ATTORNEY FOR APPELLANT			ATTORNEYS FOR APPELLEE

Jerry J. McGaughey				Jeffrey Modisett

Vincennes, IN					Attorney General of Indiana

							Christopher L. LaFuse

							Deputy Attorney General

							Indianapolis, IN

IN THE

SUPREME COURT OF INDIANA

JEFFREY SCOTT MORRISON,			)

							)

	Appellant (Defendant below),	)

							)

			v.				)Cause No. 42SOO-9605-CR-392

							)

STATE OF INDIANA,				)

							)

	Appellee (Plaintiff below).	)					

APPEAL FROM THE KNOX CIRCUIT COURT

The Honorable Murphey C. Land, Judge

Cause No. 42C01-9508-CF-040

SHEPARD, Chief Justice.

	Jeffrey Scott Morrison and Danjo Graziano were tried by a jury

in a joint trial.  The jury found Morrison guilty on two counts:  murder, a felony,1 and battery, a class B misdemeanor.2  The jury also found Graziano guilty of murder.  The court sentenced Morrison

to sixty-five years in prison for murder, with a 180-day 

concurrent sentence for battery.

	Morrison raises two issues:

	1) Whether the trial court abused its discretion by 

	limiting 	Morrison’s cross-examination of co-defendant  	Graziano and by refusing to allow Graziano’s written 

	agreement with the State to be introduced at trial, and,

	2) Whether the trial court abused its discretion by 

	finding the absence of certain physical evidence 	 	 	irrelevant.  

Facts

	The evidence at trial revealed that on August 1, 1995,

Morrison, Graziano, Rita Bilskie, April MacKinnon, and her son Jake

were at a tavern in Vincennes.  MacKinnon was in the process of

moving and had been staying with Bilskie, but that evening she was looking for another place to stay.  While at the bar, Steven Tatum,

an acquaintance of Graziano’s, offered MacKinnon and Jake lodging

at his apartment.  Bilskie later took MacKinnon, Jake, Tatum,

Graziano, and Morrison to Tatum’s apartment.

	Soon after arriving at Tatum’s apartment, Morrison, Graziano,

and Bilskie departed.  MacKinnon, who was Graziano’s girlfriend,

remained at Tatum’s with Jake.  Tatum made sexual advances toward MacKinnon.  When she declined his invitations, he grabbed her

wrists.  She pulled away from him, and she and her son quickly left

the apartment.  The two wandered the street until a concerned

neighbor took them into his home.  MacKinnon later saw Morrison

pass in front of the house, and she relayed to him what happened at

Tatum’s apartment.  MacKinnon and Morrison then went to Tatum’s,

where Morrison beat Tatum.  Afterward, Morrison and MacKinnon took

Jake to Bilskie’s apartment.    

	Graziano was already at Bilskie’s when Morrison and MacKinnon

arrived.  After hearing MacKinnon’s story of her encounter with

Tatum, Morrison and Graziano decided to go to Tatum’s apartment and

beat him further.  Before they left, MacKinnon gave one of them a

gun which she had previously taken from her stepfather.3  

	In his apartment, Tatum confessed to Morrison and Graziano

that he had made advances toward MacKinnon.  Graziano struck Tatum in the face, knocked him to the floor, kicked him several times,

and dragged him by the hair into the bedroom.  Graziano then shot Tatum in the knee, and one of the two defendants shot Tatum twice

in the head.  Tatum died of multiple blunt injuries and multiple

gunshot wounds.  Over the next few days, Morrison and Graziano

admitted to several individuals that they beat and shot Tatum, and

the State charged them both with murder and battery.  Both Morrison

and Graziano claim the other one fired the fatal shots.  

I.  Limitation on Cross-Examination Regarding the Agreement

	Before trial, Graziano entered into a written agreement to

testify against Morrison in exchange for charging him with a lesser

crime.  The agreement was contingent on Graziano passing a

polygraph examination.  When Graziano failed the polygraph, the

State did not amend the information.  At trial, Morrison attempted

to cross-examine Graziano about this conditional agreement, but the

court limited questioning on this subject to: "You cut a beneficial

deal with the State, did you not?"  

	Morrison argues that the trial court erred by limiting his

cross-examination of Graziano regarding this agreement and by 

excluding the written agreement from evidence because exclusion of

this matter misled the jury and violated his right to a fair trial. 

	The trial court did not err.  This Court has long held that

beneficial agreements between an accomplice and the State must be

revealed to the jury.  Morgan v. State, 275 Ind. 666, 419 N.E.2d 964 (1981); Newman v. State, 263 Ind. 569, 334 N.E.2d 684 (1975).  This rule serves to help the jury better assess the reliability and

honesty of the felon-witness.  Lewis v. State, 629 N.E.2d 934, 937 (Ind Ct. App. 1994)("The jury should have the evidence related to

any consideration a felon-witness receives in exchange for

testifying on behalf of the State").  

	Here, the State did not extend any consideration to Graziano, 

because Graziano did not pass the polygraph examination and thus

secured no consideration from the State.  As a result, there was no

deal to disclose to the jury.  The trial court’s decision to limit

Graziano’s testimony was not an abuse of discretion.  Likewise,

there was no need to submit the written agreement into evidence.  

	Graziano was charged with murder and tried jointly with

Morrison.  With Graziano facing the possibility of sixty-five years

in prison, the jury was well-aware that Graziano had a powerful

incentive to lay all the guilt on Morrison.  The rule requiring

disclosure of beneficial agreements serves to alert the jury to a 

witness’s credibility, or lack thereof.  The jury needed little

reminder here.      

II. Limitation on Cross-Examination Concerning the Evidence

	Morrison claims the court abused its discretion by prohibiting

him from inquiring about the State’s investigation and the

acquisition of scientific evidence.  Morrison claims the lack of

physical evidence placing him at the scene of the crime was

critical to contradict the testimony of the State’s eyewitness.  He

claims that disallowing questioning about or comment on the

evidence deprived him of a fair trial. 

	If evidence is of marginal relevance, the trial court has the

authority to prohibit cross-examination on that topic.  Ingram v. State, 547 N.E.2d 823 (Ind. 1989).  Morrison sought to cross- examine a police officer for the purpose of showing there was not

a trace of evidence linking him anywhere in Tatum’s apartment,

except in the kitchen and bedroom.  None of this evidence is

relevant to Morrison’s guilt or innocence.  Indiana Code Section

35-41-2-4 provides that if a person knowingly or intentionally aids

another person to commit an offense, he himself commits that

offense.  Ind. Code Ann. § 35-41-2-4 (West 1986).  Morrison

admitted in open court that he was in Tatum’s home to do him harm 

on two occasions:  first when he initially beat Tatum and, second,

when Tatum was killed.

	Morrison’s defense thus boils down to an assertion that

Graziano fired the fatal shots.  Morrison argues that Graziano’s

testimony is the only evidence regarding his conduct in Tatum’s

apartment before and during the murder of Tatum.  Whether Morrison

fired the fatal shots is immaterial to his guilt, however, because

an individual who aids another person to commit a crime is as

guilty as the actual perpetrator.  Pike v. State, 532 N.E.2d 3 (Ind. 1989).  "A person may be convicted as a principal upon

evidence that he or she aided or abetted in the perpetration of the

charged crime.  There is no separate crime of being an accessory to

a crime or aiding and abetting its perpetrator."  Taylor v. State, 495 N.E.2d 710, 713 (Ind. 1986).  The court’s limitations on this

cross-examination were not an abuse of discretion.

Conclusion

	We affirm the judgment of the trial court.

Dickson, Sullivan, Selby, and Boehm, JJ., concur.