Opinion ID: 2314882
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: C: Intent

Text: Appellant argues that even if the trial court properly admitted the Drew evidence under one or more specific exceptions, its instructions to the jury impermissibly allowed the evidence in on every conceivable theory: identity, intent, common scheme or plan, motive, and surrounding circumstances. This, he argues, is the `shotgun,' `laundry-list,' or `banquet-style' approach which has been criticized by this court because potential misuse of Drew evidence under one exception is not cured by simultaneous admission under an appropriate exception. Appellant is correct in asserting that individual trial court attention should be given to each potential ground for admissibility and the limiting instruction tailored to permit use of the Drew evidence only for the purposes for which it is properly admissible. The shotgun approach short-circuits the process [of the Drew -exception analysis] in a number of ways, Bartley, supra, 530 A.2d at 703-04 (Mack, J., dissenting), and is analytically imprecise. Thompson, supra, 546 A.2d at 420. However, in this case, as demonstrated above, the evidence was in fact permissible for consideration by the jury as probative of motive and a common scheme or plan in bearing upon the ultimate issue of identity. Thus, the only purpose listed by the trial court in its final instructions to the jury [11] which may not have been a permissible one was intent. We have previously pointed out at some length the caution that must be used with the admission of Drew evidence under the intent exception, given the danger that it may be treated as nothing more than proof of predisposition. See Thompson, supra, 546 A.2d at 420-22. However, in Thompson, the evidence was admissible only for intent, if at all, in its rather specialized meaning as bearing upon the defendant's state of mind at the moment of commission of the crime. Here, the limiting instructions warned the jury in one breath that it could only use the evidence for several enumerated purposes. With identity a dominant issue in the case, it would appear plausible that, in the context of the instruction, intent would be understood in a broader meaning as closely synonymous to motive and its probative effect on identity. [12] Moreover, without discounting the need for precision in fashioning a Drew instruction, our opinions in general recognize that once Drew evidence has been found properly admissible under one exception, the evidence is in the case and before the jury; therefore, any instructional error in also permitting its consideration for unfounded Drew purposes is typically not so prejudicial as to warrant reversal. See Groves, supra note 3, 564 A.2d at 377 (where evidence properly admitted for identity but not common scheme, the error was harmless); Calaway v. United States, 408 A.2d 1220, 1227 n. 12 (D.C.1979) (since the evidence [of a prior crime] was admissible under the intent, motive and identity exceptions, its admission under the `sexual predisposition' exception was harmless error). Cf. Bartley, supra, 530 A.2d at 696 (where jury instructed evidence of robbery could be used to show intent, identity, and common scheme or plan, no reversible error despite inapplicability of intent exception); Gates v. United States, 481 A.2d 120, 124-25 (D.C.1984), cert. denied, 470 U.S. 1058, 105 S.Ct. 1772, 84 L.Ed.2d 832 (1985) (not reversible error to admit other crimes evidence to show intent, identity, or common scheme or plan despite inapplicability of intent exception). Here, we do not think that the inclusion of intent in the instruction constituted reversible prejudice. In addition to the considerations already discussed, we note that the jury found appellant not guilty of two of the charged counts, and the prosecutor's use of the evidence was to portray the Hatfield-McCoy nature of the relationship between appellant and Curry so the jury could understand the charged crimes and appellant's motive to commit them. This was the very thrust of admissibility. The jury need not be read the story beginning in the middle of the book. In sum, we perceive no grounds for reversal in the admission of the challenged Drew evidence. [13]