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State v. Cowden11/30/2004
On November 25, 2003, the Jefferson Parish District Attorney filed a bill of information charging defendant, Jo E. Cowden, with third offense DWI in violation of LSA-R.S. 14:98(D). Defendant was arraigned on December 16, 2003 and pled not guilty. On February 5, 2004, the case was tried before a six-person jury which found defendant guilty as charged.
Defendant filed a combined motion for post-verdict judgment of acquittal and motion for new trial, which was denied on March 1, 2004. On that same date, the trial court sentenced defendant to imprisonment at hard labor for two years, suspended all but 30 days of that sentence, and imposed a fine of $2,000 with all but $750 suspended. The trial court also placed defendant on active probation for three years. [FN1] Defendant filed a motion for appeal that was granted.
FACTS
Andrew Claverie, age 20 at the time of the incident, testified that, on January 20, 2003, he and his father, also named Andrew Claverie, were performing service work on a pool behind a house on Central Avenue. [FN2] Although his father had parked his truck in front of the customer's house, part of it was blocking the neighbor's driveway. Claverie noticed that a woman was walking around next door, but he did not get a good look at her and would not be able to recognize her.
Claverie asked his father if he could move the truck because it was blocking the woman's driveway. Once he got permission, Claverie got into the truck and the woman approached. Claverie told her that he was going to move the truck, but she yelled at him and told him that "this is illegal" and "this is not right of him to do this." He assumed she was referring to the truck being in front of her driveway.
Claverie put the truck in reverse and backed it up. As he put the truck into park, he heard a noise. He thought that he had hit something, so he turned off the engine. As he got out of the truck, he heard the noise again. Claverie looked over the neighbor's fence and saw that the woman was in her vehicle spinning her tires, and the rear of the vehicle was scraping against her house.
Claverie looked over again and saw that the woman was backing her vehicle down the driveway. He testified that the woman stopped the vehicle right before the sidewalk at the end of her driveway and got out. She began yelling at Claverie again, so he walked into the backyard of the customer's house. The woman followed him.
Claverie testified that the woman started kicking the fence, so he asked the customer's son to go and get his father. He complied, and the owner of the house came outside. Claverie told his father, Andrew Claverie, Sr., what he had observed.
Thereafter, the police arrived. Claverie never spoke to a police officer regarding what he saw that day. Claverie testified that he did not give a statement to the officers, and that the signature on the statement shown to him at trial was not his, but looked like his father's. He stated that his father was 45 years old.
*2 Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Officer K.K. Karanja testified that, on January 20, 2003, at approximately 3:19 p.m., he responded to a 911 call from 320 Central Avenue. He stated that another 911 call came in approximately one minute later from defendant at 316 Central Avenue. Defendant told the operator that her next door neighbor had hit her and "roughed her up."
When Officer Karanja arrived at 320 Central Avenue, the homeowner advised him that he was having a problem with his neighbor at 316 Central Avenue, and that she refused to get off his property. Officer Karanja saw a vehicle next door in the driveway of 316 Central Avenue and a person in the vehicle. He spoke to "Andy" who gave him information regarding what had transpired.
Officer Karanja went to the vehicle next door and observ
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