Opinion ID: 2630956
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 8

Heading: Partial Exclusion of Relevant Evidence

Text: On this issue, Magallanez alleges that the district judge improperly excluded a portion of a letter from J.P. to Magallanez, which discussed J.P.'s sexual history and contained an admission that she lied to Magallanez about it. The defense filed a pretrial motion for admission of the letter, arguing that it would be useful to impeach J.P.'s credibility. The State objected that the letter was barred by the rape shield statute, K.S.A. 21-3525. The district judge agreed, saying: [T]he fact that [J.P.] may not have been a virgin or had sex on a previous time [was] not relevant in this case. During J.P.'s testimony at trial, the prosecutor asked her if she and Magallanez ever talked about sex. J.P. said that Magallanez had asked her how she felt about it and that she had told him she wanted to lose [her] virginity to someone ... [she] really cared about. Later in J.P.'s direct examination, the State moved to admit a redacted version of the disputed letter. Magallanez objected, arguing that the entire letter should be admitted because J.P.'s testimony implying she had been a virgin when she and Magallanez had sex opened the door to evidence of her earlier sexual experience. The district judge overruled Magallanez' objection and admitted the redacted version of the letter. Earlier cases have held that our review of a district judge's decision to exclude evidence under the rape shield statute is subject to an abuse of discretion standard. See State v. Lackey, 280 Kan. 190, 219, 120 P.3d 332 (2005); State v. Zuniga, 237 Kan. 788, 793, 703 P.2d 805 (1985); State v. Bressman, 236 Kan. 296, 300, 689 P.2d 901 (1984). Recently, however, this court has refined its general analysis of evidentiary rulings and determined that multiple steps are required. See State v. Reid, 286 Kan. 494, 504-09, 186 P.3d 713 (2008). These steps must be followed for evidence that may be covered by the rape shield statute as well. First, the court determines relevance, which has two components, materiality and probativeness. Materiality concerns whether the fact to be proved `has a legitimate and effective bearing on the decision of the case.' State v. Garcia, 285 Kan. 1, 14, 169 P.3d 1069 (2007) (quoting State v. Faulkner, 220 Kan. 153, 156, 551 P.2d 1247 [1976]). Our standard of review for materiality is de novo. Reid, 286 Kan. at 505, 186 P.3d 713. On probativeness, the court examines whether the offered evidence has `any tendency in reason to prove' a disputed material fact. Reid, 286 Kan. at 505, 186 P.3d 713. This court reviews probativity for abuse of discretion. Reid, 286 Kan. at 507, 186 P.3d 713. `Once relevance is established, evidentiary rules governing admission and exclusion may be applied either as a matter of law or in the exercise of the district judge's discretion, depending on the contours of the rule in question. [Citation omitted.] When the adequacy of the legal basis of a district judge's decision on admission or exclusion of evidence is questioned, we review the decision de novo.' Reid, 286 Kan. at 503 [186 P.3d 713] (quoting State v. Gunby, 282 Kan. 39, 47-48, 144 P.3d 647 [2006]). The contours of the rule in question here are found in the rape shield statute, which provides that, in a rape prosecution, evidence of the complaining witness' previous sexual conduct with any person including the defendant shall not be admissible, and no reference shall be made thereto in any proceeding before the court unless the court finds the evidence relevant and otherwise admissible. K.S.A. 21-3525(b). At the preliminary hearing, J.P. testified, We were talking, and he asked me how I felt about my virginity and how I felt about losing it. The State asked, What did you tell him? And J.P. responded, I told him that if I wanted to lose it I would want to lose it to someone I really cared about. J.P. further testified that, following this conversation, she and Magallanez got into the backseat of his car and had sex. Shortly before trial, Magallanez filed a sealed motion seeking a ruling on admission of the entire first page of a letter from J.P. to Magallanez. Although we recognize the sensitive nature of the letter's content, for purposes of discussion and decision, we must include the text of the letter in its entirety. Malaki, Hey! Whats up my sexy man friend? Not to much here ... just really bored!!... Okay and how you always ask me if I think about you everyday ... well ... I don't!! I think about you every second of every minute of every of every hour of every day!! Isn't it crazy? ? I think it is!! So about you wanting a two-page note. I don't know if I can make it that long!! ... (lolz) Sorry for the sloppy handwriting this pencil sucks ASS!! But yea ... I can't stop thinking about you! Do you know you have like the prettiest eyes!! OOO ... yea!! I WANT MY POEM BOOK BACK!!! Gosh I need it I got so much stuff I need to write! Its all going through my head right now!! Yea ... So the other night on the phone was funny!! The whole andy going ... Can I break you off? What does that meen? Can I break you off? What does that meen? Give it to you good? (lol) (lmao)!!!!! Find about the whole me not being a vergin well I didn't tell you because I wanted to forget about it!!! It only lasted like 5 min. b4 I wanted him to stop!! It was horrible and it was THE WORST NIGHT OF MY LIFE!! You please 4 give me? ? Im really sorry 