Court Opinion

ID: 9741136
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 20:49:55.826813+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:24:22.488973
License: Public Domain

*510D. E. Holbrook, Jr., J.
(dissenting). The testimony of the police handwriting expert was essential to the prosecution in convicting the defendant. Without it the prosecution could not prove that the defendant was the person who delivered the guardrails to the scrapyard and received the money. Whether or not the trial court considered the scrapyard employee a perjurer, his testimony that he could not identify who delivered the guardrails must be controlling unless the handwriting analysis is admissible.
It is a general rule that this Court will not review a claimed error unless a timely objection is made. GCR 1963, 516.2. It is also a rule that an objection without specifying the grounds will not preserve the issue for appeal. Campbell v Charles J Rogers Construction Co, 58 Mich App 411, 416; 228 NW2d 398, 401 (1975). In the present case, although only a general objection was made when the police expert testified, the objection was renewed when the documents were admitted, and in another context, in detail. Furthermore, the documents that the expert relied on were not admitted until the close of the people’s proofs and defense counsel during cross-examination of the police expert challenged the expert’s basis for relying on the documents.
Turning to the merits of the defendant’s claim, I conclude that the prosecution failed to establish that the signature on the receipt was the defendant’s. Before a comparison of handwriting can be made it is necessary that there be at least one genuine handwriting sample. MCLA 600.2144; MSA 27A.2144. The police expert acknowledged on cross-examination that he was not familiar with the defendant’s handwriting. Champion v Champion, 368 Mich 84; 117 NW2d 107 (1962), Vinton v *511Peck, 14 Mich 287 (1866), see McCormick, Evidence (2d ed), § 221, p 547. Furthermore, unlike People v Lambath, 297 Mich 349; 297 NW 519 (1941), there was no proof that the defendant signed the receipt, in fact that is what the prosecution was seeking to prove. Consequently, in order to establish that the signature on the receipt was the defendant’s the prosecution was required first to show that the signatures on the time sheet were the defendant’s. Without establishing that, all the prosecution is able to show is that the signature on the receipt is the same as the signatures on the time sheet. Flickema v Henry Kraker Co, 252 Mich 406, 410; 233 NW 362, 363 (1930), First National Bank of Houghton v Robert, 41 Mich 709, 711; 3 NW 199 (1879). Since the signatures are the only way to link the defendant to the crime, this is not enough to support a conviction.
The relevancy of the time sheet depends on the fact that signatures on the time sheet are in fact the defendant’s. Because the statements are being used to prove the truth of the matter asserted, i.e., that the signature is the defendant’s, it is necessary to find a hearsay exception. McCormick, Evidence, § 246. The applicable exception in this case is the business records exception to the hearsay rule since the time sheets are kept as a normal course of the employer’s business. MCLA 600.2146; MSA 27A.2146, People v Kirtdoll, 391 Mich 370; 217 NW2d 37 (1974). However, it is necessary that a business record be authenticated before it is admitted into evidence. People v Kirtdoll, supra, at 387, Flickema v Henry Kraker Co, supra, at 409.
In this case, the time sheets that were introduced did not have a proper foundation. In order to lay the proper foundation for the admission of the time sheets, the prosecution should have pro*512duced the person in charge of the employment records. This would have permitted defense counsel the opportunity to challenge the authenticity of the records and the methods by which they were kept. People v Kirtdoll, supra.
In order to use an expert in handwriting analysis it is necessary to have a proven genuine signature. First National Bank of Houghton v Robert, supra. In this case there is no proven signature of the defendant so that the expert had nothing on which to base his opinion. Without either the expert’s opinion or the time sheets as evidence, the trier of fact could not have found through competent evidence that the defendant in fact made the delivery of the guardrails to the scrapyard.
I would reverse and remand for a new trial.