Opinion ID: 577004
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Disclosure/Admission of the Report

Text: 15 Defendants claim that the district court erred in disclosing only a small part of Kevorkian's hospitalization report and in excluding the disclosed portions from evidence. They claim that this evidence was relevant and admissible because it would have demonstrated that Kevorkian was both biased and unable to perceive or tell the truth. We address these arguments separately.
16 The thrust of the defense at trial was that no payoff scheme existed between defendants and Kevorkian or any other prostitute, and that Kevorkian, and those witnesses purporting to corroborate her testimony, were lying. According to defendants, Kevorkian's medical records were relevant evidence of her motive to lie about defendants' role in the payoff scheme. Defendants contend that her hysteroid dysphoria and potential for splitting caused her to harbor an irrational hatred of Butt and Semon, which drove her to testify falsely about them. 17 In so arguing, defendants relied upon the affidavits of their expert, Dr. Alan Green. Green informed the district court that hysteroid dysphoric individuals who employ splitting may idealize others and then quickly devalue them when they feel any hint of rejection. 4 Defendants argued that Kevorkian experienced an emotional backlash consistent with this profile, and that her testimony was concocted to punish them for dashing her magical expectations. The district court was not persuaded. Finding no support for defendants' bias theory, and, in particular, no evidence of any triggering rejection of Kevorkian by defendants, the court ruled Kevorkian's psychiatric history not relevant to her motivation to testify. 5 18 District courts have considerable discretion in determining the relevancy of evidence, and this discretion must be respected absent abuse. Conway v. Electro Switch Corp., 825 F.2d 593, 597 (1st Cir.1987); see also United States v. St. Michael's Credit Union, 880 F.2d 579, 601 (1st Cir.1989). We find no abuse here. 19 Defendants produced no convincing evidence that Kevorkian's testimony was fabricated to avenge imaginary insults, or, indeed, that it was fabricated at all. Kevorkian took the stand pursuant to an immunity and compulsion order. She stated that she was testifying against Butt and Semon because she had been subpoenaed to do so, and that she felt no animosity toward them. Undisputed evidence demonstrated that a close, personal relationship existed between Kevorkian and defendants. Kevorkian testified that she viewed their friendship as unwavering, from late 1983 on, and defendants produced no persuasive evidence to the contrary. 20 Defendants sought to convince the district court that certain discrepancies in Kevorkian's testimony demonstrated a growing vindictiveness toward them. They relied upon three examples. The first was that Kevorkian apparently told an FBI agent, at the outset of the government's investigation, that she and Semon had sex once, and then testified at trial that they had sex twice. It is not at all clear, though, that Kevorkian's testimony shifted on this point. It appears that when questioned by the FBI, Kevorkian stated that she and Semon had sex, without specifying the number of times, and that the agent, paraphrasing her remark, reported it as once. Her trial testimony, therefore, as readily corroborates as it does contradict her earlier statement. 21 The second example cited by defendants was that Kevorkian told the FBI that both defendants threatened her with violence lest she publicize the payoff arrangement, but testified at trial, months later, that only Semon threatened her. This inconsistency is less stark than defendants suggest. At trial, Kevorkian stated that while Semon uttered the threats, Butt was present whenever they were made. Her earlier assertion that both defendants threatened her--again, as paraphrased by the FBI agent--arguably reflects nothing more than this. 22 Finally, defendants maintained that the absence of any evidence of threats from certain audio tapes made by Kevorkian of conversations between her and defendants proves that the threats did not occur, but were, instead, recently contrived consistent with defendants' theory of her growing bitterness. Yet these tapes were made during the later phase of the payoff scheme, when, quite plausibly, Kevorkian had proved herself capable of keeping defendants' secret and the need for threats had dissipated. 23 At best, these examples are of minor significance. Without doubt, they are an insufficient basis for our finding abuse.
24 The district court found Kevorkian's hospitalization report of 1987 not relevant to her credibility, despite the suggestion contained therein that she was mentally unstable at a time covering events about which she later testified. Defendants, relying on longstanding precedent that evidence of mental instability is relevant for purposes of impeaching a government witness, argue that the court abused its discretion in deeming Kevorkian's medical history irrelevant. 25 For over forty years, federal courts have permitted the impeachment of government witnesses based on their mental condition at the time of the events testified to. See United States v. Hiss, 88 F.Supp. 559, 559-60 (S.D.N.Y.1950). Evidence about a prior condition of mental instability that provide[s] some significant help to the jury in its efforts to evaluate the witness's ability to perceive or to recall events or to testify accurately is relevant. United States v. Moore, 923 F.2d 910, 913 (1st Cir.1991). The readily apparent principle is that the jury should, within reason, be informed of all matters affecting a witness's credibility.... United States v. Partin, 493 F.2d 750, 762 (5th Cir.1974). See also United States v. Lindstrom, 698 F.2d 1154, 1165-66 (11th Cir.1983). 26 Despite this precedent, we are aware of no court to have found relevant an informally diagnosed depression or personality defect. Rather, federal courts appear to have found mental instability relevant to credibility only where, during the time-frame of the events testified to, the witness exhibited a pronounced disposition to lie or hallucinate, or suffered from a severe illness, such as schizophrenia, that dramatically impaired her ability to perceive and tell the truth. 6 27 In United States v. Barrett, 766 F.2d 609, 615-16 (1st Cir.1985), for example, the jury heard evidence that the government's star witness had once been sufficiently agitated, psychotic, and delusional to have been prescribed a dose of medication typically recommended for those who confuse fact and fantasy, and that the witness had been taking this medication up until one or two weeks prior to trial. In Partin, where the exclusion of a government witness's psychiatric history produced reversible error, the witness had voluntarily committed himself to a psychiatric hospital a few months prior to the events about which he testified, experiencing auditory hallucinations and believing himself to be another person. 