Opinion ID: 1898380
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 28

Heading: Should the court have permitted expert testimony on the question of Oliver Johnson's identification of the defendant?

Text: The trial court refused to permit the testimony of Dr. Robert Buckhout, a psychologist and expert in eyewitness identification, either at the Wade hearing or during trial. At the Wade hearing the court rejected the proffered testimony as irrelevant, saying that the only Wade issue was impermissible suggestibility of identification from the newspaper photograph. The court explained that the expert testimony, offered to show the inherent unreliability of identification from newspaper photographs, was irrelevant because even if the published newspaper photograph qualified as a police-identification procedure, only suggestibility, not credibility, was then at issue. During his case in chief, defendant again offered expert testimony from Dr. Buckhout, relating to Johnson's eyewitness identification of defendant, based on its unique circumstances. The State agreed that the situation was unique, asserting that the expert testimony would therefore not be helpful because it would pertain to the fallibility of perception in the classic situations in which eyewitnesses glimpse a defendant at the crime scene and later make an identification at a line-up. Defendant argued that the same principles would apply as in classic situations, because Johnson testified that he had seen defendant three times, very briefly, on December 11, 1982, and because Johnson's newspaper identification was analogous to a show-up. The court excluded the testimony, finding that it failed to satisfy even the liberal test for admission of expert testimony set by the Third Circuit under federal rules. See United States v. Downing, 753 F. 2d 1224 (3d Cir.1985) (admission of expert testimony, based on helpfulness standard, conditioned on two factors: (1) threshold balancing of scientific reliability and likelihood of prejudice, and (2) fit between scientific findings and facts of case); Fed.R.Evid 702. The necessity for, or propriety of, the admission of expert testimony, and the competence of such testimony, are judgments within the discretion of the trial court. State v. Zola, 112 N.J. 384, 414, 548 A. 2d 1022 (1988). We find no abuse of discretion in the court's exclusion of Dr. Buckhout's testimony. Admission of expert testimony is limited by Evidence Rule 56(2), which allows such testimony as to matters requiring scientific, technical or other specialized knowledge if such testimony will assist the trier of fact to understand the evidence or determine a fact in issue. The Rule imposes three basic requirements: (1) the intended testimony must concern a subject matter that is beyond the ken of the average juror; (2) the field testified to must be at a state of the art such that an expert's testimony could be sufficiently reliable; and (3) the witness must have sufficient expertise to offer the intended testimony. [ State v. Kelly, 97 N.J. 178, 208, 478 A. 2d 364 (1984).] See Biunno, New Jersey Rules of Evidence (Anno. 1990), Comment 5 to Evid.R. 56. Here the testimony failed on the first prong of the Kelly test. The trial court stated that it did not question the expert's qualifications. Opinion of a qualified expert may be presented to a jury if it will genuinely assist the jury in comprehending the evidence and determining issues of fact. State v. Odom, 116 N.J. 65, 70, 560 A. 2d 1198 (1989). The proffered testimony was not clearly helpful to the jury's assessment of either the reliability of Johnson's eyewitness identification or the effect of his seeing defendant's photograph in the newspaper. Johnson's testimony was amply tested on cross-examination, and defendant failed to demonstrate that the subject matter (problems of eyewitness identification) was beyond the ken of the average juror. State v. Kelly, supra, 97 N.J. at 208, 478 A. 2d 364.