Opinion ID: 2823201
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Statement Number (7) by Ms. Gallardo

Text: The defendant lists the following as the seventh statement by Ms. Gallardo with which he takes issue on appeal: “That on the night she decided to go to the police to reveal Mr. Virola’s status as being ‘wanted,’ she was receiving text messages and photographs from Mr. Virola indicating that he knew where she lived and that he was coming for her   .” See footnote 9, supra. The defendant did object to Ms. Gallardo’s just-referenced testimony at trial; however, he “opened the door” to the issue during his cross-examination of Ms. Gallardo. Consequently, there was no abuse of discretion in the trial justice’s overruling of defendant’s objection. On cross-examination, the defendant asked Ms. Gallardo questions regarding her reasons for moving out of the home which she had shared with the defendant, without informing the defendant, in order to move to Chino Valley with Alice. That questioning elicited the fact that she acted in that way even though she had stated that the defendant loved and provided for his son. It also elicited the fact that the defendant called and asked about their son and that she continued to communicate with the defendant by text message regarding their son even after she had moved. It is the contention of the state, with which this Court agrees, that the state was free, on redirect examination, to elicit the testimony at issue in order to illustrate what the state was contending was Ms. Gallardo’s reason for moving without informing the defendant—that she was afraid of him. That testimony counteracted the attempts on cross-examination to suggest that Ms. Gallardo’s motives in moving had to do solely with pursuing her new relationship. Therefore, the defendant’s arguments on appeal with respect to statement number (7) are unavailing. See, e.g., State v. Mastracchio, 112 R.I. 487, 495, 312 A.2d 190, 195 (1973) (holding that “[o]nce [the] defendant opened up the door to [certain] evidence in an attempt to impeach [a witness’s] credibility, he could not complain when the state followed with further - 26 - testimony of a like character in clarification of what had been brought up on crossexamination”). IV