Opinion ID: 1687133
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: trial court erred in allowing hearsay testimony concerning prior rapes of the prosecutrix by the defendant.

Text: Mary Gill, the mother of the prosecutrix and wife of the appellant, testified for the defense. The defense attempted to show through her testimony that Lynn Gill was hostile toward her father and had urged her mother to divorce him. As a part of this attempt to impeach Lynn's testimony, defense counsel questioned Mrs. Gill about a conversation which took place two weeks before the incident which gave rise to the charges in this case. In this conversation Lynn is alleged to have said she would get even with her father. On cross-examination the prosecution was allowed to bring out more of the same conversation, including testimony from Mrs. Gill that Lynn had told her that the appellant had raped her four (4) times. Appellant contends that the testimony was inadmissible hearsay and highly prejudicial, with any probative value outweighed by the prejudice. The State points out that no specific objection was made to the testimony as hearsay, and as a consequence the objection is waived and can not be raised on appeal. Moreover, the objectionable testimony was a continuation of a conversation brought in by the defense in an attempt to show the prosecutrix's hostility toward her father and once having allowed a partial view of the circumstances, the prosecution was rightly allowed to include the remainder of the mother's conversation with the daughter, including accusations against the father of prior sexual assaults. The trial court told the appellant that he could not shut the door. Where one side opens the door, the other may come in and develop that point in greater detail. See Jefferson v. State, 386 So.2d 200, 202 (Miss. 1980); Cf. Simpson v. State, 366 So.2d 1085, 1086 (Miss. 1979). There being no reversible error found in the proceedings below, the judgment and sentence of the Circuit Court are affirmed. AFFIRMED. PATTERSON, C.J., ROY NOBLE LEE, P.J., and HAWKINS, DAN M. LEE, PRATHER, ROBERTSON, SULLIVAN and ANDERSON, JJ., concur.