Opinion ID: 206447
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Officer Good Voice Flute's Observation

Text: At trial, White Calf objected to Officer Good Voice Flute's testimony that, at the time of her arrest, L.R.F. looked pretty small; didn't look like she was 19 and looked like a grade schooler. White Calf characterizes Officer Good Voice Flute's opinion as irrelevant and extremely prejudicial. White Calf opines it shed no light on [White Calf's] reasonable belief about [L.R.F.]'s age and only misled the jury due to the fact [the opinion] came from a police officer. White Calf emphasizes the prosecutor exploited Officer Good Voice Flute's testimony twice in her closing argument. The district court did not abuse its discretion. Fed.R.Evid. 701 allows a non-expert witness to express an opinion rationally based on the perception of the witness which is helpful to . . . the determination of a fact in issue. White Calf's § 2243(c)(1) defense required the jury to decide whether White Calf reasonably believed L.R.F. was at least 16 years old. The perceptions of L.R.F.'s appearance by anyone who saw her on the night in question were probative of that fact. United States v. Yazzie, 976 F.2d 1252, 1255-56 (9th Cir.1992), is instructive. In Yazzie, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals analyzed Fed.R.Evid. 701 and reversed a district court's exclusion of lay testimony regarding age in a § 2243 prosecution. Yazzie, 976 F.2d at 1255-56. The Ninth Circuit provided five reasons why the evidence was admissible. Id. First, the jurors could not themselves assess how old the minor looked at the time of the incident. Id. at 1255. Second, it is . . . difficult to put into words why one believes that a person is one age and not the other, as one's reasons for concluding that a person is a particular age are both too complex and too indefinable to set out fully. Id. at 1255-56. Third, a witness may not know, let alone be able to report precisely, what factors induced his or her conclusion, so the fact that the witness reached the conclusion is the important part of the testimony, not the largely undeterminable or inexplicable reasons that prompted the conclusion. Id. at 1256. Fourth, age is a matter on which everyone has an opinion, and [i]t is therefore particularly appropriate for a lay witness to express an opinion on the subject. Fifth, the witnesses' opinions were especially appropriate in a § 2243 prosecution where the defendant asserts a mistake-of-age defense, because [i]t is relevant that others having a similar opportunity to observe the minor formed an opinion as to her age that was similar to the opinion the defendant claimed to have formed. Id. Their testimony goes both to [the defendant]'s credibility and to the reasonableness of his belief. Id. All of these considerations, which supported reversal in Yazzie, support affirming the district court's admission of Officer Good Voice Flute's opinion regarding L.R.F.'s age. United States v. Enterline, 894 F.2d 287, 288-91 (8th Cir.1990), which White Calf cites for the proposition that a law enforcement officer's testimony about matters observed at the scene of a crime is inherently suspect and must be excluded, is inapposite. In Enterline, we merely held that an FBI agent's testimony about the contents of a computer printout, which indicated vehicles on the defendant's property had been reported stolen, was admissible under the public records exception to hearsay rule, Fed.R.Evid. 803(8)(B). Enterline does not compel a result contrary to Yazzie or contrary to the district court's reasonable exercise of its discretion to admit the officer's perception of L.R.F.'s appearance and age on June 30, 2008.