In re P.M.S.

[Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets, it may be cited as In
re P.M.S., Slip Opinion No. 2026-Ohio-1543.]




                                         NOTICE
     This slip opinion is subject to formal revision before it is published in an
     advance sheet of the Ohio Official Reports. Readers are requested to
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     South Front Street, Columbus, Ohio 43215, of any typographical or other
     formal errors in the opinion, in order that corrections may be made before
     the opinion is published.




                          SLIP OPINION NO. 2026-OHIO-1543
                                       IN RE P.M.S.
  [Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets, it
        may be cited as In re P.M.S., Slip Opinion No. 2026-Ohio-1543.]
Criminal law—Juvenile delinquency—Sufficiency of the evidence—Rape—R.C.
        2907.02(A)(2)—A rational trier of fact could have found beyond a
        reasonable doubt that juvenile offender used force, as defined by R.C.
        2901.01(A)(1), to compel victim to submit to sexual conduct—Court of
        appeals’ judgment affirmed.
     (No. 2023-1531—Submitted February 11, 2025—Decided May 1, 2026.)
               APPEAL from the Court of Appeals for Warren County,
                        No. CA2022-05-036, 2023-Ohio-3825.
                                  __________________
        BRUNNER, J., authored the opinion of the court, which KENNEDY, C.J., and
FISCHER, DEWINE, DETERS, HAWKINS, and SHANAHAN, JJ., joined.
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         BRUNNER, J.
         {¶ 1} This appeal centers on what constitutes force under Ohio’s rape
statute, R.C. 2907.02, to sustain an adjudication of delinquency against a child who
has engaged in sexual conduct with another child. Applying the same laws and
evidentiary review that is used in adult criminal cases, we affirm the Twelfth
District Court of Appeals’ judgment and hold that sufficient evidence was presented
during the delinquency adjudication to prove that the offender used violence,
compulsion, or constraint to compel the victim to submit to the sexual conduct.
                                    I. BACKGROUND
         {¶ 2} In 2021, appellee, the State of Ohio, filed complaints in the Hamilton
County Juvenile Court against appellant, Paul,1 alleging six counts of rape and two
counts of gross sexual imposition. At the time of the alleged offenses, Paul was 14
years old. Paul was accused of engaging in sexual activity with another child,
Charles, who was 15 years old and approximately a year older than Paul at the time
of the offenses. The boys lived together in a youth home.
         {¶ 3} The offense at issue in this appeal is one of the rape counts, which
alleged that Paul “did engage in sexual conduct, to wit: anal intercourse with
[Charles] . . . having purposely compelled submission by force or threat of force.”
During the adjudication hearing before a magistrate, the State called Kelvin
Satterwhite, an employee of the youth home who had reported the sexual activity
to authorities. Satterwhite testified that he was in the youth home when he
overheard Paul and Charles through a video monitor. Satterwhite heard Charles
say, “[N]o, I’m not gonna do it, because I gave you oral sex twice already.”




1. We adopt the pseudonyms used by the court of appeals and refer to the juvenile offender, P.M.S.,
as “Paul” and the juvenile victim, C.T., as “Charles.” See 2023-Ohio-3825, ¶ 1-2, fn. 1 and fn. 2
(12th Dist.). Those pseudonyms have also been adopted by the parties in their briefs submitted to
this court.




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Satterwhite further testified that he then “heard [Paul] mumble, ‘but I want you,
and I want you now.’”
       {¶ 4} Satterwhite testified that he went outside looking for the boys and
heard voices behind a shed at the back of the youth home. He then described what
he saw:


       [Charles] was bent over and [Paul] was behind him, and he had both
       hands around his waist pulling him towards him, and I immediately
       asked what they was doing. And [Charles] jumped up, and [Paul]
       stood up, and then he just blurted out that he wanted me to do it.


