Opinion ID: 2264062
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Lt Thomas Kaminski

Text: The defendant's next assignment of error concerns the cross-examination of Lt. Thomas Kaminski (Lt. Kaminski) of the Tiverton Police Department. The trial justice prevented defendant from inquiring into the names of the twenty-three people whom Lt. Kaminski interviewed during the course of his investigation. The defendant argued before the trial justice, and renews the argument before this Court, that the names of the people interviewed by Lt. Kaminski were relevant to his knowledge and understanding of the case. Lieutenant Kaminski's knowledge of the case, in turn, would give credibility to his interview of Alan Shepard, the gas station attendant and key witness for the state. As noted previously, a trial justice may limit a line of questioning if it is irrelevant to the proceedings, or if the relevance of the line of questioning is outweighed by any of the reasons prescribed in Rule 403 of the Rhode Island Rules of Evidence. Oliveira, 730 A.2d at 24. Rule 403 provides: Although relevant, evidence may be excluded if its probative value is substantially outweighed by    considerations of undue delay, waste of time, or needless presentation of cumulative evidence.  (Emphasis added.) In light of the fact that defendant could inquire about how many people Lt. Kaminski interviewed, the trial justice was well within her discretion to find either: (1) that the individual names of all interviewees were not relevant to proving his knowledge and understanding of the case; or (2) that, even if they were somehow relevant, reciting the name of each interviewee would have been a waste of time that would have unduly delayed a long and complicated trial. We hold that the trial justice did not err in doing so. D