Opinion ID: 199698
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Cross-Examination of Kevin Meserve about his Prior Convictions and Character for Violence

Text: 33 Meserve argues that the district court committed reversible error by permitting the government to cross-examine his brother, Kevin, about his disorderly person and assault convictions and about his alleged violent reputation in the community. The challenged portion of Kevin's cross-examination is as follows: 34 Q: Now, Mr. McKee asked you questions about your conviction for unlawful sexual contact in '94 and '95, but that's not your only conviction, is it? 35 A: I have a couple of assaults on my record. 36 Q: 1999-1979, disorderly conduct. 37 MR. McKEE: I object, Your Honor, That's improper cross-examination under Rule 609. It specifically precludes that. A disorderly conduct? 38 MR. McCARTHY: I can lay a foundation for it. 39 THE COURT: Go ahead. BY MR. McCARTHY: 40 Q: You're a tough guy, aren't you Kevin? 41 MR. McKEE: I object. 42 THE COURT: Overruled. BY MR. McCARTHY: 43 Q: You're a tough guy, aren't you? 44 A: I wouldn't classify myself as a tough guy. 45 Q: Been in a lot of fights in your day? 46 MR. McKEE: I object, improper character evidence, impeachment. 47 THE COURT: Just a minute. Objection's overruled. 48 A: How many would you classify as a lot? BY MR. McCARTHY: 49 Q: More than one? 50 A: Yeah, I've been in more than one, probably two. 51 Q: Okay. And as a result of that, people in the community are afraid of you, aren't they? 52 A: No. 53 Mr. McKEE: Object, Your Honor. A continuing objection to my client's -- excuse me -- this witness' alleged behavior in the past as not being relevant, as not being permissible character evidence under Rule 608 or any other rule. 54 The COURT: Mr. McCarthy? 55 MR. McCARTHY: Well, Your Honor, I disagree. If his reputation in the community is basically as an assaultive person about whom people are afraid, that's very significant when it comes to the other people's testimony about him and about what's happened. 56 THE COURT: I'm going to allow it over objection. You'll have a continuing objection. 57 Mr. McKEE: Thank you, Your Honor. BY MR. McCARTHY: 58 Q: In fact, you were convicted of assault as recently as 1997, weren't you. 59 MR. McKEE: Same objection, Your Honor. 60 THE COURT: You have a continuing objection. 61 MR. McKEE: This is with respect to Rule 609. 62 THE COURT: Overruled. 63 A: Yes. BY MR. McCARTHY: 64 Q: Is that right? 65 A: Yes. 66 Meserve objects to this entire line of questioning, asserting that the questions about Kevin's disorderly person and assault convictions were improper because these convictions were not permissible subjects of cross-examination under Rule 609(a) and that the questions about Kevin being a tough guy and having been in a lot of fights in his day were improper character evidence under Rule 608. The government counters that Meserve failed to preserve these issues for review and that any errors that may have occurred were harmless, given the cumulative weight of the evidence against Meserve.
67 The government devoted a great deal of space in its brief and time at oral argument to defending the untenable position that the issues raised by Meserve on appeal were not preserved for review because the defense failed to make both contemporaneous objections and motions to strike and because Kevin did not answer many of the government's questions, or provided answers arguably favorable to the defense. Because of the vehemence with which the government argues a position with no seeming support in the law, this court pauses to discuss the obligations placed on each of the parties to a trial by the Federal Rules of Evidence. 68 It is a basic tenet of our law that in order to preserve an evidentiary issue for review, the party opposing the admission of the evidence must make a timely objection. Fed. R. Evid. 103(a)(1); United States v. Auch, 187 F.3d 125, 130 (1st Cir. 1999); United States v. Barone, 114 F.3d 1284, 1293 (1st Cir. 1997); United States v. Wihbey, 75 F.3d 761, 770 & n.4 (1st Cir. 1996); Willco Kuwait (Trading) S.A.K. v. deSavary, 843 F.2d 618, 625 (1st Cir. 1988); see also United States v. Taylor, 54 F.3d 967, 972 (1st Cir. 1995) (In general, the law ministers to the vigilant, not to those who sleep upon perceptible rights.). Thus, the government argues that the defense's failure immediately to object when Kevin was asked about convictions in addition to his unlawful sexual contact convictions constrains this court from considering the matter on appeal absent plain error. Fed. R. Crim. P. 52(b); Olano, 507 U.S. at 732-37. Examination of the transcript, however, reveals that Meserve's attorney objected as soon as it became obvious that the government's line of questioning was in violation of Rule 609, i.e., when the government indicated that the conviction about which it was asking was a twenty-year-old disorderly conduct conviction. To be timely, an objection must be made as soon as the ground of it is known, or reasonably should have been known to the objector. United States v. Check, 582 F.2d 668, 676 (2d Cir. 