Opinion ID: 163124
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Dr. Bebensee

Text: 67 Shortly before lunch on the fourth day of trial, defense counsel called as a witness Dr. Bebensee, a professor with a doctorate in education, counseling psychology. ROA, Vol. 16 at 122. The defense sought to qualify her as an expert in child psychology, child physical abuse, child sexual abuse, ... the validation criteria and detection of sexual abuse. Id. at 149. When defense counsel informed the court that Dr. Bebensee would need extra time to set up some demonstrative exhibits, the court ordered disclosure of the exhibits to the prosecution so that it could lodge any objections that it might have before the jury returned from lunch. The prosecution had previously been informed of Dr. Bebensee's proposed testimony by a letter sent thirty days before trial. 68 When court reconvened, the prosecutor expressed concern about the inappropriateness of exhibits that set forth lists reiterating paraphrases of prior testimony of various witnesses at the various hearings, allegedly so that Dr. Bebensee could compare the statements and comment on their consistency, credibility, and validity. Id. at 115. Defense counsel argued that the exhibits were proper demonstrative aids because they would explain the basis for Dr. Bebensee's opinion on whether the evidence indicates a valid claim of sexual assault. Id. at 117. Elaborating, defense counsel explained that Dr. Bebensee would not simply testify about the criteria that has [sic] to be followed when investigating these kinds of cases but would also be applying that [sic] criteria to this case in order to be able to give her opinion on the stand concerning how the investigation was conducted, whether it was conducted properly or not, whether the information that is provided through the investigation indicates a valid claim of sexual assault or not along with a lot of other things that are involved in her testimony. Id. at 116-17 (emphasis added). 69 This response led the court to question the propriety of Dr. Bebensee's testimony altogether. The court stated: 70 It appears to be, in significant part, that the expert is going to come in and do something other than merely describe in abstract what a proper investigation of a sexual assault on a child might be. It's clearly suggested in your comments that she is going to deal not in abstract but with the particulars of the statements of various people in this case and to render an opinion as to the quality or credibility of the statements, and that gets dangerously close to, if not becoming actually an impermissible statement by an expert as to what is true or what is not true in the facts of the case. 71 Id. at 117-18. As a result, the trial court ruled that it would be necessary to hold a hearing outside the jury's presence for the purpose of determining the admissibility of Dr. Bebensee's testimony.
72 The Petitioner's offer of proof with respect to Dr. Bebensee's testimony was, as the district court noted, less than clear. Mem. Op. and Order at 42. A large part of it related to validation criteria, which Dr. Bebensee described as certain things that are looked at in regards to the validation of — or the credibility of the whole investigation of an allegation of sexual assault on a child. ROA, Vol. 16 at 136-37. She went on to list the criteria, which include (1) when, where, how and to whom the child disclosed the alleged assault; (2) how the child told the story, including comparison of the first story to subsequent tellings; (3) whether the telling of the story begins to look like it's been remembered versus programmed, id. at 137; (4) the child's exposure to multiple episodes of abuse and any other experience the child may have had with sexual material or situations; (5) whether the offender groomed the child so that the child was more approachable; (6) the offender's threats or other inducement for the child to keep the incident a secret; (7) the detail with which the child described the incident over time; (8) recantation; and (9) the child's family situation. The sources Dr. Bebensee provided for her testimony included protocols and checklists describing how a proper investigation of alleged sexual assault on a child should be conducted. She testified, however, that the purpose of [the] criteria was to determine better if the child is credible or not credible, since children can and do lie about being sexually molested. Id. at 141-42 (emphasis added). 73 At this point in the hearing, defense counsel asked whether he should offer Dr. Bebensee as an expert. In response, the court expressed concern about the admissibility of Dr. Bebensee's opinion on the validity of the evidence and suggested that defense counsel tell the court what you intend that the jury would hear from this witness. Id. at 143. Defense counsel stated that Dr. Bebensee would testify, in terms of the validation criteria, as to how such an investigation should have been conducted and how it was conducted in this case. Id. at 143. When the court specifically asked whether she would render opinions as to the validity of the evidence, defense counsel did not answer directly but replied: 74 She would be able to render an opinion as to how the investigation was conducted, whether it was conducted properly or not. 75 She would be able to render an opinion as to whether the reports and statements made by the police personnel are inconsistent or consistent and whether or not significant details change. 