Court Opinion

ID: 9739945
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 20:23:58.689473+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:24:14.901337
License: Public Domain

*581ANN WALSH BRADLEY, J.
¶ 91. (dissenting). Although I have misgivings with the majority's expansive application of the greater latitude rule, I write separately to address its attempt to fit the "square peg" of prior acts evidence into the "round hole" of an acceptable statutory purpose of motive, plan, or scheme.
¶ 92. Wisconsin Stat. § (Rule) 904.04(2) warns that prior acts evidence is not admissible to prove the character or propensity of the person charged with an offense. Although there exist limited purposes for which such prior acts may be admitted, the "general rule is to exclude evidence of other bad acts to prove a person's character in order to show that the person acted according to his character in committing the present act." State v. Fishnick, 127 Wis. 2d 247, 253, 378 N.W.2d 272 (1985).
¶ 93. Our other acts jurisprudence in child sexual assault cases continues to veer farther from the prohibition against propensity evidence set forth under Wis. Stat. § (Rule) 904.04(2). Today the majority continues the trend in eroding the statutory mandate. Its attempt to link Davidson's prior conviction to an acceptable statutory purpose is a thinly veiled endorsement of the unrestricted use of propensity evidence in child sexual assault cases.
¶ 94. In Whitty v. State, 34 Wis. 2d 278, 292, 149 N.W.2d 557 (1967), this court noted the danger in admitting prior acts evidence. The court set forth reasons for limiting the use of such evidence: 1) the overwhelming tendency to presume the defendant guilty because he is a person likely to commit such acts; 2) the tendency to condemn not because of the defendant's actual guilt but because he may have escaped punishment for previous acts; 3) the injustice in attacking a person who is not prepared to show that the *582evidence used for attack is fabricated; and 4) the confusion of issues that may result from the introduction of other crimes. Id.
¶ 95. Despite Whitty's admonitions, the majority sanctions the admission of Davidson's prior act by contorting the definitions of the acceptable purposes enumerated under Wis. Stat. § (Rule) 904.04(2). The majority approves the use of the prior act to establish motive and erroneously subscribes to the view that motive is an element of second-degree sexual assault of a child. Majority op. at ¶¶ 59, 65. It is not. "While motive may be shown as a circumstance to aid in establishing the guilt of a defendant, the State is not required to prove motive on the part of a defendant in order to convict." Wis JI — Criminal 175.
¶ 96. Sexual gratification is inherent in the crime of sexual assault, and a defendant's conduct reveals this purpose. When the identity of the defendant is in issue or there is a claim that the sexual contact was "innocent" and occurred by mistake, prior acts evidence may be relevant. State v. Friedrich, 135 Wis. 2d 1, 53, 398 N.W.2d 763 (1987) (Heffernan, C.J., dissenting). In this case Davidson did not assert a defense of mistake or raise the issue of identity, but rather he asserted that the alleged assault never occurred. Thus, neither motive nor even the purpose of sexual gratification was at issue.
¶ 97. The circuit court acknowledged as much in one of its earlier motion hearings to determine the admissibility of Davidson's prior conviction. Aware that Davidson's defense to the charge was that the sexual assault never occurred, the court noted:
As far as plan or motive, like I say, the defendant has a good point on that. Quite simply, that if you *583get to the incident happening at all, plan or motive is no longer a serious issue. That's the way I see the case, at this point.
Nevertheless, the circuit court subsequently retreated and allowed the conviction into evidence not solely to establish motive, which the court recognized would be unfairly prejudicial, but additionally to establish plan, scheme, or opportunity. This decision was an erroneous exercise of discretion.
¶ 98. By allowing the prior act into evidence to establish motive, the circuit court admitted propensity evidence that it acknowledged would be highly prejudicial. In effect, this evidence suggested to the jury that because Davidson previously had committed a sexual assault against a minor, he had the proclivity to perpetrate an assault upon his 13-year-old niece. Davidson was thereby subjected to defending against both his present charge and a past act for which he had already served his punishment.
¶ 99. The majority cites several cases in support of its liberal admission of prior acts evidence under the guise of motive. See State v. Plymesser, 172 Wis. 2d 583, 593, 493 N.W.2d 367 (1992); Friedrich, 135 Wis. 2d at 22; Fishnick, 127 Wis. 2d at 260-61. These cases warrant a thorough re-examination, however, because they validate the indiscriminate use of other acts evidence when motive is not at issue and when the defendant's conduct alone establishes the purpose of sexual gratification.
¶ 100. Both Fishnick and Friedrich do contain the magic cautionary words: "[o]ther-acts evidence is admissible when probative of the elements of a crime, subject to the general rule excluding character evidence." Fishnick, 127 Wis. 2d at 250; Friedrich, 135 Wis. 2d at 22. However, the words of caution have a *584toothless effect here because the majority's analysis is tantamount to a blanket rule permitting character evidence in child sexual assault cases. This approach amounts to an unwarranted relaxation of the eviden-tiary standard under Wis. Stat. § (Rule) 904.04(2).
