Opinion ID: 2251591
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Exclusion of Evidence of Mistaken Identification

Text: Appellant argues that the trial court erred by excluding testimony from a defense witness that she had once mistaken another man for Jackson. When Jackson's friend, Shirley Ann Williams, was on the stand, defense counsel asked her whether she had ever encountered anybody in this community that you mistakenly believed was William Jackson. The court sustained the State's objection to the relevancy of this question. Defense counsel then made an offer to prove outside the presence of the jury. The offer of proof was that Williams would have testified that at approximately the time this crime occurred she encountered another man whom she mistakenly believed to be Jackson. The court re-affirmed its earlier ruling. Evidence is relevant if it has a logical tendency to prove or disprove a material fact. Leavell v. State (1983), Ind., 455 N.E.2d 1110. From testimony that a friend of the defendant had once encountered a man whom she mistakenly believed to be Jackson, Jackson presumably wanted the jury to infer that Shelby similarly may have mistakenly believed it was defendant who attempted to rob the restaurant. Evidence that a friend had once mistakenly identified Jackson could support an inference, he says, that a business acquaintance could have similarly misidentified him. Such evidence would also have been relevant to a material fact in this case, that is, identification. However, the trial court has broad discretion in its rulings on the admissibility of evidence. Fisher v. State (1984), Ind., 468 N.E.2d 1365. The trial court's decision to exclude evidence which is arguably relevant will not be reversed unless there is a showing that the trial court's discretion was manifestly abused and that the defendant was denied a fair trial. Henderson v. State (1983), Ind., 455 N.E.2d 1117. The object of the testimony was to suggest the possibility that in a community of several hundred thousand people there might be someone who could be mistaken for Jackson. It seems likely that this is something the jurors could have accepted as true without any testimony at all. We conclude the trial court did not abuse its discretion in refusing to admit the testimony.