“The Ninth District Court of Appeals issued its opinion in Stanley Smith Jr.’s case Wednesday. The court overruled all of Smith’s assignments of error. Smith is a former University of Akron student who was convicted last fall of felonious assault, kidnapping and domestic violence.”
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The Ninth District Court of Appeals issued its opinion in Stanley Smith Jr.’s case Wednesday. The court overruled all of Smith’s assignments of error.

Smith is a former University of Akron student who was convicted last fall of felonious assault, kidnapping and domestic violence. The charges arose from an incident that took place in spring 2006.

According to reports, Smith visited a former girlfriend at her off-campus apartment, kidnapped her and brought her back to his room in Gallucci Hall where he was a resident assistant. There, Smith was accused of choking and sexually assaulting the woman.

After being sentenced to eight years in prison, Smith appealed. He raised five issues of error on appeal.

Among those issues were arguments that Smith did not face a jury of his peers because the state excluded a black individual, that he did not have the effective assistance of counsel and that the court should not have allowed testimony of other acts.

However, the appellate court sustained the prosecutor’s assignment of error, which argued that the trial court erred and abused its discretion in not conducting a sexual offender classification hearing.

The court’s opinion remanded the case to the trial court for further proceedings.

Smith was arrested April 14, 2006 on charges of rape, kidnapping and felonious assault. The incident took place between 6 p.m. on April 11 and 8 a.m. on April 12.

The victim told police that Smith choked her several times at her apartment before she agreed to leave with him, accompanying him back to his dorm room, where he repeatedly choked her.

According to Smith’s appellate brief, the victim testified that she and Smith then wrote contracts for the other to sign.

The victim’s contract for Smith stated that Smith would have to stop trying to control me, let me do my schoolwork, quit interfering with my school, stop being an asshole, don’t trip out about dumb shit and be nice. She then told Smith that she didn’t mean what she had written, and Smith then choked her again, his brief stated.

An April 21 indictment added charges of sexual battery and domestic violence.

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