Court Opinion

ID: 9786519
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-30 23:57:21.232655+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:36:46.072247
License: Public Domain

Johnson, J.,
concurring: I concur with the majority but write separately to express my frustration with the K.S.A. 60-455 issue. Judge Greene has taken the hand of cards dealt to him by our mandatory precedent and played them well. However, declaring the other crimes evidence to be part of the res gestae and thus admissible independent of 60-455 to show one of the eight material facts specifically listed in the statute strikes me as so contrived that I experience a sensation akin to fingernails on a blackboard.
Reading K.S.A. 60-455 in a vacuum, stripped of prior interpretations and attempts to convert its provisions into a mathematical formula, I perceive, perhaps naively, a simple rule. In the criminal context, the State cannot present evidence that a defendant committed a specific bad act on another occasion solely to establish a *671bad character propensity as proof that the defendant must have committed the currently charged crime, i.e., defendant did bad before, therefore defendant must have done bad now. However, the statute continues, if the other bad act is relevant to the current crime, it is admissible.
Perhaps unfortunately, the drafters of the statute included exemplars of material facts to which the other crime evidence might be relevant. Notwithstanding the statutory word “including,” judicial interpretation has declared that to be admissible the other crime has to be relevant to one or more of the eight material facts specifically listed in the statute, i.e., the list is exclusive. State v. Bly, 215 Kan. 168, 175, 523 P.2d 397 (1974). Thus, other crime evidence relevant to the current prosecution is nevertheless excluded if it cannot be fit into one of the illustrative facts. Predictably, relevancy to some of the listed facts, notably intent and plan, have been considerably broadened.
Bly also imposed a jury instruction requirement on other crime evidence:
“Generally in every case where evidence of other crimes is admitted solely under the authority of 60-455 the trial court should give an instruction hmiting the purpose for which evidence of the similar offense is to be considered. [Citations omitted.] It should be noted, however, that where evidence disclosing another criminal offense has a direct bearing on and relation to the commission of the offense itself, it is admissible without a hmiting instruction. [Citation omitted.] Stated in another way, it is not prejudicially erroneous for the trial court to fail to give a hmiting instruction on the purpose of evidence of other crimes when the challenged evidence is admissible independently of K.S.A. 60-455. [Citation omitted.]” 215 Kan. at 176.
Since then, case law has mandated reversal if evidence admitted solely under K.S.A. 60-455 is not accompanied by a limiting jury instruction. State v. Whitehead, 226 Kan. 719, 722, 602 P.2d 1263 (1979).
Our courts have utilized Bly’s reference to independently admissible other crimes evidence to develop a parallel universe of reasons that prior crimes evidence can be admitted without reference to tire statutory list of “exclusive” material facts. See, e.g., State v. Clark, 261 Kan. 460, 471, 931 P.2d 664 (1997) (res gestae *672evidence relevant to motive, intent, and absence of mistake); State v. Jones, 247 Kan. 537, 547, 802 P.2d 533 (1990) (to establish relationship of the parties, the existence of a continuing course of conduct between the parties, or to corroborate the testimony of the complaining witness as to the act charged). As noted in the majority opinion, res gestae evidence must show “motive, opportunity, intent, preparation, plan, knowledge, identity, or absence of mistake.” State v. Edwards, 264 Kan. 177, 200, 955 P.2d 1276 (1998). These are the same material facts illustrated in 60-455. However, if the evidence is labeled “res gestae,” it is declared admissible independently of 60-455 and independently admissible evidence requires no limiting instruction. See State v. Wilson, 247 Kan. 87, 97, 795 P.2d 336 (1990).
I confess to being incapable of comprehending the distinction between statutorily admissible evidence “relevant to prove some other material fact” of die current crime under K.S.A. 60-455, and independently admissible evidence having “a direct bearing on and relation to the commission of the offense itself’ under Bly. 215 Kan. at 176. The evidence is either relevant to a specific fact in the current prosecution or it is offered to invoke character propensity reasoning. See Comment, Other Misconduct Evidence: Rethinking Kansas Statutes Annotated Section 60-455, 49 Kan. L. Rev. 145, 146 (2000). A plain reading of K.S.A. 60-455 excludes the character propensity reasoning evidence but allows the relevant evidence.
Fortunately, in this instance, under any analysis, the evidence of which Coburn complains was admissible. I would prefer to be able to consider the issue based on determining whether the only relevancy of the evidence was to establish character propensity. However, the current judicially created rules do not permit such a straightforward analysis.