Opinion ID: 1058506
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Instruction on Direct and Circumstantial Evidence

Text: The defendant challenges the trial court's use of the alternative pattern jury instruction on direct and circumstantial evidence. See T.P.I.CRIM. 42.03(a) (4th ed.1995). It provides in pertinent part as follows: Direct evidence is those parts of the testimony admitted in court which referred to what happened and was testified to by witnesses who saw or heard [or otherwise sensed] what happened first hand. If witnesses testified about what they themselves saw or heard [or otherwise sensed], they presented direct evidence. Circumstantial evidence is all the testimony and exhibits which give you clues about what happened in an indirect way. It consists of all the evidence which is not direct evidence.... The defendant claims the instruction erroneously implies that all evidence is direct evidence, except hearsay. Here, a commonsense understanding of the instructions in the light of all that has taken place at the trial likely ... prevail[ed] over technical hairsplitting. Boyde, 494 U.S. at 381, 110 S.Ct. 1190. We conclude that there is no reasonable likelihood that the jurors interpreted the trial court's instructions so as to prevent proper consideration of direct and circumstantial evidence.