Opinion ID: 1665225
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Identification Witnesses

Text: Ibar's first two claims involve the testimony of Roxana Peguera, Marlene Vindel, Maria Casas, Jean Klimeczko, Ian Milman, Melissa Munroe, and Tanya Quiñones. He argues that the prior identifications of the defendant by Peguera, Vindel, Casas, Klimeczko, Milman, and Munroe should not have been admitted as substantive evidence. In addition, Ibar contends that these witnesses as well as Quinones were called as witnesses simply for the purpose of impeachment. The State contends the prior identifications by these witnesses were properly admitted under section 90.801(2)(c), Florida Statutes (1999). The State also argues that the defendant did not object to the six witnesses based on the theories now being advanced and therefore the issues have not been preserved for appellate review. The record reflects that the defense did object to the identification evidence in question being used as substantive evidence, but did not object to these six witnesses on the basis of being called as witnesses simply for the purpose of impeachment. During the investigation, police showed these witnesses a photograph created from the video surveillance tape taken at the victim's home. The witnesses testified at trial that when they were initially shown the photo, they identified the person in the photo as Ibar or someone who resembled Ibar. In an attempt to show that the initial identifications were more definite, the State then called police investigators to testify that these six witnesses had actually confirmed the identity of the person in the photo as Ibar. The investigators' testimonies were not admitted as impeachment, however; they were admitted as substantive evidence under section 90.801(2)(c), Florida Statutes (1999). We agree with the defendant that the prior identifications testified to by the officers should not have been admitted as substantive evidence under section 90.801(2)(c). Section 90.801(2)(c) provides as follows: (2) A statement is not hearsay if the declarant testifies at the trial or hearing and is subject to cross-examination concerning the statement and the statement is: . . . . (c) One of identification of a person made after perceiving the person. This statutory provision has been interpreted by a number of courts as involving statements of identification made by a witness to or victim of a crime or event. This interpretation of the statute gives meaning to the wording of the statute and its use of the term perceiving and is in keeping with the interpretation given to the statute by a number of our district courts of appeal. The Fourth District Court of Appeal in Stanford v. State, 576 So. 2d 737 (Fla. 4th DCA 1991), addressed the meaning and intent of section 90.801(2)(c). In Stanford, the trial court allowed the victim's daughter and another person to testify concerning out-of-court statements the victim made to them which included the victim naming the defendant as her assailant. The trial court allowed these statements as substantive evidence under section 90.801(2)(c), that is, statements of identification made after perceiving a person. In disagreeing with the trial court on this point, the district court said: We believe that the typical situation contemplated by the code and the case law is one where the victim sees the assailant shortly after the criminal episode and says, that's the man. Hence, the phrase identification of a person made after perceiving him refers to the witness seeing a person after the criminal episode and identifying that person as the offender. We do not believe this code provision was intended to allow other out-of-court statements by a witness to others naming the person that the witness believes committed the crime. To extend the rule that far would permit countless repetitions by a witness to others, regardless of time and place, of the witnesses' belief as to the guilty party, a result we do not believe intended by the drafters of the rule. Id. at 739-40 (footnote omitted); see also State v. Richards, 843 So. 2d 962 (Fla. 3d DCA 2003); Simmons v. State, 782 So. 2d 1000 (Fla. 4th DCA 2001). This interpretation of the statute has continued and formed the basis of the Second District Court of Appeal's decision in Smith v. State, 880 So. 2d 730 (Fla. 2d DCA 2004). In Smith, the Second District addressed the identical statutory provision in a situation involving witnesses to the criminal episode. At Smith's trial the State presented the testimony of several witnesses who were present in the Charleston Park neighborhood of Lee County, Florida, on the night Timmie Ray Mabry was killed. Three of the witnesses, Chad Moreland, Iris Moreland, and Jason Kafus, had given prior recorded statements to the police, and in those statements had either said they saw defendant Smith shoot the victim or saw him running with the gun shortly after the shooting. The three had also said they heard Smith say he had shot someone. However, at trial, Chad Moreland said he did not see Smith with a weapon and did not hear Smith make any incriminating statement. Iris Moreland, Chad's sister, stated at trial that she was not at the scene of the shooting and did not hear Smith make any statement. Jason Kafus testified that he was not