Opinion ID: 1958968
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Testimony Regarding Hollowpoint Bullets.

Text: The last question that we consider has to do with the reason why defendant voluntarily gave his gun to the police a few days after the murder, without ever being asked to do so. The State at trial sought to prove a motive for the surrender of defendant's weapon that would be inculpatory rather than exculpatory. It produced testimony that defendant had repeatedly told his daughter's boyfriend that he believed that hollowpoint bullets could not be traced to any particular gun. The State also provided an expert witness who testified that the spent bullet found in the victim's house must have been fired from defendant's gun and, although it was so damaged that he could not tell if it was a hollowpoint bullet, it was perfectly consistent in weight and configuration with the hollowpoint bullets found in defendant's house. Defendant argues that the testimony of both the boyfriend and the expert should have been excluded at trial as irrelevant. He says that hollowpoint bullets cannot be connected either to himself or to the murder, and that therefore any testimony concerning them or his belief about them is not relevant to any issue in the case. Again, the record does not support defendant's contention. A State Police detective discovered a partial box of .38 caliber bullets in defendant's home. He thought that there were nine bullets in the box. He gave the box to the State's ballistics expert, who produced it at trial and identified the bullets as being of the hollowpoint variety. It was thus established that defendant had hollowpoint bullets in his house. The fact that at trial the box turned out to contain ten rather than nine bullets shows merely that someone made a mistake in counting, and does not affect the fact that the bullets that were there were found in defendant's house and fitted his gun. The ballistics expert's testimony was relevant to the question whether the bullet that killed Maxine Eaton was a hollowpoint bullet that had come from the box in defendant's house. The hollowpoint bullets were thus connected both to defendant and to the scene of the crime. The Superior Court did not err in admitting the challenged testimony relating to them. The entry is: Judgment vacated. Remanded for further proceedings consistent with the opinion herein. All concurring.