State v. Streeper

523 P.3d 710

STATE of Utah, Appellee,

v.Jacob Rich STREEPER, Appellant.

No. 20180337-CA

Court of Appeals of Utah.

Filed December 22, 2022

Emily Adams, Freyja Johnson, and Cherise M. Bacalski, Attorneys for Appellant

Sean D. Reyes and Jonathan S. Bauer, Attorneys for Appellee

Judge David N. Mortensen authored this Opinion, in which Judges Gregory K. Orme and Ryan M. Harris concurred.

Opinion

MORTENSEN, Judge:

¶1 Jacob Rich Streeper confessed to family members and the police to variously drugging, sexually assaulting, sodomizing, and raping his three young daughters, half-sister, and niece. At trial, he stuck to much of what he had confessed and admitted before the jury that he had drugged and molested several young girls, including his own daughters. Yet he claimed that the parts of his previous confessions that related to more egregious sex acts, including rape and sodomy, were false. The jury convicted Streeper on all counts. He now claims that his trial counsel was ineffective for not retaining an expert on false confessions. We affirm.

BACKGROUND¹

¶2 In August 2016, Streeper's wife (Wife)—who was six months pregnant at the time—confronted him about child pornography she found on his iPod.² In response, Streeper "grabbed [her] and pushed [her] down on the couch," "sat on [her] lap," and twisted her "arm as hard as he could to try to get [the iPod] out of [her] hand." As Streeper pressed into her stomach, Wife screamed, awakening the two oldest of the couple's three minor daughters, who came into the room. Streeper deleted the child pornography from the retrieved iPod. Wife called the police, her family, and Streeper's parents. She then kicked Streeper out of the house.

The First Case: Streeper Sexually Abuses His Niece and Half-sister

¶3 Shortly thereafter—apparently in response to the discovery of child pornography on the iPod—Streeper's niece (Niece), then fifteen years old, revealed that Streeper had touched her vagina when she was nine or ten during a sleepover.³ In a subsequent interview with police officers, Streeper admitted to sexually abusing Niece. During the same interview, Streeper also admitted that he "inappropriately kissed" his oldest daughter (Daughter 1), who was twelve years old, on the shoulder on a different occasion. Streeper further admitted in this interview that he had digitally penetrated the vagina of his half-sister (Half-sister) when she was eight or nine and he was eighteen.

¶4 The State charged Streeper with two counts of aggravated sexual abuse of a child (for the acts he admitted to committing on Niece and Half-sister) and two counts of domestic violence related to his assault on Wife.

The Second Case: Streeper Sexually Abuses His Three Daughters

¶5 Around this same time, Streeper's ten-year-old middle daughter (Daughter 2) revealed that Streeper "had hurt her vagina" and that she had found condom wrappers in her bedroom. Wife found one condom wrapper on the floor next to where Streeper would sometimes sleep when he stayed in Daughter 2's room. Daughter 2 also reported that Streeper gave her medication to help her sleep and that "she woke up on one occasion with [Streeper] on top of her hurting her vagina."

¶6 Police officers interviewed Daughter 2 and Daughter 1 at the Children's Justice Center. Daughter 2 told police that Streeper had "taught her how to french kiss using her tongue with him," that Streeper touched her vagina, and that when she was younger, he would "rub white cream on her vagina ... for a long time." She also revealed that Streeper would give her "white pills to help her sleep" and that she would have stomachaches, vaginal pain, rashes, and headaches after taking these pills. She recalled having difficulty waking up after taking the pills. She "remembered feeling like somebody would grab her hips and pull her down on the bed at night." Daughter 2 mentioned that Streeper would "watch her while she was taking baths, and it made her feel very uncomfortable." She shared one incident in which she "accidentally brushed against" Streeper's private parts when she was getting out of the bathtub. Streeper responded by saying, "You touched my private parts. Now I get to touch yours," and chasing her until he was able to touch her vaginal area. Daughter 2 further disclosed that she had seen Streeper take his youngest daughter (Daughter 3), who was three years old, into the bathroom and lock the door and that she could hear Daughter 3 crying.

¶7 Daughter 1 revealed to officers that she had "received small white pills" from Streeper "to help her sleep at night." She remembered waking up with a sore vagina, a stomachache, and a rash on her inner thighs, as well as experiencing painful urination. She recalled that as early as third grade, Streeper would "rub ... cream on the inside and outside of her vagina" in a way that she described as "being very aggressive" and "for a long time." She stated that while Streeper was kissing her shoulder, "he had put his leg around her."