at the scene when the shooting occurred and that he did not recall giving a statement to police. As a result of this trial testimony, the State was allowed to call as a witness Detective Jeff Brown, the lead investigator in the case. Detective Brown had interviewed a number of witnesses in the case, including the Morelands and Kafus, and he identified the tape-recorded statements of each. The tapes were then played to the jury in their entireties. The tapes were allowed in as substantive evidence under the recorded recollection exception to the hearsay rule. The defendant was convicted of the lesser crime of manslaughter with a firearm and shooting into an occupied vehicle. On appeal and after determining that the tape recordings did not satisfy the requirements of recorded recollection, the Second District addressed the State's argument that the tape recordings were admissible as substantive evidence under section 90.801(2)(c). In holding that only portions of the statements were admissible as substantive evidence of identification, the Second District quoted with approval a line of cases including Stanford that discussed the admissibility of evidence under section 90.801(2)(c). The cases relied on and cited by the court involved a variety of out-of-court identifications from lineups, photopaks, and showups. These cases also have one feature in commonthe person whose out-of-court identification was at issue was either a victim of or a witness to the criminal episode. For example, in Lewis v. State, 777 So. 2d 452 (Fla. 4th DCA 2001), the victim of a carjacking described his assailant to the police. [3] A short time later, the defendant was taken to the location where the victim was, and the victim identified him. At trial, the victim was unable to identify the defendant as his assailant. Over objection, the police officer was allowed to testify concerning the prior identification. On appeal the Fourth District affirmed and found the identification admissible under section 90.801(2)(c) as a statement of identification made after perceiving the defendant. The court went on to opine that one of the principles applicable to the admission of this type of identification as substantive evidence is the inherent reliability of identifications made shortly after the crime. See also A.E.B. v. State, 818 So. 2d 534 (Fla. 2d DCA 2002) (finding admissible under section 90.801(2)(c) an out-of-court identification made by a witness who saw the juvenile approach the victim's house and go into the backyard); Ferreira v. State, 692 So. 2d 264 (Fla. 5th DCA 1997) (finding admissible the eyewitness out-of-court identification of the defendant from a photographic lineup one week after the murder); Brown v. State, 413 So. 2d 414 (Fla. 5th DCA 1982) (finding admissible the victim's out-of-court statement of identification despite the fact that the victim testified at trial that he was mistaken in his prior identification). Without discussing the perimeters of section 90.801(2)(c), this Court in Evans v. State, 838 So. 2d 1090 (Fla. 2002), found admissible the out-of-court statements of identification made by two eyewitnesses to a shooting. While other courts, most notably the federal courts, have under similarly worded statutes found admissible statements of identification made by persons other than victims and witnesses to the crime, we believe the view espoused by our district courts will better serve the ends of justice. To expand the rule to allow as substantive evidence an out-of-court identification made by anyone who sees or is shown a picture of the defendant could result in the defendant being convicted through the testimony of persons who have no relationship or connection to the criminal offense. As the Stanford court also opined, expansion of the rule could lead to an endless repetition of out-of-court identifications. Although Ian Milman's prior testimony concerning identification was not admissible as substantive evidence under section 90.801(2)(c), it was admissible as substantive evidence under section 90.801(2)(a). Section 90.801(2)(a) provides that an out-of-court statement is not hearsay if the declarant, in this case Milman, testifies at the trial and is subject to cross-examination about the statement. In addition, the prior statement must be made under oath at a trial, hearing, or other proceeding or in a deposition. Lastly, the prior statement must be inconsistent with the declarant's present testimony. Milman testified at Ibar's second trial that he was shown photos and initialed them just to show that he looked at them. Milman said that the man in the still photo was not Ibar; he indicated that he never said the person was Ibar and had never said it was Ibar at the grand jury proceeding. Detective Paul Manzella testified that Milman positively identified Ibar. The State impeached Milman using the grand jury transcript. The trial judge dismissed the jury from the courtroom and then discussed Milman's prior grand jury testimony with the parties. The judge pointed to the language in Milman's grand jury testimony that specifically contradicted his trial testimony. Thus, the trial judge was within his discretion in determining that Milman's identification of Ibar was admissible as substantive evidence. See Johnston v. State, 863 So. 2d 271 (Fla. 