Court Opinion

ID: 9676507
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 05:25:54.184029+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:16:48.995409
License: Public Domain

Steele Hays, Justice, dissenting. I find no error in the trial court permitting Dr. Charles Kemp to express an opinion as a medical expert that this child had been sexually abused. The trial judge told the doctor not to state that the boy was testifying truthfully, and not to rely solely on what the boy had told him. Working within those limits the doctor was asked if he could formulate an opinion as to sexual abuse with a reasonable degree of medical certainty based on the history he took, the living circumstances, and physical findings; the doctor said he could and proceeded to state it. The jurors doubtless recognized the doctor was merely stating an opinion and they were not bound by it in the slightest. The defense was free to show on cross-examination whether it was based on fact or on conjecture and that is how we ought to leave it, to the judgment of the trial court. We have recognized that the trial court is in the best position to weigh all the factors affecting the admissibility of evidence, McQueen v. State, 283 Ark. 231, 675 S.W.2d 358 (1984), and we should, I believe, be restrained in overruling those actions.