Opinion ID: 1096608
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 18

Heading: Exclusion of Mitigation Testimony

Text: In his eleventh claim, Conde argues that the trial court erred in excluding the proffered testimony of a jail chaplain in support of mitigation evidence of Conde's sexual abuse as a child. The chaplain was not listed as a witness for the defense, but his testimony was proffered on the fourth day of the penalty phase. The defense informed the court that the chaplain's testimony would be that, after Conde's arrest and four years prior to trial, Conde had confided to him about sexual abuse by a family member as a child. The defense argued that the testimony was newly discovered evidence and critical to corroborating Conde's claim of sexual abuse, as testified to previously by his psychotherapist Olga Hervis on the basis of her interviews with Conde. Upon the State's Richardson [17] objection, the trial court agreed that the late disclosure was inadvertent but excluded the chaplain's testimony on three grounds: that its admission would prejudice the State, the confession to the chaplain was self-serving, and the testimony was cumulative of Hervis's testimony. A trial court's decision on a Richardson hearing is subject to reversal only upon a showing of abuse of discretion. See State v. Tascarella, 580 So.2d 154, 157 (Fla.1991). The trial court applied the proper test for a Richardson hearing, analyzing whether intentional nondisclosure or prejudice to the other side was present. We find that even if the trial court erred in excluding the chaplain's testimony, the error was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt under the standard set forth in State v. DiGuilio, 491 So.2d 1129 (Fla.1986). We also note that the trial court properly admitted the chaplain's testimony at the Spencer hearing, where the possibility of prejudice to the State no longer existed.