Court Opinion

ID: 9730701
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 15:21:16.490852+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:26:08.695739
License: Public Domain

WAHL, Justice
(dissenting).
I must respectfully dissent. Defendants in criminal cases have a statutory and constitutional right to testify in their own behalf. Minn.Stat. § 611.11 (1978); State v. Rosillo, 281 N.W.2d 877 (Minn.1979). In a case such as this, where inconsistencies in the complainant’s testimony raised grave doubts as to whether the defendant committed anything other than assault and where even the trial judge expressed the opinion that it was a very close issue as to whether or not this was an aggravated robbery, it was imperative that the jury hear the defendant’s version of the incident. The defendant did not take the stand, however, because the court refused to limit the impeachment use of his prior conviction for aggravated robbery, a crime identical to the one for which he was on trial. The potential use of this prior conviction had a chilling effect upon defendant’s exercise of his right to testify in his own behalf.
Defendant’s apprehension of inherent prejudice is well founded. An empirical study of the jury system at the University of Chicago Law School resulted in a finding that, all other things being equal, the use of prior convictions for impeachment resulted in a 27 percent increase in the conviction rate. Note, Admissibility of Prior Convictions to Impeach a Defendant-Witness, 15 S.D.L.Rev. 161, 162 (1970), citing Kalven & Zeisel, The American Jury 160-61 (1966).
Defendant’s prior aggravated robbery conviction is not a crime involving untruthful conduct so as to be automatically admissible under Minn.R.Evid. 609(a)(2). It is admissible into evidence, if at all, under Minn.R.Evid. 609(a)(1) only if the trial court properly determines that its probative value outweighs its prejudicial effect. That determination must be guided by factors set *654out by this court in State v. Jones, 271 N.W.2d 534, 538 (Minn.1978): the impeachment value of the prior crime; the date of the conviction and the defendant’s subsequent history; the similarity of the past crime with the charged crime; the importance of the defendant’s testimony; and the centrality of the credibility issue. Applying these factors, I conclude that the impeachment value of this five-year-old conviction for an identical crime was minimal, the need for defendant’s testimony critical.
The trial court erred in ruling that the probative value of the prior conviction for aggravated robbery outweighed its prejudicial effect. I would reverse the conviction and grant a new trial.