Opinion ID: 2206745
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: the exclusion of evidence

Text: The defendant asserts that the trial justice committed prejudicial error in declining to admit as a full exhibit a letter written by Trooper Swanberg to Sonia requesting instructions concerning her wishes relating to the disposition of her automobile and whether she wanted to reclaim it. Before this letter was offered as an exhibit, counsel for defendant was permitted to elicit testimony from the trooper concerning the general tenor of the letter and its purpose. Counsel was further permitted to obtain testimony from the trooper that Sonia did not respond to the letter. The trial justice rejected the letter as a full exhibit on grounds of relevance. It is a well established doctrine in this jurisdiction that questions of relevance are entrusted to the discretion of the trial justice and rulings whether of exclusion or admission will not be disturbed save for an abuse of discretion. State v. Neri, 593 A.2d 953, 956 (R.I.1991). In our opinion, the exclusion of the letter did not constitute prejudicial error or abuse of discretion in light of the testimony that counsel was allowed to obtain from the trooper that substantially accomplished the ultimate purpose of showing that Sonia did not reclaim the automobile. Counsel was allowed to elicit testimony that would support an inference that Sonia may well have been a participant in this offense. That was the ultimate objective of defendant's line of questioning. The trial justice also excluded as exhibits photographs that had been taken of the automobile after it was impounded. Testimony from the troopers indicated that the interior of the vehicle was disheveled and messy. Defense counsel sought to introduce photographs taken by the police that would illustrate this condition for purposes of supporting defendant's testimony that he had not noticed the grocery bag on the floor behind the passenger's seat. The rationale for the trial justice's exclusion of this photograph was that Swanberg who was asked to authenticate the photograph, stated that he had not taken the picture. He denied that it fairly and accurately depicted how the car looked when he first pulled it over because he recalled seeing several objects inside the car that were not in the photograph, including a baby seat, some automobile parts, and cassette tapes. The trooper was unable to recall the location of two large brown objects visible in the photographs. In short, the trooper did not authenticate the photograph as being an accurate depiction of what he had seen in the automobile on the night of defendant's apprehension. Consequently, a proper foundation was not laid for its admission as a full exhibit. See State v. Bennett, 92 R.I. 316, 168 A.2d 282 (1961); State v. Esposito, 73 R.I. 94, 54 A.2d 1 (1947). The trial justice did not err in declining to admit the photographs.