Court Opinion

ID: 9855215
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 06:21:07.757043+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:23:43.764534
License: Public Domain

*157Mr. Justice Frantz
dissenting:
Certain testimony elicited from the witness Wolney by the People was damning, and being, in my view, inadmissible, requires a reversal. A chronology involving this witness is necessary in order to understand that error in respect of this witness had several facets.
The prosecution had called Wolney for the sole purpose of having him identify the deceased. In his testimony, Wolney told of his acquaintanceship with the deceased and identified the latter by certain photographs which were admitted in evidence. Wolney further testified that he had seen the deceased’s body at the mortuary.
In the course of cross-examination, the defendant asked Wolney certain questions concerning activities of the deceased and Wolney on the day prior to the death. An objection to these questions on the ground that they were beyond the scope of the direct examination was sustained. The trial court suggested that, if defendant wanted this evidence introduced, she should later call Wolney as her witness.
Pursuant to the suggestion, the defendant did call Wolney as her witness in making her defense, and questioned him concerning the amount of drinking and the places frequented by him and the deceased the morning of the tragedy. Defense counsel admonished the witness at the time of interrogation, “Please don’t refer to anything [deceased] stated.” On cross-examination the prosecution, over defendant’s objection, sought to go beyond the scope of defendant’s direct examination of Wolney. Notwithstanding the objection, the court permitted questions and answers relating to quarrels between the defendant and the deceased on the night before, and questions and answers as to the substance of conversations between Wolney and the deceased on the morning of the tragedy, part of which shows that the deceased said he was then “going home to put [the defendant] out”; that *158“the conversation was, he had an argument the night before, and that he had to slap [defendant] to take a gun that she was loading away from her, and that he was going home and put her out.” The court admitted this testimony on the theory that it showed the “mental state of the victim and ill feeling or hostility between decedent and defendant.”
On redirect examination, the defense attempted to mitigate the damage of this testimony by asking Wolney about other inconsistent statements he had made on the same matter. The trial court sustained the prosecution’s objection on the theory that Wolney was a defense witness and he could not be impeached without the showing of surprise.
It will be noted from what has been said that the trial court applied the rule, limiting cross-examination to that which had been gone into on direct examination, to the defendant’s effort to cross-examine Wolney when he testified for the People, and that the court did not apply the same principle when Wolney was called as a defense witness. It is submitted that this rule should operate alike for the People and for the defendant. What is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.
Ordinarily, cross-examination of a witness must be confined to the scope of the examination in chief, and any other evidence elicited thereby is and should be treated as new matter. Such new matter is subject to cross-examination, since it constitutes evidence produced by the original cross-examiner. Carter v. People, 119 Colo. 342, 204 P.2d 147; Smith v. People, 120 Colo. 39, 206 P.2d 826.
A case which involved an analogous situation to the present one is that of State v. Board, 135 Mont. 139, 337 P.2d 924. There the Court pithily said: “You may not parry with sharpened blade in cross and expect only a sheathed blade in return.” Here, in relation to cross-examination, the court permitted the People to use the sharpened blade; conversely, it disarmed the defendant.
*159The right to cross-examination is unquestionably a valuable right, and to unwarrantably limit its use results in prejudicial error. “Where one cross-examines a witness called by his adversary as to matters beyond the direct examination and thus makes the witness his own, the party who called the witness has the right to cross-examine him as to such new matter.” 58 Am. Jur. 342, § 618, Witnesses.
Again, using 58 Am. Jur., Witnesses, we quote from § 611, page 340, as follows: “In a judicial investigation the right of cross-examination is absolute, and not a mere privilege . . .” The text writer cites in support of this statement Alford v. United States, 282 U.S. 687, 51 S. Ct. 218, 75 L. Ed. 624; Fahey v. Clark, 125 Conn. 44, 3 A.2d 313, 120 A.L.R. 517; and State v. Zolantakis, 70 Utah 296, 259 Pac. 1044, 54 A.L.R. 1463.
The late Mr. Justice Hall declared in Archina v People, 135 Colo. 8, 307 P.2d 1083, that “the right of cross-examination is a valuable constitutional right guaranteed to all defendants.” A constitutional right of cross-examination can hardly be less than an absolute right.
A case having a situational bearing on the present case is that of United States v. Stoehr, 196 F.2d 276, 33 A.L.R.2d 836. Note the language of the Court regarding the development of new matter: “Where new evidence is opened up on redirect examination, the opposing party must be given the right of cross-examination on the new matter . . .” (Emphasis supplied.) Here a reading of the cold, stark record as it reveals the testimony of Wolney in chambers discloses a difficult, resistive, and inconsistent witness who admitted he had been drinking prior to testifying. This was never presented to the jury. His prejudice and credibility were never, therefore, subjected to fundamental safeguards of accuracy and truthfulness by cross-examination. 58 Am. Jur. 339, § 610.
Did the trial court properly admit the testimony of Wolney in which he stated that the deceased had informed him that morning that deceased and the de*160fendant “had an argument the night before, and that he had to slap Dorothy to take a gun that she was loading away from her, and that he was going home and put her out”? Was such testimony properly admitted to show the “mental state of the victim and ill feeling or hostility between decedent and defendant?” These questions are answered in the negative.
I would hold that this is an improper application of the exception to the hearsay rule, known as utterances to show the mental state of a person; it was clearly hearsay insofar as it showed “ill feeling or hostility between decedent and defendant.” On the question of state of mind, the trial court inverted the rule.
We are not concerned with the mental state of the deceased; his mental state was not a fact in issue in this case. At least, it was not an issue until and unless the defendant made it such. Bershenyi v. People, 71 Colo. 432, 207 Pac. 591. The majority thus misinterprets the Bershenyi case.
For the reasons herein stated, I am in disagreement with the majority opinion.
Mr. Justice Day joins in this dissent.