4 lieing to you but I really don't want anyone to know especially you!!! But that was all in the past and I don't want to talk about it! Wow.. My handwriting really sucks today!! The district judge ruled that J.P.'s virginity was irrelevant to the case and that the content of the letter regarding J.P.'s previous sexual encounter was barred by the rape shield statute. Specifically, he noted that the rape charge depended upon J.P. being younger than 14, not on her behavior: [I]t doesn't matter what the actions of the victim were in this case because of the nature and the age of the victim. In addition, in the judge's view, other evidence to impeach J.P.'s credibility was available to the defense. At this point in the case, the district judge correctly discerned that the letter was clearly probative on J.P.'s sexual history, but he also correctly ruled that evidence of J.P.'s sexual history was not material to whether she had been raped by Magallanez. Excluding any portion of the letter to prove J.P. had been sexually active before her encounters with Magallanez was appropriate because such evidence was covered by the rape shield statute and was not otherwise relevant and admissible for this purpose because of its failure to meet the materiality requirement of the relevance inquiry. However, the district judge appears to have failed to fully grasp the secondary significance of the letter. The letter also was material and probative evidenceindeed, the best evidence the defense could imagine havingthat J.P. was capable of lying and had lied in the past about her sexual conduct. This evidence was at the heart of the defense theory, i.e., that J.P. was lying about Magallanez in this case. Under these circumstances, the letter met the exception to the shield erected by the statute. It was otherwise relevant and admissible for this impeachment purpose. It was not enough for the district judge merely to observe that other impeachment evidence existed, when none could have matched the power of J.P.'s admission in her own handwriting that she had lied about her sexual history. At trial, J.P. repeated that she had told Magallanez she wanted to lose her virginity to someone she cared about, and the State admitted a redacted form of the letter that omitted everything between (lol) (lmao)!!!!! and My handwriting really sucks today!! The State was interested in sponsoring circumstantial evidence of the intimate nature of J.P.'s relationship to Magallanez. It may also have wanted to prevent the jury from hearing that J.P. was sexually experienced, hoping to capitalize on any purity bias that could draw paternalistic sympathy. The defense made a timely objection, again seeking to admit the entire page of J.P.'s letter. But the district judge did not change his pretrial ruling. This was error. Regardless of whether the rape shield statute could have previously been applied to prevent the defendant's introduction of evidence of J.P.'s sexual history that was not otherwise relevant and admissible, it could no longer be applied to prevent Magallanez from impeaching J.P.'s own testimony on that subject or from demonstrating that she had lied about it before. Again, J.P.'s credibility was key. And, as Magallanez argued at trial and before this court, the State opened the door to the otherwise off-limits issue of J.P.'s virginity. Although not invoked by either party, K.S.A. 21-3525(c) makes clear that there is an exception to the statutory shield in situations such as the one before us here. If a prosecutor introduces evidence of a complaining witness' previous sexual conduct or a complaining witness testifies to that conduct, the defense need not be silent. If such evidence or testimony is introduced, the defendant may cross-examine the witness who gives such testimony and offer relevant evidence limited specifically to the rebuttal of such evidence or testimony introduced by the prosecutor or given by the complaining witness. K.S.A. 21-3525(c). The redacted portion of the letter would have rebutted both J.P.'s statement implying she was a virgin when she first had sex with Magallanez and impeached her testimony overall. See State v. Atkinson, 276 Kan. 920, 931, 80 P.3d 1143 (2003) (citing K.S.A. 60-420) (error to exclude evidence of complaining witness' inconsistent statements to police about prior sexual history with defendant; once inadmissible evidence elicited, similar evidence can be admitted to rebut); compare State v. Rakestraw, 255 Kan. 35, 44-46, 871 P.2d 1274 (1994) (citing State v. Purdy, 228 Kan. 264, Syl. ¶ 2, 615 P.2d 131 [1980]) (when party seeks to introduce redacted statement into evidence, redaction must not distort its meaning; if the complete statement is exculpatory and the redacted statement is inculpatory, we must conclude that the redacted statement distorts the meaning of the complete statement); Dewey v. Funk, 211 Kan. 54, 57, 505 P.2d 722 (1973) (when party introduces inadmissible, prejudicial evidence, opposing party may introduce similar evidence as needed to remove unfair prejudice; litigant who draws from his own witness irrelevant testimony which is prejudicial to the opposing litigant ought not to object to its contradiction on the ground of its irrelevancy). We thus conclude that the district judge erred in refusing to admit the redacted portion of the letter written by J.P. Rather than address whether this error requires reversal on its own, we will address it in our discussion of cumulative error below.