Court Opinion

ID: 9746745
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-27 14:35:45.50307+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:25:16.326182
License: Public Domain

PAPADAKOS, Justice,
dissenting.
I must dissent to the use by the Majority of the general rule that evidence of past crimes is inadmissible to prove that a defendant committed the crime with which he is presently charged. I do not believe that this rule, with its exceptions, has any relevance to the issues presented in this case. Rather, Professor Wigmore’s phrase “prior acts of a similar nature” as indicated in the quote used by the Majority, pp. 543-544 (II Wigmore, On Evidence,. § 302, pp. 241, 245, 246 (Chadbourn Rev. 1979)) is directly on point.
Appellant has been charged with criminal homicide caused by child abuse. Appellant explained this homicide as resulting from accident. To negate this accident theory, the Commonwealth introduced evidence that three years earlier, another child in Appellant’s care also suffered substantial bruises which were thought, by medical authorities, to be the result of child abuse. In this prior event, no one *548spoke of “crimes” nor was Appellant charged with a crime. Surely, not every bruised child has been criminally assaulted. If that were so, no parent would be free from criminal conduct in administering corporal punishment. And don’t let anyone try to convince me that the hickory paddle did not abuse the sensitivity of my posterior.
Three years earlier, the Appellant was suspected of bruising a child by acts characterized as child abuse. Appellant made no denials at that time. The child, fortunately, survived. Now, three years later, Appellant is again suspected of bruising a child and, unfortunately, such bruises caused the death of the child. The prior act, not adjudged criminal, is similar in nature to the present act and may surely be shown to refute a claim of accident.
By referring to the prior act as a “crime” and permitting the introduction of evidence of prior “crimes” in this case, the Majority has, in effect, charged, tried and convicted Appellant of a “prior crime.” This is not only unconscionable, but also unnecessary to the proper disposition of the issue presented.
Furthermore, I disagree with the grant of a new trial on the thin rationale advanced by the Majority. In essence, the Majority is advocating that a new trial be granted because the Appellant was not permitted to introduce irrelevant evidence. Appellant attempted to introduce evidence that his former wife had also been seen choking young Billy, the victim of the prior child abuse incident. The purpose, of course, was to challenge the credibility of the witness and to create a doubt as to whether Appellant was, in fact, responsible for the alleged child abuse in the prior event. This would certainly be proper if the Appellant had denied having abused the child in the prior incident and had implicated his prior wife. At trial, Appellant was shown to have explained that Billy’s bruises were received from two older children who were staying temporarily with his family and who played roughly with Billy. He did not attempt to implicate his former wife as causing the bruises that took Billy to the hospital. Absent such an allegation, the evi*549dence that approximately one year after the stated incident she was seen choking Billy is totally irrelevant. This evidence was properly excluded and no new trial is warranted. I, therefore, must dissent from the grant of a new trial.