Opinion ID: 3060658
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Evidentiary Hearing in District Court

Text: After the government moved to allow K.S. to testify by two-way closedcircuit television, the district court held an evidentiary hearing. Janie Plaxco, a mental health counselor who had treated K.S., testified, inter alia, that: (1) K.S. was scared of Defendant Fee and nervous to be in the same room with him because of the things he had done to her; (2) K.S. was scared of testifying in court; (3) K.S. admitted to Plaxco that she had self-mutilated her forearms because she was upset and said she was scared to go to court; (4) Plaxco observed the sores grow worse over time; (5) Plaxco once saw K.S. in an emergency session because K.S.’s anxiety appeared to be escalating and because K.S. had hit her grandmother after hearing Rhonda Fee’s voice; (6) K.S.’s anxiety level was much more severe than that of a typical child preparing for testimony at trial and, in fact, 3 Plaxco had not encountered any child as nervous to testify in court as K.S.;1 (7) on a scale of 1 to 10, with 10 meaning a child would need to be hospitalized, K.S.’s anxiety level was 8.5; (8) based on Plaxco’s experience with K.S., Plaxco opined that K.S.’s testimony in front of Defendant Fee would be substantially likely to cause K.S. emotional trauma; and (9) allowing K.S. to testify by two-way closedcircuit television would lessen K.S.’s trauma. Defendant Fee called Leah Belser, a forensic interviewer and therapist who had reviewed videotape of Plaxco’s interviews of K.S. Belser testified that: (1) Plaxco’s having conducted three, rather than one, interview may have contributed to K.S.’s anxiety; and (2) children may, in general, mutilate themselves for many reasons, including stress, anxiety or displacement from their family.