Opinion ID: 2114832
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 13

Heading: Doctrine of Chances

Text: As already indicated, rule 404(2) prohibits the admission of bad act evidence that is relevant only to show that the defendant has a propensity to act in a certain manner. The rule is designed to prevent the trier of fact from inferring the defendant's state of mind on the charged occasion from the defendant's subjective, personal character, disposition, or propensity. State v. Sullivan, 216 Wis.2d 768, 576 N.W.2d 30 (1998). The doctrine of chances purports to avoid asking the trier of fact to infer the defendant's state of mind from the defendant's subjective, personal character by asking the trier of fact to make an intermediate inference of objective improbability under the doctrine of chances and then an ultimate inference of intent based on the improbability of the conduct. (Emphasis supplied.) State v. Sadowski, 247 Mont. 63, 72, 805 P.2d 537, 542-43 (1991). In Sadowski, 247 Mont. at 72-73, 805 P.2d at 543, quoting Edward J. Imwinkelried, Uncharged Misconduct Evidence § 5:05 (1984), the Montana court stated: `The doctrine teaches us that the more often the defendant performs the actus reus, the smaller is the likelihood that the defendant acted with an innocent state of mind. The recurrence or repetition of the act increases the likelihood of a mens rea or mind at fault. In isolation, it might be plausible that the defendant acted accidentally or innocently; a single act could easily be explained on that basis. However, in the context of other misdeeds, the defendant's act takes on an entirely different light. The fortuitous coincidence becomes too abnormal, bizarre, implausible, unusual, or objectively improbable to be believed. The coincidence becomes telling evidence of mens rea.' However, other commentators have harshly criticized the reasoning underlying the doctrine of chances. See, e.g., Andrew J. Morris, Federal Rule of Evidence 404(B): The Fictitious Ban on Character Reasoning From Other Crime Evidence, 17 Rev.Litig. 181 (1998); Paul F. Rothstein, Intellectual Coherence in an Evidence Code, 28 Loy.L.A.L.Rev. 1259 (1995). Rothstein argues that the only way to explain the supposed disparity between the chances, or probability, that an innocent person would be charged so many times and the chances, or probability, that a guilty person would be so charged is the fact that a guilty person would have the propensity to repeat the crime. If it were not for the propensity to repeat, the chances, or the probability, that an innocent person and a guilty person would be charged repeatedly would be identical. Id. at 1263. Likewise, Morris argues that the assumption underlying the objective probability of the doctrine of chances necessarily dependsin a mathematically demonstrable manneron the assumption that the defendant's character is unchanging. Morris, supra, at 201. Nonetheless, despite the apparently flawed reasoning underlying the doctrine of chances, the majority of courts have adopted the doctrine without question. See, e.g., State v. Sullivan, supra ; People v Crawford, supra ; State v. Sadowski, supra .