Court Opinion

ID: 9728475
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 14:09:01.927485+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:25:48.872729
License: Public Domain

N. J. Kaufman, J.
(dissenting in part, concurring in part). I must lodge a partial dissent to the position taken by my colleagues. I do not agree *684that impropriety arose from the admission of similar acts evidence on the facts of this case.
There were only two instances wherein testimonial references were made to uncharged similar acts defendant might have engaged in with the complainant. On direct examination, the complainant first indicated that the defendant might have taken liberties with him on prior occasions, but, he wasn’t sure. Then, the complainant answered affirmatively when asked if prior incidents had occurred. On cross-examination, complainant recanted, indicating he did not know if he had ever done anything with the defendant before. The complainant was a confused, nervous and possibly frightened nine-year-old boy. Testimonial inconsistencies can be understood and anticipated in such situations. I do not feel that this testimony can be said to have improperly introduced similar acts into evidence.
The second testimonial reference came with the examination of the protective services worker. She testified, on direct examination, that the complainant had told her of various dates upon which similar acts occurred. On cross-examination, defense counsel interrogated the witness further in this particular area. I believe that this inquiry was part of a defense strategy to discredit the complainant by exhibiting the inconsistencies and contradictions in the complainant’s testimony. Another stratagem might have been to highlight the physical impossibility of the task attributed to the defendant by emphasizing the frequency with which these incidents allegedly occurred.
In either event, I do not feel that this cause should be reversed due to the improper admission of similar acts evidence. The complainant’s testimony did not generate such an error, and the *685protective services worker’s testimony merely consisted of matters the complainant had related to her outside the courtroom.
Another factor worthy of note which supports the idea that defense counsel utilized the protective services worker’s testimony as part of a defense strategy is that defense counsel never objected to the introduction of similar acts evidence. No motions were made to suppress such evidence under the similar acts statute and the trial court was never called upon to rule in this area.1 The only motion made that might possibly encompass this subject matter was a prosecutorial motion to exclude evidence of the complainant’s prior sexual activities with third persons brought under the restrictive evidence provision of the criminal sexual conduct statute. The trial court granted this motion, and defendant premises one of his allegations of error thereupon. At trial, however, defense counsel questioned the complainant in defiance of the court’s admonition and received an answer. Thus, evidentiary exclusion under the restrictive evidence provision did not work to defendant’s prejudice.
I disagree with the majority only on the similar *686acts issue. I join in their treatment of defendant’s remaining allegation. Accordingly, I would affirm defendant’s criminal sexual conduct conviction, reverse his habitual offender guilty plea, and remand this cause for resentencing upon the former conviction.

 Even though I do not feel the testimony herein brought the similar acts issue to the fore, if it had, I would favor admission. Such has been the state of the law for over 100 years. As Mr. Justice Christiancy stated in People v Jenness, 5 Mich 305, 323-324 (1858), an appeal from a conviction of incest:
"[W]here a witness has testified to a fact or transaction which, standing alone and entirely unconnected with anything which led to or brought it about, would appear in any degree unnatural or improbable in itself, without reference to the facts preceding and inducing the principal transaction, and which, if proved, would render it more natural and probable; such previous facts are not only admissible and relevant, but they constitute a necessary part of such principal transactions — a link in the chain of testimony, without which it would be impossible for the jury properly to appreciate the testimony in reference to such principal transaction.” (Emphasis in original.)
See also People v DerMartzex, 390 Mich 410; 213 NW2d 97 (1973).