State v. Patterson

Scott Patterson (plaintiff) sexually molested his stepdaughter on two occasions. The child immediately reported the abuse to her mother, Patterson’s wife, who confronted Patterson. Patterson denied the accusation, and the child recanted. Patterson then abused the child again and subsequently admitted to the abuse. The mother sued for divorce. The State of Utah (defendant) charged Patterson with aggravated sexual abuse of a child. Between the wife filing for divorce and the state filing criminal charges, Patterson met with the bishop from his church and admitted that he had sexually molested his stepdaughter. After the criminal charges were filed, Patterson and his trial counsel hired a doctor to prepare a psychosexual evaluation of Patterson. Patterson consented to the inclusion of his confession to the bishop in the doctor’s evaluation report. Patterson reviewed the final draft of the report before it was disclosed to the court and to the state prosecutors. The state told Patterson it would use the evaluation report to impeach his testimony if Patterson denied molesting his stepdaughter at trial. Based on that warning, and on the advice of counsel, Patterson did not testify at trial. Patterson was convicted. Patterson appealed and sought to overturn his conviction based on ineffective assistance of counsel, arguing that (1) his attorney failed to assert clergy-penitent privilege to prevent the state from using the bishop’s comments against Patterson at trial; and (2) but for his attorney’s failure to raise clergy-penitent privilege, Patterson would have testified in his own defense.