Opinion ID: 2320829
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Allegedly Perjured Testimony

Text: It is axiomatic that `this [C]ourt will not consider an issue raised for the first time on appeal that was not properly presented before the trial court.' State v. Oliveira, 774 A.2d 893, 924 (R.I.2001) (quoting State v. Breen, 767 A.2d 50, 57 (R.I.2001)). L'Heureux is not permitted to raise here for the first time his baseless claim that Prosecutor Wall knowingly used perjured testimony in his closing statement to the jury in violation of L'Heureux's due process rights. [6] Even if L'Heureux's contention was not waived for purposes of this appeal, and was properly raised here, his argument in support of his contention lacks merit. L'Heureux attacks the testimony of state's witness Patricia Bergeron, who testified on direct examination that she was with Faria inside Faria's father's home from the late afternoon until around midnight on Friday, November 10, 1989, and that there was a party there that night. L'Heureux argues that the November 10 Rehoboth police report proves that Bergeron committed perjury because the report shows that an officer drove by the Attleboro home several times that night and did not see in the driveway the truck that L'Heureux told the Rehoboth police Faria drove. However, Faria lived with his father, and Faria's girlfriend testified that the truck in question belonged to Faria's father. It is entirely reasonable to assume that the truck was not in the driveway because Faria's father was using it that evening, not because Faria was out of the house. The police report merely contained information about L'Heureux's claim that Faria had vandalized his home. Nothing in the report supports L'Heureux's contentions that Bergeron committed perjury or that the prosecutor knowingly used perjured testimony in his closing argument to the jury, and to which defense counsel failed to object. Indeed, the prosecutor invited the jury to assume that everything [L'Heureux] said is true,    is that any justification for killing someone, someone who has a five-dollar bill in one hand and the other hand up against the body surprised by the shot, they didn't even see it was coming? L'Heureux was not justified under any theory of self-defense in shooting Faria to death because he believed that Faria had vandalized his home. [7] We are satisfied that the trial record fails to support L'Heureux's contention that the prosecutor at his trial knowingly used perjured testimony in his closing argument. That contention utterly lacks merit and is immaterial because L'Heureux had no justification as a matter of law for shooting and killing Faria for the alleged earlier vandalism of his home.