76 She can give an opinion regarding the analysis of the emotional, behavioral, and mental characteristics of the child, family background, previous reporting, and things along those lines. 77 She can give an opinion concerning corroborative statements and whether there was appropriate interview and investigative procedures that were used in this particular case, and we would be asking her to do that. 78 Id. at 144. He further asserted that Dr. Bebensee's testimony would help the jury to understand the meaning of the contradictory information it received from the witnesses. Id. at 148. 79 The prosecutor then questioned Dr. Bebensee. She elicited Dr. Bebensee's admission that she had not interviewed any of the witnesses personally but based her testimony on a forensic analysis of the police reports and transcripts of prior testimony. Furthermore, she had conducted no controlled experiments involving the validation criteria she described. Although Dr. Bebensee testified that she thought that other psychologists — Sgroi (whom she claimed had conducted a controlled experiment using the validation criteria in 2,000 cases), Delipse, Kelly-James, Jones and Underwagner — might have conducted such experiments, she was unable to substantiate her claim at the time. Nor has the defense provided such substantiation on any subsequent occasion, either on direct appeal or habeas review. 80 The prosecutor contended that Dr. Bebensee was employing statement ... validity assessment, a process in which a witness's statements are analyzed sentence by sentence. Id. at 170, 160. She pointed to one of Dr. Bebensee's exhibits, which appeared to reflect such an analysis, and provided several articles describing and discrediting the technique. Dr. Bebensee's testimony regarding validation criteria, the prosecutor argued, was unreliable and inappropriate in that it would have involved her opinion on the credibility of the Victim and/or the accusation. 81 Dr. Bebensee strongly denied that she was engaging in statement validity assessment in analyzing this case. Then, when asked by the prosecutor whether she was going to tell the jury that the police interview of the Victim was not done well and therefore resulted in an invalid report, Dr. Bebensee said: I'm not going to say the report is not valid. I'm going to say that there are things that should have been done according to the standards in the field, even in the police field that should have been done that were not done. Id. at 161.
82 The trial court ruled that the admissibility of the testimony offered by Dr. Bebensee was governed by Colorado Rule of Evidence 702, which requires the trial court to determine whether proffered evidence will assist the factfinder to either understand other evidence or to determine a fact in issue. Id. at 187. The court noted that there had been many Colorado appellate decisions in recent years concerning expert testimony in child sexual assault cases, and that while these decisions had held admissible many varied types of expert testimony, they had held inadmissible any testimony which essentially told the jury who[m] to believe. Id. at 189, quoting People v. Gaffney, 769 P.2d 1081, 1087 (Colo.1989). 83 The court proceeded to rule on the admissibility of Dr. Bebensee's proffered testimony. It used as a guide her letter to the prosecutor summarizing her six proposed conclusions. The court also considered her voir dire testimony. 84 In the first three conclusions in her letter, Dr. Bebensee expressed the view that the initial and subsequent statements made by the Victim, family members and friends, and police personnel were inconsistent and significant details change. Id. at 190-91. The court stated that the jury[] should be fully competent to recognize those observations without expert opinion directing them to these inconsistent statements or changes in detail. Id. at 190. Hence, it ruled that scientific knowledge or specialized knowledge would [not] be at all necessary to demonstrate that to the jury. Id. 85 The fourth conclusion was an [a]nalysis of emotional, behavioral and mental characteristics of the child, family background, previous reportings, etc., related to pre-alleged abuse and post-alleged abuse to show that they do not meet the necessary criteria established by the professional literature. Aplt.App. at 381. The court found this statement somewhat puzzling, ROA, Vol. 16 at 191, and said it could not determine on what point it would be probative, even if true. The court said: 86 [T]here is nothing to indicate that the lack of posttraumatic — or postevent emotional behavior or mental characteristics would necessarily mean that an event as simple as the touching or fondling that's been involved in this case did or did not occur. And again, I must say that I don't think that that analysis would be useful to the jury in deciding the issues that are presented in this case. 87 Id. at 192. 