Opinion ID: 2374546
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Appropriateness as rebuttal testimony

Text: Mylon argues that the Demers testimony went beyond the scope of proper rebuttal. Rebuttal evidence is evidence which contravenes, antagonizes, confutes, or controls `the inference sought to be drawn by new facts introduced by the adverse party at the next previous stage'. Payson v. Bombardier, Ltd., 435 A.2d 411, 413 (Me.1981), quoting Emery v. Fisher, 128 Me. 124, 125, 145 A. 747, 747 (1929). Demers' testimony tended clearly to refute and contradict the testimony of Mylon that the had had nothing to drink after 6:00 p.m. the evening before the fatal collision. It was well within the range of the trial judge's discretion to allow Demers to give his expert opinion in rebuttal. [A]n appellate court will pay considerable deference to the judge's determination of what constitutes proper rebuttal, taking into account the fact that he alone has the opportunity to assess the evidence with the benefit of having heard the testimony sought to be rebutted and of observing the way it went in before the jury. Payson v. Bombardier, Ltd., 435 A.2d at 413. Of course, otherwise proper rebuttal testimony may be excluded, under M.R. Evid. 403, if its probative value is substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice, confusion of the issues, or misleading the jury, or by considerations of undue delay or waste of time. But admission of the Demers testimony against any Rule 403 objection was itself a judgment call, reviewed only for clear abuse of discretion. See State v. Stack, 441 A.2d 673, 676 (Me.1982). In permitting this rebuttal evidence, the justice presiding at Mylon's trial committed no error. In State v. Collin, 441 A.2d 693 (Me. 1982), the trial judge had excluded very similar opinion testimony by the same Patrick Demers that was offered by the defense to cast doubt on the validity of an intoxilyzer test result presented by the State; this court found no reversible error in the exclusion of the similar evidence. In Collin, the evidence failed to link up the proffered Demers opinion about an average person to that particular defendant, thus greatly diminish[ing] the probative value of the evidence sought by defense counsel. Id. at 695. Disregarding that shortcoming, which was avoided by the State in the Mylon trial, the Collin case and the present Mylon case illustrate well the breadth of the trial judge's discretion in doing the judgmental balancing required by Rule 403. On sets of facts that appear identical for all that the appellate records can reveal, one judge may admit the proffered evidence, while another judge may exclude it; and yet it may well be that neither will have committed any reversible error. An appellate court will find no error on the part of either, in absence of a clear showing of an abuse of discretion.