Bunn v. State

A jury found Michael Shane Bunn guilty on two counts each of child molestation, aggravated child molestation, and cruelty to children in the first degree. Following the denial of his amended motion for new trial, Bunn appeals, alleging that the evidence was insufficient to sustain guilty verdicts on the two counts of cruelty to children and that the trial court erred in failing to define “maliciously” in its charge to the jury. Bunn also contends that he received ineffective assistance of counsel. Having reviewed each of these claims, we find no error and affirm. The record reveals that Bunn supervised the victims, his two nieces, while their mother was away at work. T. B., the 7-year-old victim, testified that Bunn touched her private parts with his “weewee” on more than one occasion and that these events occurred at her mother’s home in the living room. The 9-year-old victim, K. B., testified that Bunn touched her in her “privates” and indicated that he did so with his penis and hand. She stated further that if she or her sister did not want to take off their pants, Bunn “would make us,” and that Bunn had touched her inappropriately “ten or eleven” times. K. B. explained that she observed Bunn touch T. B. inappropriately as well. The victims told their mother that while she was away at work, Bunn would make them “sit on the couch he pulls us to him and puts his hands down our pants on our privates.”

The therapist who conducted the forensic interview with the girls testified that T. B. told her Bunn “pulled her up on him in the living room on the couch, that it happened more than one time. She said she had seen it happen to K. B. . . . she was also asked to lick Bunn’s . . . penis.” The therapist testified further that K. B. told her Bunn had “pulled her up on him, as well . . . his private part had gone inside her private part as well as outside her private part, that he had moved around . . . that it happened every day from when he started watching them in August until several days before the interview.” A video of the forensic interviews was played for the jury.1