Court Opinion

ID: 9492336
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 14:38:42.510393+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:55:15.370499
License: Public Domain

TERENCE T. EVANS, Circuit Judge,
concurring.
As I see it, the only issue that merits attention in this case is whether the district judge clearly abused his considerable discretion in not allowing the defense to introduce the Heard affidavit into evidence. For me, the answer to that question is a slam-dunk. He didn’t. But even if he did, the error would be harmless here because the affidavit, as I see it, is as phony as a three-dollar bill. Why would Timothy Heard prepare and sign an affidavit that misspelled his name (as “Herd”) but correctly spell the harder name — Am-erson — of someone who just happened to be the beneficiary of the information in it? This affidavit, on its face, doesn’t pass the smell test, and any prosecutor worth her salt would make mincemeat out of it in front of the jury. That said, I concur with Judge Coffey’s bottom line but not necessarily with every observation he makes along the way to getting there.