Opinion ID: 2276112
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Reference to Appellant's probation status.

Text: The trial court made a pre-trial ruling pursuant to KRE 404(b) and KRE 103(d) to exclude evidence of Appellant's parole violation and a warrant for his arrest on unrelated charges. Nonetheless, two witnesses made unsolicited comments that Appellant was on probation. [3] In each instance, Appellant's motion for a mistrial was denied. He claims that this amounts to reversible error. We disagree. In describing their encounter following the shootings, Lester Baker testified, Like I told him, you know, we were both on probation, and theoretically, we weren't supposed to even be together. Though overruling Appellant's motion for a mistrial, the trial court offered to admonish the jury to disregard that portion of Baker's testimony. Defense counsel rejected the offer, explaining that the admonition would only highlight and underline the impermissible testimony. While testifying on direct examination by the Commonwealth concerning the circumstances that prompted the police to search for Appellant as a suspect in the shootings, Lieutenant Mark Barnard of the Lexington Police Department testified, At that time we knew he had a probation violation. Again, the trial court denied Appellant's motion for a mistrial and offered to admonish the jury to disregard the testimony. Again, Appellant declined the court's offer. A mistrial is unwarranted absent a manifest or real necessity for such an extraordinary remedy. Grundy v. Commonwealth, Ky., 25 S.W.3d 76, 82 (2000) (internal quotations omitted). This high standard results from the presumption that an admonition can cure a defect in testimony. Alexander v. Commonwealth, Ky., 862 S.W.2d 856, 859 (1993), overruled on other grounds by Stringer v. Commonwealth, Ky., 956 S.W.2d 883, 891 (1997). See also Price v. Commonwealth, Ky., 59 S.W.3d 878, 881 (2001). The presumption is overcome in only two situations: (1) when an overwhelming probability exists that the jury is incapable of following the admonition and a strong likelihood exists that the impermissible evidence would be devastating to the defendant; or (2) when the question was not premised on a factual basis and was `inflammatory' or `highly prejudicial.' Johnson v. Commonwealth, Ky., 105 S.W.3d 430, 441 (2003) (citations omitted). This standard is the same where the movant waives the protections of an admonition due to oversight or as a matter of trial strategy. If an admonition is offered in response to a timely objection but rejected by the aggrieved party as insufficient, the only question on appeal is whether the admonition would have cured the alleged error. Graves v. Commonwealth, Ky., 17 S.W.3d 858, 865 (2000) (no error in refusing to grant mistrial because admission of impermissible evidence could have been cured by an admonition, which defendant did not request). Applying the first exception set forth in Johnson, it would be tenuous to conclude that the jury was incapable of ignoring such brief and undetailed remarks regarding Appellant's probation, and even more tenuous to conclude that they were devastating to his defense. See, e.g., Kinser v. Commonwealth, Ky., 741 S.W.2d 648, 653 (1987) (admonition sufficient to cure police testimony that he knew enough about the case to think that [the defendants] had possibly committed this murder). The second exception is inapplicable as well. Both remarks were unsolicited (one was elicited during Appellant's cross-examination of the witness), so the requirement that the impermissible testimony originate from a question lacking a factual basis is unmet. Also, because the jury could have assumed that Appellant was on probation for any number of relatively minor crimes, the testimony was not inflammatory; both references to Appellant's probation lacked any description of the underlying offense. Johnson, supra, at 441, 113 S.Ct. 2658 (admonition sufficient to cure prosecutor's reference to defendant's guilty plea where no reference was made to the underlying offense and the jury could have assumed Appellant pled guilty to a speeding violation). The jury could also have assumed that Appellant was on probation for a drug-related conviction, which would not have prejudiced him, because his own audiotaped statement, which was played to the jury, contained numerous references to his illegal drug use. There was no manifest necessity warranting a mistrial.