Opinion ID: 1551187
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Height Demonstration

Text: The defendant next challenges the denial of his request that he be allowed to stand up in the courtroom and demonstrate his height to the jury. The trial court ruled that the demonstration was inadmissible on relevancy grounds. The defendant argues that the identity of the assailants, and, specifically, the height disparity between them, was a relevant physical characteristic that was admissible at trial. All evidence must be relevant to be admissible. N.H.R. Ev. 402. Evidence is relevant if it has any tendency to make the existence of any fact that is of consequence to the determination of the action more probable or less probable than it would be without the evidence. N.H.R. Ev. 401. Relevancy determinations are within the sound discretion of the trial court, and we will not overturn such determinations absent an unsustainable exercise of discretion. State v. Yates, 152 N.H. 245, 249, 876 A.2d 176 (2005). To demonstrate that the trial court exercised unsustainable discretion, the defendant must show that the ruling was clearly untenable or unreasonable to the prejudice of his case. Id. At trial, the victim testified that there was a height disparity between the two assailants and that the assailant with the tattoo was shorter than the other. On cross-examination, defense counsel attempted to elicit testimony regarding the specific height of each assailant. The victim, however, consistently described the assailants in terms of their height relative to each other. While the defendant alleges that his height was a fact of consequence in this case, it was of consequence only as it compared to the height of the second assailant, who was not present at trial. Therefore, the trial court reasonably found that having the defendant stand up and demonstrate his actual height to the jury had no tendency to make the existence of the height disparity between the two assailants any more or less probable. Accordingly, we find that the trial court's determination that the height demonstration was inadmissible was neither untenable nor unreasonable.