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Parties Involved:
United States of America
Appellee
Eric Welsh
Appellant

Document Text:

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS 

TENTH CIRCUIT 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 

Plaintiff-Appellee, 

. FILED 

Umt«i s,rates Courr of .Appeals r enrh c;,.,,.; • .,,. _., -·-'· . 

MAR 19 1990 

.ROBERT L. HOECKER 

Clerk 

v. 

ERIC WELSH, 

Defendant-Appellant. 

No. 89-4064 

(D.C. No. 88-CR-186G) 

(D. Utah) 

ORDER AND JUDGMENT* 

Before*fACHA and BALDOCK, Circuit Judges, and O'CONNOR, District 

Judge. 

After examining the briefs and appellate record, this panel 

has determined unanimously that oral argument would not materially 

assist the determination of this appeal. See Fed. R. App. P. 

34(a); 10th Cir. R. 34.1.9. The case is therefore ordered 

submitted without oral argument. 

Eric Welsh appeals from a verdict of guilty on the charge of 

Assault with a Deadly Weapon Within Indian Country, 18 U.S.C. 

§§ 113(c), 1153. Welsh contends that the district court erred by 

preventing the introduction of evidence of prior specific 

* This order and judgment has no precedential value and shall 

not be cited, or used by any court within the Tenth Circuit, 

except for purposes of establishing the doctrines of the law of 

the case, res judicata, or collateral estoppel. 10th Cir. R. 

36.3. 

** The Honorable Earl E. O'Connor, Chief Judge, United States 

District Court for the District of Kansas, sitting by designation. 

Appellate Case: 89-4064 Document: 01019966379 Date Filed: 03/19/1990 Page: 1 
instances of violent acts by the victim, Cesspooch. Welsh argues 

that the court's ruling prevented him from showing that Cesspooch 

was the aggressor, undermining Welsh's claim of self-defense. We 

affirm. 

Welsh sought to introduce evidence of specific instances of 

Cesspooch's violent acts for two purposes: first, to show that 

Cesspooch was the aggressor; second, to show that his own actions 

in self defense were "reasonable." We agree with Welsh that he is 

entitled to introduce evidence of Cesspooch's aggressive nature 

and that he is not required to show personal knowledge of the 

victim's character. Perrin v. Anderson, 784 F.2d 1040, 1045 n.3 

(10th Cir. 1986). We noted in Perrin, however, that 

"evidence of a violent disposition to prove that the 

person was the aggressor in an affray" is given as an 

example of the circumstantial use of character evidence 

in the advisory committee notes for Fed.R.Evid. 404(a). 

When character is used circumstantially, only reputation 

and opinion are acceptable forms of proof. Fed.R.Evid. 

405 advisory committee note. We therefore find that the 

district court erroneously relied upon the character 

evidence rules in permitting testimony about specific 

violent incidents involving Perrin. 

Perrin, 784 F.2d at 1045 (emphasis added) (footnote omitted). 

Welsh attempts to distinguish Perrin by arguing that the 

proffered specific instance testimony in that case was by four 

officers not immediately involved in nor eyewitnesses to the 

attack and that their testimony was thus "circumstantial"; 

whereas, Welsh claims that he sought to cross examine Cesspooch 

about past instances of his own aggressive behavior, which would 

be "direct'' evidence. This distinction is unpersuasive. Except 

insofar as Cesspooch testified about his actions at the time of 

the attack, his testimony about his own prior aggressive acts is 

2 

Appellate Case: 89-4064 Document: 01019966379 Date Filed: 03/19/1990 Page: 2 
as much circumstantial evidence as that of the four officers in 

Perrin. The testimony may "directly'' prove that Cesspooch is 

aggressive generally; but it is at best circumstantial evidence 

that Cesspooch was the aggressor in the attack. As such, we 

adhere to our holding in Perrin that when character evidence is 

used circumstantially, only reputation and opinion are acceptable 

forms of proof. The district court admitted such reputation 

testimony. 

Welsh's second contention is that the district court erred by 

restricting testimony concerning prior specific instances to 

events about which Welsh had personal knowledge. We find no 

error. The relevant standard is whether a reasonable person in 

the defendant's position would .have felt in imminent danger of 

bodily injury or death. In evaluating Welsh's self defense claim, 

the jury should only consider the information in Welsh's 

possession at the time of the attack. The question is the 

objective reasonableness of Welsh's actions based on the 

information he possessed, not the objective reasonableness of the 

action in the light of all the evidence available to the jurors. 

Evidence of a victim's aggressive habits is thus permissible 

to show that the victim was the aggressor independent of the 

defendant's personal knowledge; but the claim of self defense 

should be evaluated solely on the basis of the objective 

reasonableness of the defendant's actions based on his personal 

knowledge of the victim. Cross examination of specific instances 

about which the defendant did have personal knowledge may be 

admissible, however. Cross examination on these instances permits 

3 

Appellate Case: 89-4064 Document: 01019966379 Date Filed: 03/19/1990 Page: 3 
,. .I 

• 

the jury to evaluate better the reasonableness of the defendant's 

actions. 

The district court did not err on the facts of this case. 

Evidence of the victim's aggressive and violent reputation was 

admitted through the testimony of Ryan Black. Testimony 

concerning specific instances of the victim's prior aggressive 

behavior about which Welsh had prior knowledge were admitted in 

cross examination. There was no error in the district court's 

evidentiary rulings. The judgment of the district court is 

AFFIRMED. 

4 

ENTERED FOR THE COURT 

Deanell Reece Tacha 

Circuit Judge 

Appellate Case: 89-4064 Document: 01019966379 Date Filed: 03/19/1990 Page: 4