¶ 101. In further relaxation of this evidentiary standard, the majority approves the use of Davidson's 10-year-old conviction to prove plan or scheme under the statute. "Evidence showing a plan establishes a definite prior design, plan or scheme which includes the doing of the act charged." State v. Spraggin, 77 Wis. 2d 89, 99, 252 N.W.2d 94 (1977). This requires more than a similarity between the prior act and the charged offense. Indeed, there must be a linkage between the two acts that permits the conclusion that the prior act led to the commission of the charged offense. State v. DeKeyser, 221 Wis. 2d 435, 448, 585 N.W.2d 668 (Ct. App. 1998). See also Friedrich, 135 Wis. 2d at 39 (Heffernan, C.J., dissenting) (citing Cleary, McCormick on Evidence, § 190, p.559 (3d ed. 1984)).
¶ 102. The threshold measure for this similarity is nearness of time, place, and circumstance of the other act to the alleged offense. Hough v. State, 70 Wis. 2d 807, 814, 235 N.W.2d 534 (1975). It is difficult to imagine how Davidson's sexual contact with a six-year-old girl in the basement of a church constituted a step towards the commission, a decade later, of the alleged assault of his 13-year-old niece in a family camper. The two acts represent distinct events, separated by a significant period of time and occurring at different places under dissimilar circumstances. They are not part of a particular plan to achieve a specific purpose.
¶ 103. To justify the admission of Davidson's prior conviction, the majority nevertheless asserts that there exist striking similarities between the two acts in *585the potential for discovery, the vulnerability of the minor victims, and the type of sexual contact involved. The majority's assertion is unpersuasive. I agree with the court of appeals that the likelihood of discovery in a church basement while people are either upstairs or down the hall in a separate room is markedly different than the potential for discovery in a situation in which family members are sleeping four or five feet away.
¶ 104. Furthermore, although both victims were vulnerable because they were minors, the vulnerability of a six-year-old approached by a stranger differs considerably from the vulnerability of a 13-year-old confronted by her uncle with other family members nearby. Finally, the type of sexual contact presented in both incidents, the touching of the girls between their legs, is a type of contact unfortunately at issue in an overwhelming number of sexual assault cases.
¶ 105. The general similarities between the two incidents do not reveal a unified plan or scheme to justify the use of Davidson's prior conviction in his prosecution for sexually assaulting his niece. The majority's approval of Davidson's prior conviction as admissible other acts evidence stands in direct contravention of Whitty, 34 Wis. 2d at 292, which expressed utmost concern over the potential of unfair prejudice and urged the exercise of restraint in admitting prior acts evidence.
¶ 106. As the court of appeals noted, this court recently reaffirmed the vitality of Whitty in State v. Sullivan, 216 Wis. 2d 768, 775, 576 N.W.2d 30 (1998). Although not a sexual assault case, Sullivan recognized the significant danger underlying the liberal acceptance of prior acts evidence. Yet, the majority pays only lip service to Sullivan and overlooks the rein-vigoration of Whitty. It accomplishes this by applying *586the three-prong test in its analysis while ignoring the substance of Sullivan's holding, which requires a careful determination of prior acts so that unfair prejudice through the use of character evidence is avoided.
¶ 107. This court now has an established pattern of admitting prohibited propensity evidence. In a rare exception to this established pattern, the court recently approved the exclusion of other acts evidence in a sexual assault case. However, predictably it was in a case in which the defendant, not the State, sought to introduce the evidence. See State v. Scheidell, 227 Wis. 2d 285, 595 N.W.2d 661 (1999). The majority reached this conclusion notwithstanding its acknowledgement that a less stringent standard for admissibility applies when a defendant offers prior acts for purposes of exoneration. Id. at 304.
¶ 108. Unfortunately our post -Whitty jurisprudence consistently reveals that courts may freely permit prior acts evidence in child sexual assault cases to show the defendant's propensity to abuse children. Despite Sullivan's valiant attempt to revitalize Whitty and its call to exercise restraint in prior acts determinations, this court has once again contorted the definitions of the acceptable statutory purposes to meet the facts.
¶ 109. Rather than endeavoring to stretch beyond repair the definitions of the acceptable purposes under Wis. Stat. § (Rule) 904.04(2), the majority should simply lay all its cards on the table and acknowledge that it is sanctioning the blanket use of propensity evidence in child sexual assault cases. However, the majority maintains its refuge under the cloak of the very statute it simultaneously erodes. The dissimilarities between Davidson's prior act and present charge are pronounced and do not serve to establish *587any acceptable purpose under Wis. Stat. § (Rule) 904.04(2). Instead, Davidson's prior conviction constitutes propensity evidence excluded under the statute.
¶ 110. An honest and forthright approach by the majority would serve us all better than perpetrating the artifice of adherence to Wis. Stat. § (Rule) 904.04(2). Because the majority engages in legal gymnastics to justify the admission of propensity evidence in contravention of the statute, I dissent.
¶ 111. I am authorized to state that CHIEF JUSTICE SHIRLEY S. ABRAHAMSON and JUSTICE WILLIAM A. BABLITCH join this dissenting opinion.