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Court upholds revocation of suspended sentence Thursday, Jan 31, 2008 Arkansas News Bureau LITTLE ROCK - The state Court of Appeals on Wednesday rejected the appeal of a Fort Smith man who had his suspended sentences for several old offenses revoke after pleading guilty to sexually assaulting a 65-year-old woman. William Lee Andrews had argued that Sebastian County Circuit Judge J. Michael Fitzhugh erred in sentencing him to 17 years in prison after a parole revocation hearing. Between 2001 to 2006, Andrews was charged in separate arrests on three counts of residential burglary, three counts of second-degree forgery, two counts of theft of property and one count each of breaking or entering, possession of methamphetamine and misdemeanor driving while intoxicated. He received suspended sentences in each case, on the condition he pay fines and restitution, and that he not violate the law. Last year, prosecutors charged Andrews with second-degree sexual assault in an attack on an elderly woman in her apartment. After the charge was filed, prosecutors sought a parole revocation hearing. Fitzhugh revoked the suspended sentences and sentenced Andrews to 17 years in jail. Andrews later pleaded guilty to the sexual assault charge and he was sentenced to 10 years in prison, with eight suspended. That sentence was to be served concurrently with the 17-year sentence. In his appeal, Andrews argued there was not enough evidence to support the revocation of his sentences. He said the sex was consensual and an expert who testified at a hearing could not say conclusively that the woman had been raped. The appeals court disagreed. "The trial court was not required to believe (Andrews') testimony," Chief John Mauzy Pittman wrote, "and there is no requirement that a rape victim's testimony be corroborated by any evidence, much less conclusive medical evidence." |
