Opinion ID: 1058602
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: testimony of terrence mcnamara

Text: Crane next asserts that the trial court erred in allowing the Estate to call Terrence McNamara as a witness solely for the purpose of impeachment, when the substance of his testimony was unchallenged. McNamara was Crane's custodian of records and the designated corporate representative responsible for reviewing and certifying responses to discovery propounded upon Crane from 2000 until June 2004, including discovery in this case. A number of Crane's responses to interrogatories, submitted under McNamara's verification, were untruthful. Over Crane's objection, the trial court allowed the Estate to call McNamara as an adverse witness to impeach Crane's credibility. Generally, we review a trial court's decision to admit or exclude evidence using an abuse of discretion standard and, on appeal, will not disturb a trial court's decision to admit evidence absent a finding of abuse of that discretion. Riverside Hosp. v. Johnson, 272 Va. 518, 529, 636 S.E.2d 416, 421 (2006). While a trial court has no discretion to admit clearly inadmissible evidence, a great deal must necessarily be left to the discretion of the court of trial, in determining whether evidence is relevant to the issue or not. Id., 636 S.E.2d at 421-22 (internal citations omitted). Evidence is relevant if it has any logical tendency to prove an issue in a case. Goins v. Commonwealth, 251 Va. 442, 461, 470 S.E.2d 114, 127 (1996). [R]elevant evidence may be excluded only if the prejudicial effect of the evidence outweighs its probative value. Id. Crane's primary complaint is based on the legal proposition that a party may not impeach his own witness. While we agree that the Estate could not call McNamara for the sole purpose of impeaching him, see Virginia Electric & Power Co. v. Hall, 184 Va. 102, 105-06, 34 S.E.2d 382, 383 (1945), this is not what occurred at trial. Rather, the Estate argued to the trial court that it intended to call McNamara in order to show the pattern of untruthful behavior exhibited by John Crane. Such a pattern, if it existed, was relevant, to a primary issue in the case, whether Crane knew or had reason to know of the health risks posed by the asbestos-containing products it manufactured. Because McNamara's testimony concerned an improper discovery verification procedure, it tended to undermine the credibility of Crane's assertion that he employed proper procedures with respect to researching the dangers posed by asbestos or to disseminating that information and that Crane was forthcoming with regard to other statements it made. Thus, McNamara's testimony did have a logical tendency to prove an issue in the case, and we cannot say that it was irrelevant. Crane further argues that, because it conceded that McNamara's actions regarding discovery were improper, McNamara's testimony did not concern any factual issues in the case, but was merely calculated to inflame the passion and prejudices of the jury. We reject this argument because first, as stated above, McNamara's testimony was relevant to the issue of Crane's credibility, and thus did concern a factual issue in the case. Furthermore, the jury's allocation of damages among the defendants belies any argument that McNamara's testimony unduly prejudiced Crane. Accordingly, we conclude that the trial court did not abuse its discretion in allowing McNamara to testify.