Case Name: Shalonda GRIFFIN, Appellant, v. STATE of Florida, Appellee
Court: Florida District Court of Appeal
Jurisdiction: Florida
Decision Date: 2002-10-16
Citations: 827 So. 2d 1098
Docket Number: No. 1D01-2926
Parties: Shalonda GRIFFIN, Appellant, v. STATE of Florida, Appellee.
Judges: BOOTH and POLSTON, JJ., concur; BROWNING, J., dissents with separate opinion.
Reporter: Southern Reporter, Second Series
Volume: 827
Pages: 1098–1102

Head Matter:
Shalonda GRIFFIN, Appellant, v. STATE of Florida, Appellee.
No. 1D01-2926.
District Court of Appeal of Florida, First District.
Oct. 16, 2002.
Nancy A. Daniels, Public Defender; David P. Gauldin, Assistant Public Defender, Office of the Public Defender, Tallahassee, for Appellant.
Robert A. Butterworth, Attorney General; Kenneth D. Pratt, Assistant Attorney General, Office of the Attorney General, Tallahassee, for Appellee.

Opinion:
PER CURIAM.
Appellant was tried as a principal on battery charges along with three other co-defendants. After a mistrial was declared as to the co-defendants, Appellant sought to admit into evidence proffered testimony of two rebuttal witnesses to impeach the victim's credibility pursuant to section 90.608(5), Florida Statutes (2001). Specifically, Appellant sought to impeach the victim's testimony given during cross-examination prior to the mistrial, wherein she denied threatening one of the co-defendants at a liquor store. Appellant offered the testimony only to impeach the victim's credibility, and stated that it was not being offered in support of her self-defense claim. Accordingly, Smith v. State, 606 So.2d 641 (Fla. 1st DCA 1992)(reversing trial court's exclusion of proffered testimony relating to specific instances of violence by the victim) is not applicable.
Because Appellant did not offer the testimony in support of her self-defense claim, we find that the trial court did not abuse its discretion in refusing to allow the impeachment testimony as a collateral issue. Section 90.608(5) provides that any party may attack the credibility of a witness by contradictory testimony given by another witness as long as the facts testified to are not collateral to the issue. Patterson v. State, 157 Fla. 304, 25 So.2d 713, 717 (1946); Faucher v. R.C.F. Developers, 569 So.2d 794, 804 (Fla. 1st DCA 1990), receded from on other grounds, 625 So.2d 868 (Fla. 1st DCA 1993)(en banc).
An issue is collateral for purposes of impeachment by contradiction, if it cannot be introduced for any reason other than contradiction. Lawson v. State, 651 So.2d 713, 715 (Fla. 2d DCA 1995). "Evidence is collateral and therefore inadmissible when it neither (1) is relevant to prove an independent fact or issue nor (2) would discredit a witness by establishing bias, corruption, or lack of competency on the part of the witness." Strasser v. Yalamanchi, 783 So.2d 1087, 1095 (Fla. 4th DCA 2001).
First, as a result of the mistrial, the central issue of the case concerned solely the Appellant's actions. Therefore, any facts surrounding the liquor store incident between the victim and the co-defendant had no relevance to the central issue concerning the guilt or innocence of the Appellant on battery charges, even though Appellant was charged as a principal, because the proffered testimony was only offered to the sole purpose of contradicting the victim's testimony. See United States v. Payne, 102 F.3d 289, 294-295 (7th Cir.1996)(court held that the proffered testimony of accomplice's girlfriend was collateral where it was not related to the central issue concerning defendant's guilt or innocence on drug charges and was only offered for the sake of contradicting the accomplice's testimony).
Second, the proffered testimony was not offered to discredit the witness by establishing bias, corruption, or lack of competency.
Accordingly, the trial court did not abuse its discretion in refusing to allow the proffered testimony for purposes of impeachment.
AFFIRMED.
BOOTH and POLSTON, JJ., concur; BROWNING, J., dissents with separate opinion.