Opinion ID: 1753213
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: the lower court erred in allowing certain letters into evidence.

Text: Appellant contends that the following answer of Deborah Jean Wilder during her direct testimony constitutes reversible error: Q. Have you had any contact with [Watson] lately? A. He's come by the office where I work, but we didn't really talk. He was just telling me he was out of jail... . MR. VANDERBURG: Objection, Your Honor. We object to the answer; it's not responsive; it's improper; and we move for a mistrial on the contents of the answer. The lower court overruled appellant's objection and motion for mistrial as a result of the answer of Wilder. In United States v. Webster, 750 F.2d 307 (5th Cir.1984), the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeal addressed a witness's reference to the last deal of a defendant. The Court held that this fleeting, unexplained reference to the `last deal' [was] obviously not reversible error. 750 F.2d at 336. See also United States v. Washam, 529 F.2d 402 (5th Cir.1976); Anderson v. State, 285 So.2d 748 (Miss. 1973); Traxler v. State, 244 Miss. 403, 142 So.2d 14 (1962). The answer of Wilder was not responsive to the question and there was no purposeful effort or intent on the part of the State to elicit such information from the witness. Assuming arguendo that the answer constituted error, certainly it was harmless error under the facts of this case. The assigned error III is rejected. The assigned error IV relates to the prosecution's introduction of certain letters of complaint from credit card customers during the testimony of one William Bobbitt. Appellant argues that the admission of such letters was error in that they constituted hearsay. William Bobbitt was the manager of the credit card department of Midland Bank & Trust, Memphis, Tennessee, which was the upstream bank for the First National Bank of Hernando in the processing of credit card deposits. He testified that these letters of complaint, as well as the credit card charge slips themselves, were maintained as a normal course of banking procedure. A pertinent part of his testimony follows: Q. Would these letters of complaint that the credit card owners wrote go to the processing center in Omaha, Nebraska? A. They would at that time and then be forwarded to us, and we would in turn forward them to Hernando. Q. So, you in turn would receive from the Omaha processing center the complaints written by the credit card owners? A. Yes, sir. Q. Now, sir, during the early portion of 1983, let's say the months of March or April, did a problem arise within your bank and the First National Bank of Hernando relating to credit card charge slips deposited through a business known as Elvis, Elvis, Elvis? A. Yes, it did. Q. Explain to the jury what that problem was, sir. A. We began to get a great number of complaints that the tickets that had been deposited through this company and charged to the number of people's accounts were not authorized charges, charges that they stated they had not made or not authorized. Q. And did you actually receive these complaints from the credit card holders themselves? A. Through the processing center, yes. Q. And do you maintain these documents and records as a normal part of banking business? A. We do. Rule 803(6), Mississippi Rules of Evidences, provides: (6) Records of Regularly Conducted Activity. A memorandum, report, record, or data compilation, in any form, of acts, events, conditions, opinions or diagnosis, made at or near the time by, or from information transmitted by, a person with knowledge, if kept in the course of a regularly conducted business activity, and if it was the regular practice of that business activity to make the memorandum, report, record or data compilation, all as shown by the testimony of the custodian or other qualified witness, unless the source of information or the method or circumstances of preparation indicate lack of trustworthiness. The term business as used in this paragraph includes business, institution, association, profession, occupation, and calling of every kind, whether or not conducted for profit. The Official Comments following Rule 803(6) states: It is important to note that the custodian as well as the other qualified witnesses may testify. Thus, it is not necessary to call or to account for all participants who made the record. However, the source of the material must be an informant with knowledge who is acting in the course of the regularly conducted activity. This is exemplified by the leading case of Johnson v. Lutz, 253 N.Y. 124, 170 N.E. 517 (1930), which is still the applicable law today under the rule. That case held that a police report which contained information obtained from a bystander was inadmissible; the officer qualified as one acting in the regular course of a business, but the informant did not. As stated, the custodian of the credit card department files testified that these letters of complaint, along with the credit card charge slips, were maintained as a normal course of banking procedure. The complaints were a natural follow-up of the credit card charge slips in determining that they were spurious. We are of the opinion that in the trial of this criminal conspiracy case the complaints were properly admitted under Rule 803(6). The assigned error IV is rejected.