493 F.2d at 764. Similarly, in Hiss, the government's key witness was allegedly a psychopathic personality disposed to chronic, persistent and repetitive lying ... acts of deception and misrepresentation ... and a tendency to make false accusations. In re Hiss, 542 F.Supp. 973, 993 (S.D.N.Y.1982) (describing mental condition of government witness in Hiss, 88 F.Supp. 559), aff'd without opinion, 722 F.2d 727 (2d Cir.1983). And in Lindstrom, medical records showed that a government witness had manipulated the results of a medical test and woven an intricate fabrication to explain it, that the witness chronically misinterpret[ed] the words and actions of others, and that she exhibited pseudoneurotic schizophrenia with marked paranoid trends, 698 F.2d at 1164-65. 28 Defendants do not suggest, nor is there evidence to the effect, that Kevorkian was disposed to the sorts of hallucinations, false accusations, or distortions present in these cases. Her psychiatric history consists of a single report based on one interview following her suicide attempt in 1987. The disclosed sections of the report find no evidence of psychotic thinking. They describe Kevorkian as an angry and alert individual suffering from atypical depression and borderline personality disorder, namely, hysteroid dysphoria with a marked potential for splitting. As well, they report indications ... of considerable rejection sensitivity ... very poor personal judgment ... [and] impulsivity and despair.... 29 The district court was impressed, as are we, by the absence of a formal psychiatric diagnosis or of any diagnosis ... of a mental illness which [would] prevent[ ] [Kevorkian] from perceiving matters truthfully and testifying about them. After reviewing the report in its entirety, as well as observing Kevorkian on the witness stand for two days, the trial court was of the opinion that she was not mentally incapacitated in any way. It found no evidence of paranoid fantasies and concluded that her depression, as described by the examining psychologist in 1987 and as speculated upon by Dr. Green, was a condition ... within the norm. 7 30 We find nothing improper in the trial court's management of this delicate question. Having examined the 1987 report in full, ourselves, we find the court's assessment of it to have been fair. Admittedly, we cannot rule out the possibility of any relationship between Kevorkian's past mental health and her credibility at trial. Her depression may well have colored her perception of reality. The same may be said, though, of most of life's ordeals and of the painful and embarrassing ones, in particular. In ruling Kevorkian's psychological profile not relevant to her veracity, the trial court evidently concluded that a tighter logical nexus was necessary to justify the introduction of such personal and potentially stigmatizing material. While recognizing that another court might have ruled differently, we are unable to find that the district court in this case abused its broad discretion in holding as it did.
31 An additional aspect of defendants' relevancy argument needs to be addressed. According to defendants, the district court's relevancy ruling was predicated upon its judgment that Kevorkian's psychiatric history was per se inadmissible 'character evidence.'  Were we to concur in defendants' characterization, we might well be inclined to find reversible error. In our view, however, the district court based its exclusion of the contested evidence not upon a per se rule, but, rather, upon its carefully considered findings that Kevorkian's medical history was not relevant to any issue in the case. 32 To the extent that the court did rely upon Rule 404's proscription of character evidence, it explicitly considered the exception, contained within the rule, for evidence of a witness's character for truthfulness. 9 Thus, rather than making the sort of categorical judgment described by defendants, the district court simply determined that the proffered evidence did not bear upon Kevorkian's veracity. We therefore find no error.
33 Our affirmance of the trial court's relevancy determination disposes of defendants' claim that the trial court erred in barring full or additional disclosure of Kevorkian's 1987 hospitalization report. A district court's determination regarding compliance with a discovery order is committed to its sound discretion and is reversible only for abuse. United States v. Tejada, 886 F.2d 483, 486 (1st Cir.1989). The order of the magistrate judge required the government to make available to the defense the psychiatric records of government witnesses so far as they tend[ed] to call into question the ability of a witness to perceive events accurately and/or to recount those events truthfully and accurately at a later time. The trial court, having ruled Kevorkian's medical records not relevant to her truth-telling ability or any other issue, was free to limit their discovery. See United States v. Sterling, 742 F.2d 521, 527 (9th Cir.1984) (upholding district court's non-disclosure of government witness's psychiatric records after in camera review on ground that evidence would not be admissible at trial). 34 As for defendants' attack upon the court's decision to review the report in camera, we suspect that it has been waived. Shortly before trial the government moved for in camera review. The court granted the motion one week later. So far as we can see, defendants did not object to the order and made no motion for reconsideration. Such inaction, particularly within days of the commencement of trial, presumably precludes defendants from challenging the order before us. See Reilly v. United States, 863 F.2d 149, 160 (1st Cir.1988) (when a trial judge announces a proposed course of action which litigants believe to be erroneous, [and] the parties detrimentally affected ... [fail to] act expeditiously to call the error to the judge's attention, right of appeal is waived). 35 Assuming, without deciding, that defendants' claim is viable at this stage, it cannot succeed. We accord the district court broad discretion in protecting the rights of parties through the use of in camera review of a witness's medical history. See United States v. Grey Bear, 883 F.2d 1382, 1393 (8th Cir.1989) (in camera review of witness's medical records permissible exercise of discretion where direct and cross-examination of witness elicited the relevant information); Sterling, 742 F.2d at 527 (no abuse of discretion where trial court refused to grant defendant access to government witness's psychiatric records on ground that evidence would not be admissible at trial, choosing, instead to conduct in camera review). Given the court's pre-trial decision to disclose to defendants what, in our estimation, were the most salient portions of the report, we find no abuse here.