Opinion ID: 1812000
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Lay Opinion Testimony Concerning Community Standards

Text: If the witness had answered the questions to which objections were sustained, he would have been stating his opinion. Opinion evidence is generally not admissible (although the exceptions and its flexible application have much eroded this general rule). La.R.S. 15:463; see McCormick's Handbook of the Law of Evidence, Section 11 (2d ed. 1972); Wigmore on Evidence, Sections 1917-18 (Chadbourn rev. 1978). This general rule has been justified on the ground that a witness must not be allowed to usurp the function of the jury by drawing inferences from his sense perceptions, rather than reporting the sense perceptions themselves. McCormick, Section 1920. However, there is no bright line between opinion and fact; rather, there are varying degrees to which a witness will summarize his factual sense perceptions when testifying. See State v. Garner, 255 La. 115, 229 So.2d 719 (1969) (witness's identification of a substance he saw as blood held to be statement of fact); Pugh, Louisiana Evidence Law 143-44 (1974) ( Garner criticized on the ground that identification of blood requires an inference from sense perceptions); Wigmore, Section 1919. At its best, the rule against lay opinion testimony operates to exclude evidence which, although relevant, is superfluous. The witness should testify from his first-hand knowledge, in as much detail as the trial judge in his discretion feels appropriate. [3] Nevertheless, as Wigmore, McCormick, and Pugh indicate, the opinion rule should not be applied so strictly as to exclude first-hand testimony that may be several inferences removed from raw sense perceptions, yet more helpful to the jury than mere recitation of such perceptions. The major recognized exception to the rule excluding opinion testimony is the expert opinion rule. La.R.S. 15:464 provides: On questions involving a knowledge obtained only by means of a special training or experience the opinions of persons having such special knowledge are admissible as expert testimony. Expert testimony is admitted because the expert is uniquely skilled at drawing inferences. His conclusions from real or hypothetical data are more helpful to the jury than the data themselves, without the conclusions. The jury retains the right and power to accept or reject his conclusions. The Louisiana expert testimony statute follows the commentators in recognizing that not only special training but also experience can qualify an individual as an expert on certain matters. Thus, for instance, a person who had driven automobiles and observed their speed over a period of time was permitted to testify as to his opinion of the relative speed of a particular car on a particular occasion. Fidelity & Casualty Co. of N. Y. v. Aetna Life and Casualty Co., 244 So.2d 255 (La.App.3d Cir. 1971); Wigmore, Section 1977. The jurors themselves could presumably have formed an opinion of the car's speed had they themselves been present; and they could form such an opinion if the witness would recount accurately, split-second by split-second, the data from which he drew his opinion of the car's speed. In this instance, however, his opinion is less time-consuming, less confusing, and probably more reliable than his memory of his sense perceptions. Similarly, when a witness testifies to the reputation that an individual has in the community, see La.R.S. 15:479, he is summarizing an inference from myriad individual conversations he has had with members of the community, some of which he may not even remember in detail: he is, in effect, giving his opinion of what people think of the individual. See State v. Frentz, 354 So.2d 1007 (La.1978). Community standards are clearly relevant to an obscenity conviction. La. R.S. 14:106 defines as obscene material that which the average person applying contemporary community standards would find appeals to the prurient interest. How are such standards to be proven? Relevant expert testimony may be admissible to prove community standards. Kaplan v. California, 417 U.S. 115, 121, 97 S.Ct. 2680, 2685, 37 L.Ed.2d 492 (1973); Schauer, The Law of Obscenity 276-91 (1976). With regard to proof by lay evidence, it is theoretically possible to call as witnesses a statistically significant sample of a communitysay, a thousand personsand to demonstrate that these persons had been selected in such a way as to guarantee a cross-section. This, however, would be impractical. However, it might also be possible for an individual witness to testify concerning numerous of his personal experiences in the community, from which the jury might infer a community standard. However, like a witness' testimony about the reputation of another (cf. State v. Frentz , cited above, at 354 So.2d 1011), it is much more practical to permit a witness to summarize and draw inferences from his numerous experiences, which might in themselves seem trivial and cumulative. See, e. g., State v. Henry, 250 La. 682, 198 So.2d 889 (1967); reversed on other grounds, Henry v. Louisiana, 392 U.S. 655, 88 S.Ct. 2274, 20 L.Ed.2d 1343 (1967). Generally, therefore, community standards should be regarded as one of those facts, like speed and reputation, on which a qualified lay witnessqualified by experience rather than by trainingmay give his opinion. However, the party wishing to offer such opinion evidence must first demonstrate that the witness is in fact qualified to give an opinion. Moreover, since the jurors, who are likely to be residents of the same general community, are themselves more capable of drawing inferences of community standards than, for instance, of the speed of an automobile they have not seen, or of the reputation of an individual of whom they have not heard, the trial judge in his discretion may feel that a greater threshold showing of qualification is necessary. In State v. Henry, 250 La. 682, 198 So.2d 889 (1967), we upheld the trial judge's admission of opinion testimony from a banker and a priest regarding community standards. Both witnesses had been questioned about their backgrounds, contacts, and experiences in the community, and it would have been difficult to find another so well qualified to express an opinion as to the `average person' in the community. 198 So.2d at 894-95. In contrast, the witness here was asked only about his experiences in bookstores selling sexually-oriented literature. This qualified him only to testify about the practices of these establishmentsnot to give his opinions about community attitudes in general. If a proper predicate had been laid, by asking the witness about his life in the community and about his experiences outside sexually-oriented bookstores, perhaps he would have been a qualified witness notwithstanding the fact that he was the defendant's son and co-worker. Nevertheless, in the absence of an attempt so to establish his qualifications, we find no reversible abuse by the trial court in exercising its discretion to exclude the witness's opinions because of the insufficiency of the predicate shown for them.