Opinion ID: 507209
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Evidence of Prior Act

Text: 4 The victim in the present case, a seven-year old girl at the time of the incident, testified that she had sexual intercourse with the defendant on June 24, 1984. That act formed the basis for the present charge. On redirect examination, she was allowed to testify, over objection, that on Thanksgiving Day in 1983 she also had sexual intercourse with Chavez. As indicated, the state trial judge overruled Chavez' objections to this particular testimony, and the appellate courts of New Mexico affirmed. Admission of this evidence is the first ground urged by Chavez in his petition for habeas corpus. 5 Our task is not to determine whether the admission of testimony concerning a prior act by Chavez with the victim is in accord with New Mexico state law. That has already been decided by the New Mexico courts. We are only concerned with whether the admission of this testimony impinged on rights secured Chavez by the Constitution. 6 State court rulings on the admissibility of evidence may not be questioned in federal habeas corpus proceedings unless they render the trial so fundamentally unfair as to constitute a denial of federal constitutional rights. See Brinlee v. Crisp, 608 F.2d 839, 850 (10th Cir.1979). In Brinlee, we held that the admission of testimony regarding several other acts, some of which were rather remotely related, at best, to the charge on which Brinlee was being tried, was not a basis for federal habeas corpus relief. Unlike Brinlee, the single other act in the instant case is related to the act which formed the basis for the present indictment, i.e., it was of a similar nature and perpetrated on the same victim. We find no fundamental unfairness in the admission of this evidence.