       {¶ 5} The prosecutor asked Satterwhite to describe what he saw when he
found Paul with his hands around Charles’s waist, and Satterwhite explained, “It
was a grip around his waist. He was thrusting—he was using a thrust motion
towards his private area while he was bent over.” Satterwhite testified that Charles
looked like “he was scared that it was happening to him.” Satterwhite took the boys
inside and called 9-1-1.
       {¶ 6} The prosecutor then called Charles, who testified that the boys had
shared a room together at the youth home. Charles said that he and Paul became
friends and “did things together.” He explained that they used to “play outside”
and “[t]ake walks or ride bikes.” The prosecutor asked Charles if their being friends
ever changed, and he responded, “No, not at all.”
       {¶ 7} Charles testified that Paul asked him to perform oral sex while they
were in a car together. When the prosecutor asked Charles how he had responded
to Paul, Charles said, “I responded not that good, but I couldn’t really do anything
at that point.” The prosecutor asked why, and Charles answered, “Because I was
afraid.” And when asked why he was afraid, Charles explained, “I was afraid that




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I would get in trouble. I was afraid if I did it that I would get the police called and
it would get blamed on me for letting it happen.”
       {¶ 8} Regarding the day the boys were caught behind the shed, Charles
testified that Paul made Charles pull his own pants down before Paul had anal
intercourse with him. Charles told the court that it was something he did not want
to do; he testified, “I think I was forced to, to my understanding.” When asked how
he was forced, Charles explained that Paul held his legs and hovered over him. The
prosecutor asked Charles if he had tried to get Paul to stop, and Charles responded,
“Yes,” but he stated that Paul did not stop. Charles testified that he told Paul, “I
don’t want to do it,” but that Paul “ke[pt] asking [him] at that time.”
       {¶ 9} On cross-examination, Charles acknowledged that he did not want to
get into trouble for fear that he would be moved to another group home, which
would have been his third move. And Charles agreed that Paul “never threatened”
him and “never hurt” him. Paul’s attorney concluded his cross-examination of
Charles with the following exchange:


                Q. You went behind the shed with [Paul] because he asked
       you to do that, right?
                A. Yeah.
                Q. You had sex with [Paul] because he asked you to do that,
       right?
                A. Yep.
                Q. I think you said before that you didn’t want to do it but he
       convinced you to?
                A. Yeah.
                Q. By asking and asking?
                A. Uh-huh.




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        {¶ 10} The State rested its case following Charles’s testimony, and Paul
moved for a dismissal under Juv.R. 29. Paul’s attorney argued that the State may
have proved that Paul had persuaded Charles to engage in sex with him but that it
had not established that Paul had forced Charles to do so. The State responded by
pointing to Satterwhite’s testimony that Paul was grabbing Charles’s hips and waist
and thrusting toward Charles. The State also noted Charles’s testimony that he did
not want to engage in anal intercourse with Paul and that he had felt he was being
forced to do it.
        {¶ 11} The magistrate found that Paul had committed two of the rape
offenses, including the anal-intercourse rape behind the shed, and adjudicated Paul
a delinquent child. The magistrate dismissed the remaining rape charges and both
the gross-sexual-imposition charges.
        {¶ 12} With respect to the rape charges generally, the magistrate explained:


                   All I have is [Charles] in front of me. [Charles] did talk in
        terms of he felt that he—maybe he didn’t use this word, was
        badgered, quite frequently into submitting into sexual conduct with
        [Paul], that he sees quite obvious that [Charles] is a people pleaser,
        doesn’t want to say no to anyone, doesn’t have that strength of
        character, maybe the fortitude to be able to say no as other people
        do. He indicated that that wasn’t really something he wanted to do,
        but kept submitting to the requests that were made over and over.


        {¶ 13} And with respect to the anal-intercourse rape charge at issue in this
appeal, the magistrate explained:


        On the date of the incident [Charles] had indicated that he didn’t
        want to have sex with [Paul]. [Paul] kept asking him, kept asking



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        him. He did voluntarily go behind the shed, however, he indicated
        that his pants were pulled down and [Paul] was forcing himself
        inside of him.