1978) (quoting 21 Charles Alan Wright & Kenneth W. Graham, Jr., Federal Practice and Procedure § 5037 (1977) (quoting John Henry Wigmore, Code of Evidence 25 (3d ed. 1942)). The general principle that an objection should be made after a question has been asked but before an answer has been given, Hutchinson v. Groskin, 927 F.2d 722, 725 (2d Cir. 1991), is flexible in deference to the heat of a hotly contested criminal trial, Check, 582 F.2d at 676. Thus, the defense was not required to anticipate the government's line of questioning in order for the objection to be timely. Compare Hutchinson, 927 F.2d at 725 (holding that objection was timely, even though objection was not made until after question was answered), and Inge v. United States, 356 F.2d 345, 350 n.17 (D.C. Cir. 1966) (holding that defense counsel's failure to object until after he learned the nature of the document being used to refresh the defendant's recollection did not render objection nugatory), with United States v. Benavente Gomez, 921 F.2d 378, 385 (1st Cir. 1990) (holding that because at least three pages of transcript were recorded before the defendant objected, the objection came too late to preserve the objection for appeal), and W. Fire Ins. Co. v. Word, 131 F.2d 541, 543-44 (5th Cir. 1942) (It is a rule of law so old that the memory of man runneth not to the contrary that one may not sit by without objection to rulings or instructions, and then after verdict and judgment, and when it is too late for the court to change its rulings or charge, come forward with objections on appeal and seek to put the court in error.), cited with approval in Putnam Res. v. Pateman, 958 F.2d 448, 457 n.6 (1st Cir. 1992). Meserve's objection, although delayed, was sufficiently contemporaneous to comport with the Federal Rules of Evidence. 69 The government attempts to place an additional onus on parties opposing the admission of such evidence, however, by arguing that the defense was further obligated to move to strike Kevin's answers to the government's questions in order to preserve Meserve's right to review. According to the government, once a question has been answered, even if that answer was provided pursuant to a district court's evidentiary ruling, the proper procedural vehicle to preserve rights for appeal is the motion to strike. The government was able to cite no authority for this proposition during oral argument and the court has found none. 2 70 The rule governing objections to evidence states that error may not be predicated upon a ruling which admits or excludes evidence unless a substantial right of the party is affected, and . . . [i]n case the ruling is one admitting evidence, a timely objection or motion to strike appears of record. Fed. R. Evid. 103(a)(1) (emphasis added). Because Rule 103 is written in the disjunctive, the right to review may be preserved either by objecting or by moving to strike and offering specific grounds in support of that motion. The rule is intended to ensure that the nature of an error was called to the attention of the trial judge, so as to alert him to the proper course of action and enable opposing counsel to take proper corrective measures. Fed. R. Evid. 103(a) advisory committee's note. Thus, both the plain language and underlying goals of Rule 103(a) indicate that a party opposing the admission of evidence may do so through either a timely objection or motion to strike. 3 71 Moreover, the position espoused by the government is contrary to logic. According to the government, even if a witness's answer was given pursuant to a district court's order overruling an objection, the party opposing admission of the evidence must move to strike the witness's answer to escape plain error review. Modern trial practice is unreceptive to such procedural redundancies, and were this court to adopt the government's view, it would take several steps back from the streamlining that the Judicial Conference, the Supreme Court, and the Congress attempted to accomplish through the enactment of the Federal Rules of Evidence in 1975. Because the law imposes no obligation on a party opposing the admission of evidence both to object and to move to strike, Meserve's timely objections were sufficient to preserve his rights for review. 72 In its final effort to prevent this court from reaching the merits of Meserve's claims, the government asserts that where Kevin did not answer the question posed, or where the answer elicited was arguably favorable to the defense, review is not warranted. According to the government, [n]o answer to the challenged question having been given, no evidence was admitted, and thus there is no error to correct. This position is without support in the law. 73 No court has ever held that review is forestalled if a witness does not answer a question posed or answers that question with a response favorable to the objecting party. Although the government cites two cases to support this proposition, United States v. Innamorati, 996 F.2d 456 (1st Cir. 1993) and United States v. Zaccaria, 240 F.3d 75 (1st Cir. 2001), these cases simply stand for the proposition that under such circumstances, the harmless error analysis is likely to weigh in favor of the appellee. See Innamorati, 996 F.2d at 485 (noting that because the challenged questions were not answered, the prejudicial effect of the questions was lessened); see also Zaccaria, 240 F.3d at 82-83 (holding that even if the district court erred in sustaining the objection, the error was harmless because the witness answered the question in the negative and the court did not strike his answer). 