Streeper's Confessions

¶8 Around the same time that the police interviewed Daughter 2 and Daughter 1, Streeper told his stepfather (Stepfather) that he had inappropriately touched Niece, Half-sister, and Daughter 2. Stepfather told Streeper that he needed to tell the police about the abuse. But as Stepfather prepared to take him to the police station to be interviewed, Streeper began acting "delirious" and revealed that he had taken fifty pills of Tramadol⁴ and other medicine in an attempt to kill himself. Stepfather took Streeper to the hospital, where he was admitted and treated.

¶9 Two days later, police officers interviewed Streeper at the hospital. Before speaking to him, the officers checked with the nurse and were informed that "he hadn't received any form of narcotics or any other medications at that time," that he was about to be medically released, and that it was "fine to speak" with him. One officer described Streeper as "calm," "coherent," and "lucid" during the interview. In addition to his previous admissions of abusing Niece and Half-sister, this time Streeper admitted to giving Daughter 2 and Daughter 1 Tramadol and digitally penetrating their vaginas on multiple occasions.

¶10 Later that day, Wife and Stepfather visited Streeper in the hospital. Streeper admitted to Wife that he had sexually abused all three of his daughters. Specifically, Streeper told her that he had performed oral sex on each child. Streeper also admitted that he digitally penetrated their vaginas and that he would put a condom on and rub his penis against their vaginas until he ejaculated. Streeper also admitted to giving Daughter 2 and Daughter 1 Tramadol specifically so that he could abuse them while they were sleeping.

¶11 While Streeper was making these admissions to Wife, Stepfather had been sitting outside the hospital room. Wife came out of the room and said to Stepfather, "He has confessed everything. I want you to hear it." Stepfather testified that he went in and talked to Streeper, whereupon Streeper "told [him] that he had molested every one of [his] children," including performing oral sex on each of them, rubbing his penis against their vaginas, and digitally penetrating Daughter 1's and Daughter 2's vaginas.

¶12 Wife and Stepfather reported these additional revelations to the police, and the next day the police officers returned to the hospital to conduct an additional interview. During this interview, Streeper admitted to digitally penetrating each daughter, performing oral sex on each daughter, and "wearing a condom and having his penis penetrate the labia of all three of his daughters." During this interview, Streeper also admitted that, years ago, he had performed oral sex on Half-sister.

¶13 Based on these new admissions, the State charged Streeper in a second case with three counts of rape of a child, three counts of aggravated sexual abuse of a child, three counts of sodomy upon a child, and two counts of surreptitious administration of a controlled substance.

The Trial

¶14 The two cases were tried together before a jury. At trial, Niece testified that Streeper had rubbed her vagina "skin to skin" in the middle of the night when she was nine or ten. Half-sister testified that Streeper digitally penetrated her vagina when she was almost nine years old.

¶15 Daughter 2 testified that Streeper would "watch" her and look at her "privates" when she was taking a bath and kissed her on the mouth and tongue. She also revealed that Streeper rubbed cream—which he referred to as "genie cream"—on her and Daughter 1's vaginas, which he called "genie[s]." She further testified that Streeper gave her pills to help her sleep. After taking these pills, she reported waking with a stomachache, that her "vagina was red sometimes," and that "it burned to pee." Daughter 2 also testified that the pills "always" made her feel like she "was being sunken into the bed, but [she] couldn't ever wake up." One time when she woke from one of these stupors, she saw Streeper at the foot of her bed with a "worried and shocked" look on his face. Daughter 2 stated that she felt like she was "being pulled down [her] bed sometimes" when she was asleep. She also testified that she found multiple condom wrappers in her room. Regarding Daughter 3, Daughter 2 said Streeper would "bounce his penis in her face" after getting out of the shower and that he would take Daughter 3 into the bathroom and lock the door, where she could be heard crying.

¶16 Daughter 1 testified that she had awakened to Streeper kissing her arm while having his leg wrapped around her. She also recalled that when she was in third grade, she would sometimes wake up with a "really red" vagina and a rash "between [her] legs" and that on those occasions it was painful to urinate. She remembered once waking up without her pajama bottoms on and her vagina hurting. She also said Streeper would rub cream "very hard" on her when she would report pain in her vaginal area and that he did it "a...