88 Conclusion five was that [c]orroborative statements, reports, documents and miscellaneous findings do not support the child's statements. Aplt.App. at 381. The court said that [t]his sounds to me like an opinion by the expert witness that the child is not telling the truth and that type of opinion is not admissible under a long line of well established cases. ROA, Vol. 16 at 192. 89 Dr. Bebensee's final conclusion was that [i]nappropriate interview and investigative procedures were used which brings into question the accuracy of the information gathered and conclusions that were drawn from that information. Aplt.App. at 381. The court indicated that it thought such testimony would be permissible in the abstract. But the court understood this point to mean that Dr. Bebensee would testify as to what procedures were used, what procedures should have been used, and why the difference between the `should have been used' and the `was used' led to, in her opinion, conclusions lacking in validity. ROA, Vol. 16 at 193. Such testimony, the court continued, would draw[] into question whether or not any research that is scientific research has been accomplished or demonstrated which would indicate that one line of techniques would more frequently result in a valid determination than another, and there has not been any demonstration that such conclusion would be scientific. Id. The court concluded: 90 [T]he sum of this is that the proffered testimony really is not a matter for expert opinion. I think in very large part all it does is go to [the Victim's] credibility. I don't think that expert testimony is necessary to evaluate [the Victim's] credibility. It is certainly suspect. It's certainly an area of fair argument in this case. 91 There are lots of inconsistencies. There are lots of reasons why the jury might not think that his testimony was credible, but I don't think that it is at all appropriate or necessary for an expert witness to come in here and tell this jury what result they should reach. In other words, to tell the jury her conclusions that the information gathered is not credible. 92 There does not seem to be any scientific principles or there don't seem to be any scientific principles involved in this case that cannot be understood by the jury. And while Dr. Beben[s]ee might be more qualified than the police officers who investigated this case in taking a fresh case and assimilating and interpreting the data available, I just don't see that her testimony would be assistive to the jury in the context of this particular case. 93 It would really get down to her opinion as to the credibility of the evidence where we have the accusation made by the victim and the denial by the defendant as to being the primary essence of this case.... 94 Id. at 194-95. The court ruled Dr. Bebensee's testimony inadmissible. 95 The defense objected, citing its need for Dr. Bebensee's testimony in light of the court's limitations on defense counsel's cross-examination of Detective Betz regarding his training and the investigation in the case. But the court refused to entertain further arguments. Id. at 196. The court did, however, allow defense counsel to clarify on the record his understanding of the court's ruling (during which defense counsel reminded the court of their discussion about Dr. Bebensee's forthcoming testimony when the court limited Betz's cross-examination) and to log his belated objection to the tardiness of the hearing on the admissibility of Dr. Bebensee's testimony. 96 Counsel for the defense also requested some kind of instruction to the jury explaining what they had been doing outside the presence of the jury and why the doctor would not be testifying despite defense counsel's earlier statements indicating that she would be. Id. at 203. The court agreed and explained to the jury in general terms what had happened. 97 I have ordered and ruled that a Dr. Beben[s]ee, who was a witness that you heard described earlier on in the trial, will not be permitted to testify in this case and the reason I did deals with issues of law as compared to issues of fact. 98 Dr. Beben[s]ee, having been disqualified from testifying by the Court — I don't know if that's the correct word. I shouldn't say disqualified — I just have ruled that she will not testify. 99 Id. at 208. 100 In a subsequent motion for a mistrial, defense counsel argued that the court's statement that Dr. Bebensee was disqualified adversely reflect[ed] on [defense counsel's] credibility, ROA, Vol. 11 at 12, because he had told the jury during opening statements that she would be testifying. He further stated that because Detective Betz had been allowed to opine about the consistency of the Victim's statements, Dr. Bebensee should have been allowed to 101 present[] evidence quite to the contrary... that these inconsistencies in his statement, of which Dr. Bebensee was aware of each and every one of the statements in words that [the Victim] has said on the record or in a police report, she would have testified that, in fact, these were inconsistencies. 102 Id. at 10.