People v. Summers CA3

BACKGROUND

The Prosecution Case D.S. was 17 years old in April 2011. He is one of seven brothers. He lived with his mother, R.S. (hereafter mother), who was in a relationship with defendant for 10 years, and engaged to him for eight of those years. Defendant was a father figure to D.S. and his brothers, all of whom called him “Dad.” At the age of 13, D.S. was molested by defendant’s brother, Daylon Summers. As a result, Daylon was sent to prison. When D.S. was 16, defendant took him to a Knights Inn, a motel in Yuba City, showed him how to smoke crack cocaine, and sodomized him after D.S. smoked crack. D.S. did not report the sexual assault because he did not want to be teased about it. When D.S. was 15 or 16, mother noticed that her son began spending more time with defendant. D.S. would go away with defendant for two or three days and return home “high.” Mother confronted defendant about drug use after D.S. twice tested positive for methamphetamine. Defendant said D.S. “had started on his own and they were smoking together because he didn’t want him to smoke with somebody else because if something went wrong, there’d be no safeguard.” Drug use was a source of tension between…