Court Opinion

ID: 9583848
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 22:42:33.808403+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:58:16.637166
License: Public Domain

ANDERSON, Justice
(dissenting).
I join in the dissent of Chief Justice Keith. As the Chief Justice states in his dissent, “due process does not require that the government provide the accused with any and all information which has the possibility of being relevant to the case.” To fall within the constitutional protection, the evidence must be exculpatory, that is, “both favorable to the accused and material to guilt or punishment.” Pennsylvania v. Ritchie, 480 U.S. 39, 57, 107 S.Ct. 989, 1001, 94 L.Ed.2d 40 (1987). See also State v. Paradee, 403 N.W.2d 640, 641-42 (Minn.1987) (advocating in camera review of private matters). The district court has the power to control the scope of cross-examination by prohibiting questions that are prejudicial, irrelevant, or otherwise improper. Ritchie, 480 U.S. at 53 n. 9, 107 S.Ct. at 999 n. 9. Using the words of Ritchie, the information in the complainant’s journals is neither favorable nor material to the defendant’s ease. Entries in the journals corroborate the complainant’s testimony that sexual penetration occurred, and these statements, if made at trial under oath, may well have been sufficient to support the jury’s determination that sexual penetration occurred. See State v. Steinbrink, 297 N.W.2d 291, 292 (Minn.1980). There is no reasonable probability that if the defendant had access to the journals, the result of the proceeding would have been different. The district court did not err in denying the defendant access to the journals.
I am writing separately, however, to express my concern about defendant’s assertion in his brief that the judge who presided at defendant’s trial “refused even to review the journals to determine whether they were discoverable * * *.” When defendant made a pretrial motion to obtain access to certain information, including the journals, the judge who heard this motion examined the journals in camera. That judge held that the journals were not discoverable. Just prior to trial, the state moved in limine to prevent the defendant from inquiring into or eliciting testimony regarding the journals or their contents. A different judge — the judge assigned to preside at the trial — heard this motion. Based upon information gleaned from a psychologist’s notes and a police investigative summary, defendant made an offer of proof that the journals did not include any reference to defendant’s engaging in sexual penetration with complainant. Defendant argued that the alleged silence in the journals, which were prepared contemporaneously *703with the events alleged to have occurred, was probative and exculpatory.
The record is unclear whether the judge who heard this later motion examined the journals. There is some evidence in the record that he did not. It is troubling if the judge who heard the motion and presided at trial did not review the journals. We said in Paradee that “the duty to disclose [probative materials] is ongoing; information that may be deemed immaterial upon original examination may become important as the proceedings progress, and the court would be obligated to release information material to the fairness of the trial.” 403 N.W.2d at 641 (quoting Ritchie, 480 U.S. at 60, 107 S.Ct. at 1003). While the record makes it clear in this case that any failure of the presiding judge to review the journals did not result in error, trial judges should be vigilant in their review of materials alleged to be probative so that the possibility of future errors may be avoided.