Opinion ID: 1846260
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 11

Heading: whether there was a denial of the right to present a defense.

Text: ¶ 166. Kolberg wanted to call his brother, sister, and wife as witnesses to testify on the question of how [Kolberg] was with children. Over the State's objection, the trial court ruled that such testimony would be permissible under Miss. R. Evid. 404(a)(1). After this ruling by the trial judge, the following motion arguments were heard outside the presence of the jury: MR. SMITH: Your Honor, and on that I would make a motion in limine, Your Honor, that the state not be permitted to explore issues such as whether Mr. Kolberg paid child support, which was done at the last trial. THE COURT: I would overrule that because character, if you vouch for his character, then they are certainly entitled to go into those areas which indicate bad character. MR. SMITH: But the thing about it, Judge, is they could do it if perhaps there was any factual basis for it. We have certified copies of all of Mr. Kolberg's child support payments, and he was way ahead of paying his child support at the time he was arrested. Now Dawn Kolberg at the last trial testified that, in fact, he was behind on child support, but that was in 1990 after he had been locked up two years. Soand he wasn't actually served with papers about child support nonpayment until he was up at Parchman. THE COURT: Well MR. DE GRUY: An additional point on that, Your Honor, we are introducing a pertinent trait. We are not introducing his entire character. Nonpayment of child support is not the same thing as violence or abuse to children, or otherwise. THE COURT: Mr. De Gruy, I don't think you can open the issue of character and then close the door on the state bringing out evidence on the same issue. It isthe fact that you are asking narrow questions doesn't restrict the state's ability to go into other areas of the defendant's character once you put that question at issue. So I am going to allow the testimony. I feel like the rules clearly require that I do so. But the motion in limine would be overruled. MR. SMITH: So the Court's ruling is if we put those witnesses up there they can be impeached at least by questions about whether he was behind on child support payment? THE COURT: Yes, sir. MR. SMITH: In light of that ruling, Your Honor, and I think the casethis is off the top of my head United States v. Cross. We are not going to call them, but we would like to proffer what their testimony would be. THE COURT: All right. MR. SMITH: And their testimony would be basically from both Gary and Katie that Bryan was lenient with children and various instances and examples over the years of him being good with kids and the fact that he never abused them. And then we would mark for identification the aspects of Dawn Kolberg's testimonywe will mark this as defense Exhibit 68. That we would expect to present and the ones we would present ... are essentially the ones that are highlighted. Kolberg now asserts this ruling denied him the right to present a defense because evidence of non-payment of child support was not relevant to his non-violent character with his own children. He also tells us this ruling was unfair because he could not pay child support because he had been in jail, and explaining that to the jury would further prejudic[e] Appellant's rights. ¶ 167. Under Miss. R. Evid. 404(a)(1), Kolberg was allowed to present evidence of his character as being good with his own children. However, as appropriate ruled by the trial judge, once Kolberg introduced that testimony, then, pursuant to Miss. R. Evid. 404(a)(1) evidence of his character or trait of character could be introduced by the prosecution to rebut the same. Consequently, Kolberg was not denied the right to present his defense, because the trial judge ruled he could call the three witnesses to testify. Kolberg elected not to call these witnesses so as not to open the door to this evidence. This assignment of error is without merit.
¶ 168. After the State questioned Dr. Vise during its rebuttal, counsel for Kolberg attempted to question Dr. Vise regarding his view that all of the defense expert witnesses had been paid big money and were simply hired guns. The State's objection to this question was sustained, and Kolberg now asserts this prevented him from showing Dr. Vise's bias. ¶ 169. The record reflects that this question occurred during defense counsel's cross-examination of Dr. Vise in the State's rebuttal. During the State's direct examination of Dr. Vise in its rebuttal, nothing close to this testimony was elicited. Dr. Vise had already testified in the State's case in chief, and defense counsel's cross-examination of Dr. Vise in the State's case in chief consumed 116 pages of the transcript. Thus, by the trial court's sustaining the State's objection to defense counsel's question posed to Dr. Vise on cross-examination during the State's rebuttal, it can hardly be said that Kolberg was prevented from showing any perceived bias on the part of Dr. Vise. ¶ 170. Kolberg also complains that the State's objection was sustained to his question about a grandmother not being charged with child abuse because she had the event on video tape. We agree with the State that this question was beyond the scope of redirect, and this assignment of error is also without merit. ¶ 171. Finally, Kolberg complains that he was not allowed to prove the unreliability of evidence relied on by the State. This claim again involves Kolberg's attempt to impeach Dr. Galvez. Again, Dr. Galvez was not a witness at this trial, did not testify at this trial, and Kolberg again attempted to rely on and elicit hearsay. This assignment of error is without merit.