Court Opinion

ID: 9756951
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 22:10:56.713679+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:28:33.769362
License: Public Domain

MACK, Associate Judge
(dissenting) :
In the circumstances of this case, I believe that it was an abuse of judicial discretion for the trial court to refuse the request of the appellant to reopen his defense. The theory of that defense was that appellant, who was indisputably a regular customer of the valet shop, was there on the day of the crime for legitimate purposes. Apart from the evidence of his association with the codefendant Dean at the time, the only direct evidence which linked appellant to the commission of the crime was supplied by the codefend-ant himself, who testified that he was handed the dresses by appellant, and that he, thinking they belonged to appellant, carried them from the shop, took them to his (Dean’s) grandmother’s house at a Tenth Street address and placed them on a balcony. In my opinion this testimony *387was crucial. There is no doubt, moreover, that the government considered it so. In his argument to the jury, government counsel conceded that, initially, the weakness in the government’s case against appellant had been that no one had seen appellant give the dresses to Dean. Counsel then told the jury that it need not be concerned about this weakness because Dean had testified subsequently that appellant handed him the dresses which he took to his grandmother’s house and placed on a balcony.
Appellant’s newly discovered evidence, proffered before the case went to the jury,1 allegedly would have shown through the testimony of a presumably independent witness then in court (as well as that of an investigator) that there was in fact no grandmother (of Dean at least), and that there were no balconies, and no stolen dresses left by Dean in the described house on the day in question.2 It is questionable whether this evidence could be termed collateral or “merely impeaching” even under the stringent standards looking to the finality of judgments when a motion comes long after trial. Cf. Heard v. United States, D.C.App., 245 A.2d 125 (1968). Under the larcenous circumstances here, where the accused did not leave the scene of the taking, and where the asportation was accomplished by another accused who supplied the only evidence of taking by the first accused, the immediate disposition of the fruits of the crime was so intertwined with the crime itself as to be inseparable. I cannot say that given the excluded testimony there was not a substantial possibility of appellant’s acquittal. Heard, supra at 126.
Moreover, we cannot assume that the “new trial” test of Heard applies to justify the exercise of the trial court’s discretion in denying a motion made prior to verdict. In Benton v. United States, 88 U.S.App.D.C. 158, 188 F.2d 625 (1951), a motion for a new trial was filed within five days after verdict for the purpose of presenting evidence of an impeaching nature. The court held that the motion was not required to be judged by strict standards of newly discovered evidence and that the standard to be applied was whether a new trial was required in the interest of justice. See also Brodie v. United States, 111 U.S.App.D.C. 170, 295 F.2d 157 (1961). With even greater reason, this latter standard should operate here.
I would reverse and remand for a new trial in the interest of justice.

. The parties rested and the jury was excused for the evening on one day; at the opening of court on the following morning, appellant’s counsel asked leave to present the testimony.

. Understandably the strongest objection to reopening came from counsel for the code-fendant Dean (to whom government counsel “deferred”), who argued that the request was for the purpose of destroying his client's defense and that if the case were reopened, he would be required to ask for a recess to seek further investigation for surebuttal — making for a trial ad infinitum. In denying reopening, the court observed that it would create “other and further issues in the case” and that the evidence did not go to the heart of the matter.