        {¶ 14} Paul objected to the magistrate’s decision and argued that the State
had failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt the element of force as required by
R.C. 2907.02(A)(2), which states that “[n]o person shall engage in sexual conduct
with another when the offender purposely compels the other person to submit by
force or threat of force.” The juvenile court adopted the magistrate’s decision as to
the rape charge at issue here, finding that the State had established the element of
force through Charles’s testimony, which was further supported by Satterwhite’s
testimony.2
        {¶ 15} Following the adjudication and pursuant to Juv.R. 11, the case was
transferred to the Warren County Juvenile Court, the county where Paul resided,
for disposition. That court issued an order of disposition committing Paul to the
custody of the Department of Youth Services for an indefinite term consisting of a
minimum period of one year.
        {¶ 16} On appeal, the Twelfth District affirmed the adjudication of
delinquency. While recognizing that a reasonable trier of fact could have decided
this case either way, 2023-Ohio-3825, ¶ 17 (12th Dist.), the appellate court rejected
any invitation to scrutinize the reasoning process of the trial court, id. at ¶ 18, citing
Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 319, fn. 2 (1979). The court of appeals found
that based on the testimony at the adjudication hearing, a reasonable trier of fact
could have found that Paul had “exerted physical compulsion or constraint”—i.e.,
force—to compel Charles to engage in anal intercourse. Id. at ¶ 16.



2. The juvenile-court judge determined that the evidence was insufficient to support the other rape
offense that the magistrate found Paul to have committed.




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       {¶ 17} We accepted Paul’s discretionary appeal on the following
proposition of law:


               A trial court may not adjudicate a juvenile to be delinquent
       by reason of rape when the only evidence of force is the physical
       exertion inherent in the sexual act itself.


See 2024-Ohio-555.
                                  II. ANALYSIS
                              A. Standard of review
       {¶ 18} Although “juvenile courts are not meant to function as adult criminal
courts,” In re D.R., 2022-Ohio-4493, ¶ 13, juvenile-delinquency proceedings do
have “inherently criminal aspects,” In re A.J.S., 2008-Ohio-5307, ¶ 26, citing State
v. Walls, 2002-Ohio-5059, ¶ 26. Thus, juveniles are often afforded the same
protections and entitled to the same procedural due process that adult criminal
defendants receive. See Walls at ¶ 26. Important to this appeal, a juvenile may be
adjudicated delinquent if the State’s evidence establishes beyond a reasonable
doubt that the juvenile committed an act that would constitute a crime if committed
by an adult. See R.C. 2151.35(A)(1); see also In re Winship, 397 U.S. 358, 368
(1970) (finding that juveniles, like adults, are entitled to the beyond-a-reasonable-
doubt standard in delinquency adjudications).
       {¶ 19} Therefore, in reviewing whether the State has presented sufficient
evidence to meet its burden of proof, we apply the same standard for juvenile-
delinquency adjudications that we apply when reviewing adult criminal
convictions. See In re Watson, 47 Ohio St.3d 86, 91-92 (1989); In re Washington,
1998-Ohio-627, ¶ 8; see also In re A.S., 2024-Ohio-731, ¶ 23 (8th Dist.); In re J.C.,
2019-Ohio-4027, ¶ 10 (1st Dist.); In re Fortney, 2005-Ohio-3618, ¶ 19 (4th Dist.).




