Court Opinion

ID: 9544723
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 17:00:47.818909+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:13:32.459078
License: Public Domain

THOMAS, Justice,
specially concurring.
I concur in all that is said in the majority opinion of this court except for the first sentence of footnote 3. As I understood that particular language, it leaves open a question which, according to my interpretation, the majority opinion has resolved. I hasten to add that it is resolved correctly.
In my opinion, in at least some situations an adversary in a trial contest, must be permitted to follow a procedure described in the title to § 57, Ch. 6, McCormick on Evidence (West Publishing Company 1954) as “fighting fire with fire.” In such an instance, when inadmissible evidence has been admitted which is relevant and for that reason probably damaging to the adversary’s case, or though irrelevant is likely to arouse prejudice to a material degree, the adversary having objected seasonably should be entitled to give answering evidence as a matter of right. He should not be foreclosed from assigning error on appeal if he does exactly that and still loses in the trial court. If this were not the rule he would be required to preserve his point on appeal at the cost of essentially abandoning his prospect of winning the lawsuit at the first opportunity. I know that there does exist an opposite view, but the approach of fighting fire with fire has found favor in several courts. United States v. DeCarlo, 458 F.2d 358, 372, n.1 (3rd Cir. 1972) (dissenting opinion), cert. denied 409 U.S. 843, 93 S.Ct. 107, 34 L.Ed.2d 83; United States v. Konovsky, 202 F.2d 721, 727 (7th Cir. 1953); and Salt Lake City v. Smith, 104 F. 457, 471 (8th Cir. 1900). Cf., United States v. Meneses-Davila, 580 F.2d 888 (5th Cir. 1978).
In the instant case the majority opinion permits the appellant to urge as error a *1205ruling permitting the introduction of evidence which should not have been admitted, and grants the appellant relief on this point even though the appellant introduced, in response, evidence of a similar nature designed to explain the earlier inadmissible evidence. This proposition is inherent in the ratio decidendi of this case. It is a correct resolution of the matter, and the position of this court should not be eroded by the footnote language.