Title: King v. State
Citation: 615 So. 2d 1202
Docket Number: 90-KA-1234
State: Mississippi
Issuer: Mississippi Supreme Court
Date: March 18, 1993

615 So. 2d 1202 (1993) Robert KING v. STATE of Mississippi. No. 90-KA-1234. Supreme Court of Mississippi. March 18, 1993. *1203 Richard W. Hamilton, Robert A. Pritchard, Pritchard &amp; Chapman, Pascagoula, for appellant. Michael C. Moore, Atty. Gen., Charles W. Maris, Jr., Sp. Asst. Atty. Gen., Jackson, for appellee. Before HAWKINS, C.J., and McRAE and ROBERTS, JJ. McRAE, Justice, for the Court: Robert King appeals from a conviction in the Circuit Court of Adams County for sale of a controlled substance, marijuana, as a second subsequent offender under Miss. Code Ann. § 41-29-147 (1972), and sentence of twenty-four (24) years in custody of the Mississippi Department of Corrections.[1] He alleges that the trial court erred in (1) refusing to exclude alleged erroneous *1204 evidence introduced by the State and (2) making prejudicial comments in the presence of the jury. Finding that reversible error exists in the court's admission of extrinsic testimony, we reverse and remand for a new trial. On March 29, 1989, Michael Diggs, a confidential informant wired for sound, met King at a Natchez motel for the purpose of purchasing marijuana. King called his wife, who picked up King and Diggs, and the group proceeded to travel to the nearby community of Cannonsburg. During the trip, they were under surveillance by Bureau of Narcotics agents, who followed in other vehicles. Upon arriving in Cannonsburg, King exited the vehicle and entered the mobile home of Ray White. He returned to the vehicle with a bulge under his outer clothing. The parties returned to Natchez where the marijuana sale was concluded in the motel room rented by Diggs. King was subsequently indicted, tried and convicted by a jury in the Circuit Court of Adams County. During trial, Ray White, occupant of the mobile home in Cannonsburg, testified as a witness for King. White related that on March 29, 1989, he was outside his trailer washing his car when King arrived. He stated that King conversed with him in his yard about a loan to use for gambling, that he refused to make the loan, and neither he nor King entered his mobile home on the occasion. On cross-examination, White stated that he had not been convicted of any crimes. The State then requested and elicited the following information from White without objection from the defense: Cross-examination of White concerning the details of other alleged criminal activities of King and himself was clearly violative of Miss.R.Evid. 608(b), which provides: In the Comment to Miss.R.Evid. 608 we are told: The exceptions listed in the Comments do not warrant or permit the actions of the State in this case, particularly, the questions pertaining to the involvement of King in other specific crimes with White. While the evidence elicited was clearly in contravention of Miss.R.Evid. 608(b), the error was not preserved for review by this Court. Miss.R.Evid. 103(a)(1) tells us: It is elementary that, for preservation of error for review, there must be contemporaneous objections. Smith v. State, 530 So. 2d 155, 161-62 (Miss. 1988). If this were the sole basis for reversible error, we would have no hesitancy in holding that the alleged error was waived by King's failure to timely object, but there is more. After eliciting testimony from White concerning his and King's involvement in an alleged independent offense, the *1206 State evoked additional testimony on the collateral issue. On rebuttal, the State called Lee Anthony Ford, employee of the Natchez Police Department and the following transpired: As this testimony indicates, King's attorney did, at this time, enter a contemporaneous objection. We hold that the trial court erroneously overruled the objection. The court should not have admitted Ford's testimony over the objection of King's attorney that the State was going to try to prove some independent crime against the witness. The evidence elicited on cross-examination of defense witness White, while violative of Miss.R.Evid. 608(b), was not reversible error per se and no timely objection was made as required by Miss.R.Evid. 103(a)(1). However, when the State introduced the so called "rebuttal evidence" of witness Ford, timely objection was made and the court clearly erred in admitting Ford's testimony. Under Miss.R.Evid. 103, which governs the effect of erroneous rulings, an admission of improper evidence will lead to reversal when it affects a substantial right of a party and objection to the evidence appears on the record. Receipt of improper evidence by the trial court is reversible error when it affects a defendant's right to a fair trial. When faced with the objection to improper evidence, the trial judge has two options. First, he may sustain the objection and admonish the jury accordingly, or next, he may allow the evidence and give a specific cautionary instruction to the jury at trial's end. See Hall v. State, 539 So. 2d 1338 (Miss. 1989); Darby v. State, 538 So. 2d 1168 (Miss. 1989). The trial court did neither. In a similar fact situation, we held that a defendant was prejudiced by the introduction of testimony from an alleged accomplice regarding a prior attempt to grow marijuana. We found that the trial judge, in failing to give a cautionary instruction or a jury admonishment, caused the defendant to be prejudiced and denied the defendant a fair trial by the introduction of such evidence. Hudgins v. State, 569 So. 2d 1206, 1207 (Miss. 1990). In this case, White was a crucial defense witness and the attempt to *1207 impeach his testimony by evidence of specific instances of collateral misconduct with the defendant involving other crimes was highly prejudicial. Under the circumstances, the cause must be reversed and remanded for a new trial. We address the remaining asserted errors as they may require resolution during another trial. Diggs, a confidential informant who testified for the State, referred to his notes during testimony. King objected, alleging violation of Miss.R.Evid. 803(5) because Diggs failed to demonstrate an exhaustion of memory. Miss.R.Evid. 803(5) provides: This rule should be read in conjunction with Miss.R.Evid. 612, which provides: The Comment to Miss.R.Evid. 612 states: The trial court did not abuse its discretion in permitting the confidential informant and narcotics agents to refer to their notes. See Levingston v. State, 525 So. 2d 1300, 1302-04 (Miss. 1988); Gardner v. State, 455 So. 2d 796, 799-800 (Miss. 1984). Although King urges specific instances of alleged error by the trial judge in comments made during trial, we need not decide the validity of the claims since an examination of the record shows King failed to object to any comment of the court. In Norman v. State, 385 So. 2d 1298, 1302 (Miss. 1980) we articulated: In Ratliff v. State, 313 So. 2d 386, 388 (Miss. 1975), we stated: Moreover, the complained of comments made by the trial judge, when read in the context of the entire record, do not reveal that he impermissibly crossed the line between judging and advocacy. *1208 Since we find that reversible error resulted from the trial court's action in overruling the defense counsel's objection to Ford's testimony elicited in violation of Miss.R.Evid. 608(b), we reverse and remand for a new trial. REVERSED AND REMANDED FOR A NEW TRIAL. HAWKINS, C.J., DAN M. LEE and PRATHER, P.JJ., and SULLIVAN, PITTMAN, BANKS, ROBERTS and SMITH, JJ., concur. [1] The attorneys representing King on appeal were not the same attorneys who represented him at the trial.