Thomas Vukodinovich faces 57 felony charges for a sexual relationship he had with a 49-year-old developmentally disabled woman, who the prosecution says has an IQ of 37 and is considered moderately retarded. Mr. Vukodinovich was the bus driver in charge of transporting disabled individuals to work.
According to the prosecution, he used this bus to drive the alleged victim to a number of secluded locations throughout Yolo and Solano County to have sexual relations with her and then warned her that if she reported him that he would get in trouble, be arrested and lose his job.
The 57 charges are broken down into oral copulation with a mentally deficient person, sexual penetration with a foreign object with a mentally deficient person, raping a mentally deficient person, and attempted rape of an incapable person. The charged incidents occurred between 2010 and 2012, although there is some indication they actually began in 2009. The charges amount to one incident per month of the first two charges.
Deputy DA Alvina Tzang in closing arguments on Tuesday argued that the now 49-year-old victim has the mentality of a three- or four-year-old child.
The alleged victim does not speak very well and has difficulty communicating. The incidents allegedly occurred in front of a number of other people on the bus who also had difficulty communicating, and sometimes in the presence of another who would fall asleep on the bus.
Ms. Tzang told the jury that the alleged victim would tell us what happened to her – that she did want to have sex “a little” but not “a lot” many times.
The ultimate reporting witnesses were a couple who often would pass the bus. Over a period of time, they would never actually see the sexual contact, but would rather see the two individuals in positions and locations consistent with other evidence.
While Ms. Tzang relied heavily on out of court statements that the defense claimed were conducted under false pretenses, she did note that there was sperm found in the crotch of the victim’s underwear that was confirmed through DNA.
However, none of these facts are really in dispute. In essence, this was a trial over whether the alleged victim could actually reasonably consent to having sexual relations with Mr. Vukodinovich.
While it is perhaps unsurprising that the prosecutor and defense would have very different assessments of the facts of the case, in this case it seemed that the two attorneys were talking about completely different individuals.
Defense attorney Lisa Lance would argue that this case is about a woman’s right to her womanhood and argued that the state was telling her that she could not have consensual sexual relations, ever. She argued that, in effect, we work to get developmentally disabled people as independent and self-sufficient as possible, but then preclude them from having sex.
While Ms. Lance acknowledged that Mr. Vukodinovich’s conduct was grounds to fire him and preclude him from working again, she argued it was not criminal conduct.
The state’s case rested on the evaluations of a psychiatrist who evaluated the alleged victim back in 1978 when she was just 14 years old. There was a 45-minute reevaluation in 1991.
At that point, the prosecution argued the alleged victim had moderate mental retardation and an IQ of 37. She had the mental age of three to four years.
Her understanding of sex is that of a child, Ms. Tzang argued. She can explain the process and can derive some pleasure from the experience, but she does not have a full understanding of sexuality.
She argued that the alleged victim’s brain development was stunted, preventing her from being able to learn greatly or progress past her current condition. While she holds a job, it is a repetitive job of affixing stamps to documents.
She can’t be left at home for long, can’t use the microwave, or do much other than bathing and cleaning herself.
In addition to needing to prove that the alleged victim was mentally incapable of making informed decisions regarding sexual activity, the prosecution had to show that the defendant knew that she was mentally incapable of making a decision.
Ms. Tzang argued that Mr. Vukodinovich had seen the alleged victim on a daily basis during his seven years on the job. She argued that he admitted on the video that she was acting on impulse and that she wanted what anyone else wants.
She said that the defendant knew all along that the alleged victim was not capable of making her own decisions.
The defense, however, presented a very different picture of the alleged victim, arguing that she knew a lot more than she could verbally articulate, and presented a strained relationship with her adult sister who acted as her caretaker.
In the defense’s theory of the case, the alleged victim only came forward and reported the incident when the witnesses turned Mr. Vukodinovich in to the police, that she was coached in testifying against him, and that she was lying in order not to get in trouble with her sister.
Ms. Lance called this legally enforced celibacy, and argued that the alleged victim can understand a number of things, even if she cannot vocalize it.
She learned that if she wanted to have sexual relations she had to hide it from other people.
Ms. Lance pulled testimony from about six different witnesses who testified during the trial, to paint a very different picture of the alleged victim as a woman who knows she is different from others, but wants to live as normal a life as possible.
Ms. Lance showed evidence that the alleged victim lies to people when she gets angry or is threatened with getting in trouble, including evidence that she has withheld information from and deceived her sister in the past.
Mr. Vukodinovich is now 74. He has never been accused of committing a crime, has great character references and has good job evaluations.
The alleged victim has not been tested for mental capacity since 1991 and not fully evaluated since she was 14. Judge Mock did not permit her to be reevaluated for the case, and the defense used this to argue that the prosecution’s evaluation of her mental ability is based strictly on those evaluations from over 30 years ago.
According to the defense, witnesses indicated that she could, in fact, understand a lot more than she could articulate. She was hindered by her ability to speak.
Her sister, who is her caretaker – which is her sister’s sole source of income, testified that she does things like cleaning herself, caring for pets and going shopping. Although she has a limited understanding regarding money, she does pay for things using a debit card.
