Court Opinion

ID: 9716908
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 06:53:40.351744+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:23:49.936048
License: Public Domain

DeBRULER, Justice,
dissenting.
In this case the defense was prepared to present two live witnesses, C.P. and E.J., who were prepared to testify under oath *1151that T.C. had made a false accusation against C.P. of sexual misconduct. The misconduct attributed to C.P. by T.C. did not involve oral-genital contact, and was therefore different in nature from appellant’s alleged criminal acts. Nevertheless, the sexual misconduct of C.P. was said by T.C. to have taken place during the same month as and in the same park as the sexual attack of appellant upon his brother. T.C. was ten years old. As pointed out by the majority opinion, we know that the law countenances a conviction based upon the uncorroborated testimony of a single competent witness. Lawhorn v. State (1983), Ind., 452 N.E.2d 915. We also know that it is impermissible in Indiana to give a jury instruction that the testimony of a child must be corroborated or must be given careful scrutiny or cautious examination. Lewis v. State (1976), 264 Ind. 288, 342 N.E.2d 859. The rationale of these decisions is based upon existence of a fair opportunity to confront and cross-examine witnesses before the trier of fact. If it be true that T.C. made a false accusation of sexual misconduct against C.P., as defense counsel was prepared to prove, can it be said that the jury fulfilled its duty of judging the credibility of T.C.? I think not.
In this case, the trial judge was undoubtedly faced with a difficult question. The testimony was excluded through application of Indiana’s rule against impeachment of witnesses by showing specific acts of misconduct not reduced to conviction, and upon the Rape Shield statute as well. Those are important rules indeed, but in this situation they must give way to the basic right of the accused to cross examine the prosecution’s witnesses at a criminal trial. Davis v. Alaska (1974), 415 U.S. 308, 94 S.Ct. 1105, 39 L.Ed.2d 347. Alternatively, as a matter of State substantive law, I would apply an exception to these exclusionary rules of evidence when the prosecution’s case rests primarily upon the testimony of a single eye witness who admits having made a prior accusation of similar sexual misconduct. The admissibility of such prior accusations was first recognized in Little v. State (1980), Ind.App., 413 N.E.2d 639, and Hall v. State (1978), 176 Ind.App. 59, 374 N.E.2d 62. When at trial this situation arises, the credibility of the State’s witness emerges as crucial to conviction. Any ensuing mini-trial to be conducted upon the truth or falsity of such prior accusation, restrained in scope by the exercise of discretion by the trial judge, is as I see it, a necessary cost imposed upon the witnesses and the criminal justice system, by the basic right to confront and cross-examine.
The main purpose of the Rape Shield statute is to prevent the harrassment of witnesses, primarily women, who testify in support of a claim of sexual victimization. I see the Little-Hall exception as not inconsistent with such purpose. In Carter v. State (1983), Ind., 451 N.E.2d 639, we held that the questioning of a prosecutrix in a rape case about whether she had previously charged other persons with sexual misconduct against her, “.. was clearly directed towards the past sexual activity and reputation of the prosecuting witness .. ”, and was therefore improper under the statute. Here, by contrast, the defense had two, not just one, live witnesses prepared to prove the existence of the prior charges of sexual misconduct and their falsity. It could not be correctly said of a similar question to T.C. in this case, that it was directed towards his past sexual activity rather than his past lies about sexual misconduct in the park, and thus his propensity to exaggerate or falsify about sexual matters.