State v. Butler

Hunt, Justice.

We granted the state’s application for certiorari in this case after the Court of Appeals reversed Gary Wayne Butler’s convictions for statutory rape, aggravated sodomy and child molestation. The Court of Appeals held that the trial court erred in allowing the pediatrician, who had examined the seven-year-old victim, to testify that in her opinion the child had been molested, which was an ultimate issue to be decided by the jury. Butler v. State, 178 Ga. App. 110 (342 SE2d 338) (1986).

The state’s witness, Dr. Ann Fleming, a pediatrician to whom the victim had been referred,…