Ann. § 5-14-101(11).

The circuit court did not abuse its discretion in admitting Dill’s testimony. Dill’s

statement that she saw Watkins and RJ doing chores together at the apartment complex and

that she saw Watkins kissing and massaging RJ and putting his hands up RJ’s shirt is relevant

evidence of Watkins’s plan to use his position of authority to gain access to children and

touch them for his sexual gratification. Dill’s testimony corroborated RJ’s testimony that

Watkins was often his caretaker in a position of authority over him, Watkins sexually

assaulted him when he was acting as a mentor and caretaker, and Watkins routinely led up

to sexual assault by hugging, kissing, rubbing, and massaging him. We cannot say that the

circuit court acted improvidently, thoughtlessly or without due consideration when it

determined that Dill’s testimony further corroborated RJ’s testimony and was helpful for

the jury to determine whether Watkins had sexually assaulted RJ.

Affirmed.

VAUGHT and BROWN, JJ., agree.

McKay Law Firm, PLLC, by: Matthew McKay, for appellant.

Leslie Rutledge, Att’y Gen., by: Michael Zangari, Ass’t Att’y Gen., for appellee.

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