The defense argued that the investigators’ initial interview was not set up well, with the alleged victim’s three sisters present at the interview – not a setting where the victim could relax and tell the truth without the influence of her sisters looming over her.
The defense noted that the alleged victim was able to show the investigators all of the places in rural spots of the county where they had parked and had sexual liaisons. She argued this was evidence of mental capacity – noting her ability to find these locations, despite the fact that she does not drive nor see very well.
The defense charged that investigators perpetrated fraud to get the confession from Tom Vukodinovich and the prosecution has mainly relied on this interview to prosecute the case.
The composite of witnesses that Ms. Lance presented painted a different picture of the alleged victim than the prosecution had. They said that she told a lot of stories that were not true and often lied in a vindictive manner.
They said that she likes to be treated as an adult. They said that she was not shy about talking about sex, but does not talk about sex with her sisters.
The alleged victim had told several people that she wanted to have sex with Mr. Vukodinovich, that she gave him gifts and talked about wanting to marry him.
She told one that she only wanted to have a little sex – that she preferred one finger, not two. She also told them that his penis was too soft to go in her, and she understood that his penis was smaller from other men.
The defense noted that, while the alleged victim testified that she only knew the terms “gina” and “penis,” in other contexts she used use the words “dick” and “pussy” to describe sexual organs.
The defense used this to argue that the alleged victim had been coached in much of her testimony, which was at odds with a number of the witnesses’ accounts of conversations with her. Several of these witnesses, Ms. Lance pointed out, were friends of the alleged victim and her family, not of Mr. Vukodinovich.
Ms. Lance offered that there is an order to the alleged victim’s story, that it is the same order, and that this goes to her making up stories.
In her closing, Ms. Lance argued that we strive now as a society to making developmentally delayed people more independent, but that the government’s prosecutors were, in effect, moving to deny this woman pleasure and companionship.
Following Ms. Lance’s closing arguments, Ms. Tzang offered a brief rebuttal, reiterating that the alleged victim had the mindset of a four-year-old child. She noted that the defendant had confessed to what he had done with a disabled woman.
This, she argued, was a case about the capability to give legal consent to sex and argued that the defendant took advantage of the alleged victim’s diminished sexual capacity.
She argued that, while the defense attempted to make a victim out of the defendant, the alleged victim’s understanding of sex was that of a child and that, while she may say yes to things, she clearly does not understand the act of sex or the emotions and feeling surrounding it.
She urged the jury to find the defendant guilty of all 57 counts.
The jury went out for deliberation on Tuesday. Mr. Vukodinovich, particularly at his advanced age, effectively faces life in prison for these charges.
—David M. Greenwald reporting
Antoinnette Borbon assisted in the preparation of this report.
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This article is disturbing on a number of levels. People with developmental disabilities are at disproportionately high risk for violent victimization, abuse and neglect. It has been conservatively estimated that people with disabilities are at least four times more likely to be victimized than people without disabilities, and individuals with an intellectual impairment are at the highest risk of victimization.
Some studies estimate that close to 80% of women with developmental disabilities have been sexually assaulted at some point in their lives. Other studies have found the rate for sexual assault was anywhere between 2-10 times higher for people with disabilities when compared to people without disabilities.
How unfortunate, however, that, to establish sexual abuse of a 49-year-old woman with an intellectual disability, it’s necessary to rely on sweeping generalizations and demeaning characterizations, such as “she has the mentality of a 3 or 4 year old child.” A woman with 49 years of life experience, who holds a job, most certainly does not have the mentality of a 3 or 4-year old. There is likely no sound basis to conclude—particularly based on a 35-year-old psychiatric evaluation (conducted when she was, in fact, a child)—that her “brain development was stunted preventing her from being able to learn greatly or progress past her current condition.” People with even severe developmental disabilities do learn and progress. They can express preferences and make choices, even if they are minimally verbal.
This may very well be an instance of felonious sexual abuse. And prosecutors should be commended for taking on such cases, because often they do not when the victim has an intellectual disability. But, at the same time, it should not be necessary to rely on pejorative stereotypes and decades old assessments, rather than on the facts and circumstances of the case at hand.
Eric: Good thoughts, had similar thoughts as I was listening to it live.
I find myself very conflicted in this situation. I think Eric has raised very good points with regard to the possibility for sexual exploitation of those deemed to have intellectual disabilities. However, I can also see exploitation in the denial of the ability to enjoy their full expression of their humanity because of our own preconceived notions of what is essential to consenting to sexual activity. What perplexes me the most is why Judge Mock would not have allowed a current assessment of her intellectual and emotional functionality as for virtually everyone, this will change between the ages of 14 and 49. Do we have knowledge of his rationale for such a refusal ?
@Medwoman
No, we did not get a reason other than him stating he did not see the relevancy in re-testing her. Ironic isn’t it? I, too, agree with you. This woman was not in the same mindset as a 4 year-old child. It would mean she had not made any progress over a course of 30 plus years? Is this even possible? Probably not, probably not.