Court Opinion

ID: 9785834
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-30 22:39:37.065065+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:36:08.187827
License: Public Domain

Rosen, J.,
dissenting: I respectfully dissent from the majority opinion, which essentially deems as relevant and admissible any prior conduct or allegations, even dismissed charges of criminal wrongdoing proven to be perpetrated by someone other than the respondent, when the court or jury is making the determination of whether a person is a sexually violent predator. Such a holding is contrary to the procedural safeguards put in place by our legislature when creating this statute and ignores our own rationale and recent decisions regarding the admission of criminal and civil prior bad acts.
When the legislature drafted and passed K.S.A. 59-29a02, they put in place procedural safeguards that are similar to those contained in the Kansas Code of Criminal Procedure. K.S.A. 59-29a07 requires that any court or jury shall determine, beyond a reasonable doubt, whether the person is a sexually violent predator and that, if such determination is made by a jury, it shall be by unanimous verdict. Other involuntary commitments require a lesser burden; probable cause for temporary detention, K.S.A. 59-29b59, and clear and convincing evidence in cases involving involuntary commitment for care and treatment, K.S.A. 59-29b66. Clearly the legislature recognized that depriving citizens of their liberty based on speculation and conduct that has yet to occur requires the State to meet the highest of burdens and afford those accused the greatest protections that the law will allow.
We likewise should not abandon evidentiary safeguards in these proceedings. In State v. Gunby, 282 Kan. 39, 144 P.3d 647 (2006), we painstakingly analyzed the admission of prior bad act evidence independently of 60-455 and recognized at least three types of prejudice that can result:
“First a jury might well exaggerate the value of other crimes as evidence proving that, because the defendant has committed a similar crime before, it might prop*233erly be inferred that he committed this one. Secondly, the jury might conclude that the defendant deserves punishment because he is a general wrongdoer even if the prosecution has not established guilt beyond a reasonable doubt in the prosecution at hand. Thirdly, the jury might conclude that because the defendant is a criminal, the evidence put in on his behalf should not be believed.” ’ ” 282 Kan. at 48-49 (quoting State v. Davis, 213 Kan. 54, 58, 515 P.2d 802 [1973]).
We put “an end to the practice of admission of other crimes and civil wrongs evidence independent of [60-455].” 282 Kan. at 57. We declared res gestae and other means of independently admitting this type of evidence as “dead” in Kansas. 282 Kan. at 63.
Gunby and its progeny seemed to have laid this matter to its well-deserved rest. Unfortunately, the issue has now taken on the character of a kind of judicial “Whac-a-Mole” arcade game that insists on popping up from its settled fate. By finding that any and all prior bad acts are admissible in these proceedings independently of 60-455, we have essentially overruled the core of the holding in Gunby. The majority maintains that K.S.A. 60-455, by its literal terms, does not apply because what is sought to be proved in this proceeding is not “that the person committed another crime or civil wrong on another specified occasion.” However, the real target of 60-455 is using past conduct “to prove his or her disposition to commit” crimes as an evidentiary basis that supports an inference that leads to an ultimate conclusion, which is what the majority opinion allows here. By ignoring the core purpose and underlying rationale of 60-455, the majority undermines the procedural safeguards enacted by our legislature concerning this involuntary commitment procedure. I would find that the requirements of K.S.A. 60-455 do not apply any differently in these proceedings than they do in any other judicial proceeding which may result in the lengthy or permanent deprivation of liberty and that evidence of prior bad acts, unrelated to sexual violence, are not admissible to prove a person’s disposition to commit sexually violent crimes at some unspecified future time absent our current 60-455 analysis.
Standridge, J., joins in the foregoing dissent.