74 Even when a question elicits no answer or an answer arguably favorable to the defense, the question itself may nevertheless prejudice a defendant because of the weight a jury gives to the questions asked by a prosecutor. E.g., United States v. Simonelli, 237 F.3d 19, 23 (1st Cir. 2001) (That [the witness] denied these acts does not, of course, render the questioning harmless. There is a lingering odor left by such questions . . . .); United States v. Cudlitz, 72 F.3d 992, 999 (1st Cir. 1996) (Under these circumstances, it would have been easy -- if not strictly fair -- for the jury to have given great weight to the [government's] suggestion . . . .); see also 1 John Henry Wigmore, Wigmore on Evidence § 17 (Peter Tillers ed., 1983) [hereinafter Wigmore] ([F]acts of discreditable conduct [may be] groundlessly asked about in the hope that though denied they will be assumed by the jury to be well founded.). The law provides protection against illegitimately posed questions even where they produce no answer. 75 Furthermore, the district court's instruction to the jury here that the lawyers' questions were not evidence may not eliminate the potential taint of the government's questions. Cudlitz, 72 F.3d at 999. The instruction did not occur during the course of the challenged cross-examination, but rather as part of the court's final jury charge several hours later. The court's instruction was therefore unlikely to eradicate the impression left on the jury by the government's line of questioning. Id. ([T]he sting [of objectionable questions] survives such instructions, which is why lawyers ask impeaching questions that they know will produce denials.). 76 The government's various arguments that Meserve failed to preserve his challenges to Kevin's cross-examination for review are therefore without merit. Because timely objections to the government's cross-examination of Kevin were raised at trial and because objectionable questions may be reviewed even where they produced no answer or an arguably favorable answer, the court considers Meserve's arguments under the harmless error standard of review, not the more demanding plain error standard. United States v. Joyner, 191 F.3d 47, 53 (1st Cir. 1999).
77 Having determined that Meserve's challenges to the government's cross-examination of Kevin were properly preserved for review, the court considers the testimony to which Meserve objects, bearing in mind the following points: 78 First, the district court's construction of evidentiary rules is a question of law which we review de novo. Second, the application of an evidentiary rule to particular facts is normally tested by an abuse of discretion standard, which favors the prevailing party. Finally, we may affirm the district court's evidentiary rulings on any ground apparent from the record on appeal. 79 United States v. Barone, 114 F.3d 1284, 1296 (1st Cir. 1997) (internal quotation marks and citations omitted). 80
81 Meserve's first challenge to the government's cross-examination of Kevin is that the government's questions about Kevin's disorderly conduct and assault convictions were improper because these convictions were not permissible subjects of cross-examination under Rule 609(a). Pursuant to Federal Rule of Evidence 609(a): 82 For the purpose of attacking the credibility of a witness, 83 (1) evidence that a witness other than an accused has been convicted of a crime shall be admitted, subject to Rule 403, if the crime was punishable by . . . imprisonment in excess of one year under the law under which the witness was convicted, and evidence that an accused has been convicted of such a crime shall be admitted if the court determines that the probative value of admitting this evidence outweighs its prejudicial effect to the accused; and 84 (2) evidence that any witness has been convicted of a crime shall be admitted if it involved dishonesty or false statement, regardless of the punishment. 85 Id. Thus, the government could only inquire about Kevin's convictions for disorderly conduct and assault if the crimes were punishable by a term of imprisonment greater than one year or involved dishonesty or false statement. 86 Under Maine law, disorderly conduct is a Class E crime, Me. Rev. Stat. Ann. tit. 17-A § 501(6), punishable by a maximum term of six months, id. § 1252(2)(E), and assault is a Class D crime, id. § 207(2), punishable by a term of imprisonment less than one year, id. § 1252(2)(D). Because the sentences for these crimes do not exceed one year, Meserve argues that evidence of these crimes is per se inadmissible under Rule 609(a)(1). In opposition, the government asserts that assault is not always a misdemeanor punishable by imprisonment for less than one year in Maine; section 207(2) provides that when the perpetrator is at least eighteen years of age and the assault produced bodily injury to a child under six years of age, the crime is classified as a Class C crime, punishable by a prison term of up to five years. Id. § 207(2). 