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        {¶ 20} In this case, Paul challenges whether the juvenile court had sufficient
evidence to find him delinquent for committing the act of rape. This is a question
of law that is reviewed de novo. See State v. Dunn, 2024-Ohio-5742, ¶ 28. In a
sufficiency-of-the-evidence challenge, our inquiry is focused on “‘whether the
evidence presented, when viewed in a light most favorable to the prosecution,
would allow any rational trier of fact to find the essential elements of the crime
beyond a reasonable doubt.’” Id., quoting State v. Dent, 2020-Ohio-6670, ¶ 15.
We do not “ask whether the evidence should be believed but, rather, whether the
evidence, ‘if believed, would convince the average mind [that the juvenile
committed the act] beyond a reasonable doubt.’” State v. Pountney, 2018-Ohio-22,
¶ 19, quoting State v. Jenks, 61 Ohio St.3d 259 (1991), paragraph two of the
syllabus, superseded by state constitutional amendment on other grounds as stated
in State v. Smith, 1997-Ohio-355, ¶ 49, fn. 4.
        {¶ 21} The juvenile court found that Paul had committed the offense of rape
under R.C. 2907.02(A)(2), which prohibits “sexual conduct with another when the
offender purposely compels the other person to submit by force or threat of force.”
Threat of force is not an issue in the case, as Charles testified, “[Paul] never
threatened me at all.” Rather, Paul argues that the State failed to prove that he used
force to overcome the will of Charles, because the only force he used was that which
was “inherent in the sexual act itself—the physical exertion necessary to engage in
the act.”
                 B. Establishing force under R.C. 2907.02(A)(2)
        {¶ 22} R.C. 2901.01(A)(1) defines force as “any violence, compulsion, or
constraint physically exerted by any means upon or against a person or thing.”
Rape by force may be proven by showing that a “‘victim’s will was overcome by
fear or duress.’” State v. Eskridge, 38 Ohio St.3d 56, 59 (1988), quoting State v.
Fowler, 27 Ohio App.3d 149, 154 (8th Dist.).




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        {¶ 23} Under R.C. 2907.02(A)(2), force that is “physically exerted by any
means,” R.C. 2901.01(A)(1), is all that is required. The trier of fact may need to
examine “‘the age, size and strength of the [offender and victim] and their relation
to each other.’” Eskridge at 58, quoting State v. Labus, 102 Ohio St. 26, 38 (1921).
However, we have recognized that only “minimal force” is necessary to support a
rape conviction. Id.
        {¶ 24} Paul argues that the force inherent in the sexual act cannot be
considered when making this determination. Paul suggests in his proposition of
law that there is a distinction between the force used by the offender to compel the
victim to submit to sexual conduct and the force used in performing the sexual
conduct itself. But here, the evidence in the record does not support reviewing this
case for such a distinction with respect to force in the context of rape.
                 C. The evidence was sufficient to establish force
        {¶ 25} The State argues that there was sufficient evidence of force,
regardless of the inherent force used by Paul to engage in the sexual conduct. We
agree. Satterwhite heard Charles tell Paul, “[N]o, I’m not gonna do it,” when Paul
asked for sex. Charles testified that he tried to get Paul to stop and that he felt
forced to engage in the sexual conduct. The State also presented evidence that Paul
was holding Charles’s waist and legs and thrusting into him. This evidence was
sufficient for a rational trier of fact to conclude beyond a reasonable doubt that Paul
compelled or constrained Charles in order to engage in sex with Charles without
his consent.    See Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (11th Ed. 2003)
(“compel” means “to drive or urge forcefully or irresistibly” or “to cause to do or
occur by overwhelming pressure”); id. (“constrain” means “to force by imposed
stricture, restriction, or limitation” or “to clasp tightly”). As for the sufficiency of
the evidence for the single count of rape, we find no error.




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                              III. CONCLUSION
       {¶ 26} Because a rational trier of fact could have found beyond a reasonable
doubt that Paul used force to compel Charles to submit to sexual conduct, we affirm
the judgment of the Twelfth District Court of Appeals.
                                                               Judgment affirmed.
                              __________________
       David P. Fornshell, Warren County Prosecuting Attorney, and Kristen
Brandt, Assistant Prosecuting Attorney, for appellee.
       Dearie, Fischer & Martinson, L.L.C., and John A. Fischer, for appellant.
                              __________________




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