2003) (holding that a trial judge's ruling on the admissibility of evidence will not be disturbed on appeal absent an abuse of discretion). We also find that Melissa Munroe's prior identification statement was also admissible as substantive evidence under section 90.801(2)(a). Munroe was living with Penalver at the time of the crime. She had previously told police that the man in the still photo resembled Ibar and she signed the back of the photo. At trial, the State questioned Munroe about whether she had seen Penalver and Ibar the weekend of the murders. Munroe said she did not remember when she had seen them together, but that it could have been a month or two before she read about the murders in the newspaper. The State attempted to impeach Munroe with her previous grand jury testimony. Munroe explained that what she previously told the grand jury was not inconsistent with her trial testimony because the police initially manipulated her statements. She explained that she just continued to go along with what the police initially wrote in their report. As with Milman, the trial judge deemed Munroe a turncoat witness. With this finding, the judge allowed Munroe's prior testimony to be admitted for its truth under section 90.801(2)(a). Statements made under oath include those statements made at grand jury proceedings. See State v. Green, 667 So. 2d 756, 759 (Fla. 1995). At trial, the prosecutor showed Munroe the same photos that had been shown to her at the grand jury proceeding and asked her to indicate whether the person in the photos looked like Ibar. When Munroe said no, the prosecutor then read from Munroe's 1994 grand jury testimony, which stated that the persons in the photos looked like Ibar and Penalver. Munroe's trial testimony is inconsistent with her prior grand jury testimony. The grand jury testimony is therefore admissible for its substantive value as an exception to the hearsay rule under section 90.801(2)(a). The trial judge did not abuse his discretion in admitting Munroe's prior identification as substantive evidence. Although the trial judge erred in allowing several of the identification statements to be considered as substantive evidence, we find the error harmless. See State v. DiGuilio, 491 So. 2d 1129 (Fla. 1986). In DiGuilio, we explained that the State, as the beneficiary of any error, must demonstrate beyond a reasonable doubt that the complained-of errors did not contribute to the verdict. That is to say, the State must prove that there is no reasonable possibility that the error contributed to the conviction. Id. at 1135 (citing Chapman v. California, 386 U.S. 18 (1967)). A close examination of the evidence presented in this case, both the properly admitted and the inadmissible evidence, demonstrates the harmlessness of the error in this instance. In addition to the statements of Peguera, Vindel, Casas, and Klimeczko identifying Ibar, which Ibar concedes was proper as impeachment evidence but not substantive evidence, there were other witnesses and items of evidence from which the jury could conclude that Ibar was one of the perpetrators of this triple homicide. First, there was a videotape of the murders. The perpetrator identified as Ibar removed his disguise and his face was visible on the videotape. This videotape was played for the jury. Gary Foy, one of Sucharski's neighbors, testified that he saw two men leaving in Sucharski's Mercedes-Benz. He stated that he did not get a good look at the driver of the car, but he got a good look at the passenger. Foy identified Ibar as the passenger in the Mercedes. Klimeczko testified that at some point both Penalver and Ibar came to the residence on Lee Street in a big, black, shiny new car. Although Milman denied that he had ever positively identified Ibar as the person in the still photograph made from the videotape, he did say that the person in the photograph resembled Ibar. Moreover, the trial judge admitted as substantive evidence Milman's grand jury testimony in which he positively identified Ibar. Munroe's statement placing Ibar and Penalver together during the weekend of the murder was also admitted as substantive evidence. On the issue of identification, the jury also heard evidence from Kimberly San and David Phillips that placed Ibar and Penalver in the Mercedes. Both Peguera and her mother testified that the person in the photograph resembled Ibar. We conclude that any error in admitting some of these identification statements as substantive evidence rather than as impeachment evidence was harmless error. DiGuilio, 491 So. 2d at 1135. We agree with the State that the defendant's claim that the witnesses were called for the sole purpose of impeaching their testimony is not a matter that has been preserved for appellate review because there was no objection made on this basis in the trial court. See Steinhorst v. State, 412 So. 2d 332, 338 (Fla. 1982) ([I]n order for an argument to be cognizable on appeal, it must be the specific contention asserted as legal ground for objection, exception, or motion below.). Moreover, while parts of these witnesses' testimonies were impeached, there was other evidence gleaned from these witnesses that was not impeached and was used by the State to put together the various pieces of evidence that linked Ibar to these murders.