Court Opinion

ID: 9624138
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 06:52:05.603858+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:05:39.725109
License: Public Domain

Justice WHICHARD
dissenting.
I agree with the Court of Appeals that the evidence in question was a proper subject for expert testimony. See State v. Hall, 98 N.C. App. 1, 7-8, 390 S.E.2d 169, 172-73 (1990). Most jurisdictions apparently allow such evidence. See State v. Strickland, 96 N.C. App. 642, 646-47, 387 S.E.2d 62, 65 (1990). It clearly has some “tendency to make the existence of [a] fact that is of consequence to the determination of the action [i.e., the alleged rape] more probable . . . than it would be without the evidence,” and it thus meets the statutory test for relevancy. N.C.G.S. § 8C-1, Rule 401 (1988). The concerns presented in the majority opinion are properly addressed by cross-examination, introduction of rebuttal evidence (expert or otherwise), and jury argument, not by exclusion of the testimony as substantive evidence. The concerns properly relate to the weight or credibility of the evidence, not its admissibility.
I share the following view expressed by Judge John C. Martin in a dissenting opinion for the Court of Appeals:
I would hold such expert testimony admissible. There is recognized scientific authority for the medical conclusion that there exists a complex and unique number of physical and emotional symptoms exhibited by victims of rape, which are similar, but not identical, to other post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms____An understanding of those symptoms, the unique reactions of victims of rape, is not within the common knowledge or experience of most persons called upon to serve as jurors. Therefore, expert testimony as to the symptoms of the syndrome and its existence, is admissible to assist the jurors in understanding the evidence and in drawing appropriate conclusions therefrom. ...
To say that such evidence is irrelevant misinterprets relevance. G.S. 8C-1, Rule 401 makes relevant “evidence having any tendency to make the existence of any fact that is of consequence to the determination of the action more probable or less probable than it would be without the evidence.” Just *826as evidence of physical injury has been admissible as relevant to the issue of rape, so should evidence of emotional injury to the victim be relevant to show that it is more likely that a rape occurred. Neither should the expert testimony be excluded on the grounds of unfair prejudice. . . . [T]he admission of expert testimony as to the symptoms or existence of rape trauma syndrome is no more inflammatory, prejudicial or invasive of the province of the jury as the judges of credibility and fact than any other expert testimony.
State v. Stafford, 77 N.C. App. 19, 26-27, 334 S.E.2d 799, 803-04 (1985) (Martin, J., dissenting) (citations omitted), aff’d, 317 N.C. 568, 346 S.E.2d 463 (1986).
I therefore respectfully dissent.
Justices Mitchell and Webb join in this dissenting opinion.