Colorado’s second-highest court has ruled that a person can commit bribery under state law even before a criminal proceeding begins, as long as there is an intent to influence the testimony of a potential witness.

The decision upheld the 2007 convictions of Larry Gene Lancaster, who sexually assaulted a teenage boy repeatedly after plying him with alcohol and giving him money to keep Lancaster’s criminal conduct a secret.

Lancaster had challenged his convictions, including two counts of bribery, on multiple grounds. Colorado’s bribery law prohibits a person from offering any benefit to someone “he or she believes is to be called to testify as a witness or victim in any official proceeding,” with the intent to influence testimony.

A three-judge panel for the Court of Appeals noted last week the absence of any time constraint in the law.

“We therefore conclude that the phrase ‘any official proceeding’ is not limited to pending official proceedings and includes future proceedings,” wrote Judge Rebecca R. Freyre in the July 28 opinion.

Lancaster stood trial in May 2007 for sexually assaulting J.C., who was 13 years old when he met Lancaster and approximately 15 when Lancaster began abusing him. The two first encountered each other when J.C. was shoveling snow at Lancaster’s condominium complex, and J.C. returned months later to do household chores for Lancaster.

When J.C. was 14, he began using payments from Lancaster’s housework to support J.C.’s drug and alcohol use. J.C. also began attending parties and drinking at Lancaster’s home. The encounters escalated to Lancaster masturbating J.C.

“Don’t tell anyone what happened or I’m going to jail,” Lancaster told J.C. immediately afterward, giving the boy $20.

The drinking and sexual abuse continued until Lancaster at one point attempted anal sex with J.C. The teenager halted the intercourse when it was too painful and left. Lancaster later showed up at J.C.’s home, handed him $50 and said, “Here’s for last night. Don’t tell anyone or I really will go to jail.”

J.C. eventually entered treatment for his drug and alcohol addiction, during which he told a counselor about his sexual abuse. He then reported Lancaster to the police.

A Jefferson County jury convicted Lancaster of sexual assault on a child, sexual assault on a victim incapable of appraising the nature of his conduct, bribery and related offenses. He received a sentence of 10 years to life in prison.

On appeal, Lancaster argued there was insufficient evidence to support his bribery convictions because the General Assembly only intended to criminalize such behavior when there was an “on-going proceeding.” Further, Lancaster contended his order that J.C. “don’t tell anyone” was not the equivalent of asking a witness to perjure himself.

“The statement and giving of nominal amounts of cash well before the initiation of criminal charges could simply be viewed as shame and remorse for such acts, not a prescient awareness of the filing of a criminal case,” wrote defense attorney Leslie A. Goldstein.

The prosecution disagreed, observing Lancaster himself had explicitly linked the payments to a possibility of going to jail. 

The appellate panel compared the bribery law to the similarly-worded witness tampering law, which the Colorado Supreme Court has already interpreted to apply to potential criminal proceedings, not just ongoing ones.

“Here, Lancaster gave J.C. money after sexually assaulting him and asked him not to tell anyone or he would go to jail,” Freyre wrote. “Viewing this evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution, we conclude that a reasonable jury could conclude that Lancaster believed that J.C. would be called to testify in a future criminal proceeding, and that he gave J.C. the money to influence his future testimony.”

The Court of Appeals also rejected Lancaster’s two other challenges. First, Lancaster believed the evidence was insufficient to prove J.C. was a victim incapable of appraising his own conduct. Lancaster pointed to J.C.’s detailed testimony of his abuse and his statements that “I knew what was going to happen” in arguing J.C. understood what was going on.

But the panel disagreed, with Freyre observing a jury could reasonably find that given all of the alcohol J.C. consumed around Lancaster, the teenager was incapable of fully understanding his behavior.

Second, Lancaster argued it deprived him of a fair trial for jurors to hear about a previous criminal case from 1990 in which Lancaster pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting a 19-year-old man. Lancaster believed the evidence prompted the jury to “punish” him for his past misconduct, even though the facts of the 1990 case “differed vastly” from his abuse of J.C.

“In both the prior and the charged situations,” countered Assistant Attorney General Brenna Brackett, “defendant befriended a teenaged male; isolated the teenager in his apartment; provided the teenager with alcohol; initiated sexual activity with the teenager in a similar manner in each situation; then sought to prevent the teenager from telling anyone about it. This showed a common plan, scheme, and design.”

The Court of Appeals panel cited a Colorado law that specifically enables prosecutors to introduce evidence of other behavior in sexual assault cases in order to establish a defendant’s motive or opportunity. Given the similarity of Lancaster’s conduct, the panel deemed the 1990 case was logically relevant to the case involving J.C.

The case is People v. Lancaster.