Opinion ID: 1351466
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Admissibility of the Evidence at the Rebuttal Phase

Text: (12) Defendant next contends that evidence of his false alibi, even if admissible, is a material part of the prosecutor's case, and therefore cannot be introduced during the rebuttal phase. As this court stated in People v. Carter (1957) 48 Cal.2d 737, 753 [312 P.2d 665], rebuttal testimony, as defined in former section 1093, subdivision (d), does not include a material part of the case in the prosecution's possession that tends to establish the defendant's commission of the crime. The reasons for this rule were threefold: to assure an orderly presentation of evidence so that the trier of fact will not be confused; to prevent a party from unduly magnifying certain evidence by dramatically introducing it late in the trial; and to avoid any unfair surprise that may result when a party who thinks he has met his opponent's case is suddenly confronted at the end of trial with an additional piece of crucial evidence. (48 Cal.2d at p. 753.) We find in this case, however, that no error was committed. The statement relating to defendant's knocking on the door of Charles Smart's and Paula Struppa's house was sufficiently related to the main thrust of the rebuttal evidence  the circumstances under which defendant claimed he received his leg injuries, as a means of discrediting Dr. Rappaport's testimony  to be permitted on rebuttal. Moreover, even if the one statement inadvertently played by the prosecutor  in which defendant states that he did in fact knock on his friends' front door  should have been excluded, the properly admitted evidence would still have revealed defendant's fabricated alibi. The admission of that one additional statement told the jury nothing it did not already know, and therefore was not prejudicial.