Court Opinion

ID: 9639111
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 16:05:09.692043+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:10:12.713769
License: Public Domain

John Mauzy Pittman, Chief Judge, concurring. I agree with the result reached in this case. However, I do not agree with the majority’s position that the trial court erred in admitting evidence of the stolen checks and golf clubs. As noted by the majority, evidence of other bad acts by a defendant may be admissible if independently relevant to a material issue in the case. One permissible purpose for which other crimes evidence may be admitted is to establish identity. Ark. R. Evid. 404(b). Here, appellant was tried for and convicted of theft by receiving a white Dodge pickup truck. A critical issue at trial was whether appellant was the person driving the stolen truck when it was observed and pursued by the police. Evidence was admitted that stolen checks, bearing appellant’s fingerprints, were found near the stolen truck after the driver abandoned the truck and fled. Evidence was also admitted that stolen golf clubs were later found in a storage room rented to appellant. The checks and golf clubs had been stolen in a single theft from a different victim, Dr. Jerry Bradley. Proof of a physical connection between appellant and two sets of items taken in a single grime, one of which was found in the vicinity of the stolen truck, is independently relevant to the question of whether appellant was the driver of the stolen truck. I cannot agree with the majority that proof of appellant’s “connection to the [checks and golf clubs] themselves,” without proof that they had been stolen, would have been anywhere near as probative on the issue of the driver’s identity. Appellant’s simple possession of golf clubs in a different location would be irrelevant to any issue in this case. It is the connection of the clubs to the checks found at the scene of the abandoned truck that makes the clubs relevant. It was only through proof that the checks and clubs were taken in a single act of theft that the necessary connection between the checks and clubs could be established. Appellant’s continuing connection to golf clubs stolen at the same time as the checks makes it more likely that appellant’s connection to the checks was not simply transitory or coincidental. And it cannot be disputed that, as the strength of appellant’s connection to the checks grows, so does the strength of his connection to the truck. I find no abuse of discretion in the trial court’s admission of the evidence concerning the theft and recovery of Dr. Bradley’s checks and golf clubs.