87 The record before this court does not resolve the question whether Kevin's assault conviction was for bodily injury to a child less than six, an omission for which the government blames Meserve: [I]t is Meserve's failure [to] develop a record that leaves this court with inadequate facts to resolve the issue definitively. Through this simple sentence, the government attempts to shift the burden of proving admissibility from the proponent of evidence to the party opposing the admission of the evidence. 88 It is a principle too simple to seem to need stating, however, that the government, as the party seeking to introduce evidence of a prior conviction for impeachment purposes under Rule 609, was obligated to have researched Kevin's prior offenses and to have determined that they were admissible. E.g., 1 Wigmore, supra § 17. Upon Meserve's challenge, the government should have been prepared to produce to the district court concrete proof that Kevin had been convicted of a crime punishable by more than one year within the previous ten years. Admittedly, the government may have been in possession of precisely such proof, and merely failed to produce it because the district court did not demand it upon Meserve's objection. Even so, the failure of the district court to press the government on this issue does not shift the burden to Meserve. 89 Nor do the convictions for disorderly conduct and assault introduced by the government against Kevin fall within Rule 609(a)(2), as the legislative history of the rule makes clear: 90 [T]he phrase dishonesty and false statement . . . means crimes such as perjury or subornation of perjury, false statement, criminal fraud, embezzlement, or false pretense, or any other offense in the nature of crimen falsi, the commission of which involves some element of deceit, untruthfulness, or falsification bearing on the accused's propensity to testify truthfully. 91 H.R. Conf. Rep. No. 93-1597, at 9 (1974), reprinted in 1974 U.S.C.C.A.N. 7098, 7103. To be admissible under Rule 609(a)(2), a prior conviction must involve some element of deceit, untruthfulness, or falsification which would tend to show that an accused would be likely to testify untruthfully, United States v. Seamster, 568 F.2d 188, 190 (10th Cir. 1978), elements not readily apparent in the crimes of disorderly conduct and assault. 4 92 Because the government failed to develop an adequate predicate for admitting the convictions for disorderly conduct and assault, it was error to permit interrogation concerning these convictions for the purposes of impeaching Kevin. 93
94 Meserve further argues that the questions the government posed to Kevin about being a tough guy and having [b]een in a lot of fights in [his] day were improper under Federal Rule of Evidence 608. The government counters that it was entitled to introduce evidence that Kevin had previously been involved in fights as impeachment by contradiction following Kevin's denial that he was a tough guy. 95 Pursuant to Federal Rule of Evidence 608(a): 96 The credibility of a witness may be attacked or supported by evidence in the form of opinion or reputation, but subject to these limitations: (1) the evidence may refer only to character for truthfulness or untruthfulness, and (2) evidence of truthful character is admissible only after the character of the witness for truthfulness has been attacked by opinion or reputation evidence or otherwise. 97 Id. The government's questions about Kevin's status as a tough guy and his reputation in the community for violence were completely irrelevant on the facts here to this jury's credibility determination. Even if, as suggested by the government at trial, people in the community were afraid of Kevin because he was an assaultive person, this has no bearing on Kevin's credibility as a witness, given the issues in this case. No other theory of admissibility is offered. 98 As the government's questions about Kevin being a tough guy were impermissible, they cannot serve as a launching pad for the admission of additional evidence. Moreover, the government's questions about Kevin's involvement in a couple of fights are impermissible in their own right. Under Rule 608(b): 99 Specific instances of the conduct of a witness . . . . may . . . in the discretion of the court, if probative of truthfulness or untruthfulness, be inquired into on cross-examination of the witness . . . concerning the witness' character for truthfulness or untruthfulness . . . . 100 Id. The specific instances of prior conduct about which the government questioned Kevin bore no relation whatsoever to his character for truthfulness or untruthfulness. As Meserve correctly states, the government wanted to suggest, and succeeded in suggesting, that Kevin was a man with a violent disposition. 101