Court Opinion

ID: 9645843
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 21:36:51.407781+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:11:32.216743
License: Public Domain

Smith, J.,

dissenting:

I respectfully dissent.
The alleged statement of the victim to the officer was not part of the ret gettae. There was no attempt to show that the statement of the victim was a dying declaration. There is not even a suggestion that it was a dying declaration. The trial judge in his ruling on the proffer (in the portion omitted by the majority opinion) said:
“Although the condition of the deceased was then *164critical, although he did die presumably several days later, the testimony of Officer Brown and of also Officer Brice indicates that the deceased at that time thought that he was going to live, not die, as shown by the threats to get the defendant after he left the hospital or after he recovered. The rule is stated in Connor versus State, 225 Maryland, 543, 551 states: ‘Although it is not necessary for the victim to state that he expects to die, and it is enough if his condition is such as to warrant an inference of impending death, the rule also includes a provision that the victim must be aware that his physical condition is such that it would warrant an inference of impending death.’ The evidence here shows that the victim had no such idea. He expected to live based upon the testimony which has been received.”
All of this must be placed in the context that the testimony of Officer Brown on cross-examination which Smith seeks to contradict was relative to a conversation with the victim at the hospital approximately two days after the shooting. No reference whatever had been made on direct examination to a visit by the police to the victim at the hospital. On cross-examination Officer Brown was asked about the visit and then about any statements made to him or in his presence by the victim. Furthermore, the whole defense was accidental shooting. The proffered statement was double hearsay offered as a part of the case of the defense after the defendant had testified relative to her contentions that the shooting was accidental. It no doubt was an adroit attempt to undermine the testimony of Officer Brown that when he started to place Mrs. Smith under arrest at the scene of the crime “she broke away and kicked the victim in his wound,” and his addition, when inquiry was made as to what part of the victim’s body she kicked, “Directly in the wound.” There was also testimony that at that time she shouted, “I didn’t mean to shoot you, I meant to kill you.”
It is said in Underhill, Criminal Evidence § 237 (6th ed. P. *165Herrick, 1973) on the subject of “[i]mpeachment of adverse witness by means of his prior inconsistent statements”:
“A witness may be cross-examined, and also impeached or contradicted, as to any matter brought out on his direct examination, even though it is irrelevant or collateral. But as to matters brought out on cross-examination, any impeaching or contradictory statement must be relevant, competent, and admissible. The cross-examiner cannot, in other words, cross-examine upon collateral or irrelevant matters and then proceed to impeach the witness as to such collateral or irrelevant matters. If the prior statement is collateral or irrelevant and the witness denies making it, his answer is conclusive. The test whether the evidence offered in contradiction is admissible (that is, not collateral or irrelevant) is whether such evidence would be admissible for some purpose other than mere contradiction; or, in case of prior inconsistent statements, whether evidence of the facts stated would be so admissible.” Id. at 720.
Similar observations are found in 2 Wharton, Criminal Evidence § 467 (13th ed. Torcia 1972); 2 Poe, Pleading and Practice §§ 277 and 280 (5th ed. Tiffany 1925); 58 Am. Jur. Witnesses §§ 782-790 (1948); and 98 C.J.S. Witnesses §§ 386, 580, 611 and 633 (1957). What is “competent” evidence is well summed up in 29 Am.Jur.2d Evidence § 257 (1967).
Illustrations of what I understand to be the proper application of this rule are found in Attorney-General v. Hitchcock, 1 Exch. 91, 99-100, 102, 106 (1847), to which Judge Moylan made reference for the Court of Special Appeals in Smith v. State, 20 Md. App. 254, 259-60, 315 A. 2d 76 (1974); Cofer v. State, 158 Miss. 493, 130 So. 511 (1930); Williams v. State, 73 Miss. 820, 19 So. 826 (1896); Combs v. Winchester, 39 N. H. 13 (1859); State v. Tucker, 58 N. D. 82, 224 N. W. 878 (1929); and Hildeburn v. Curran, 65 Pa. 59 (1870). I infer from these cases and the authorities that any evidence *166which is not competent to be received as evidence in one’s case in chief cannot be introduced for the purpose of impeachment because, by definition, evidence that could not be introduced in one’s case in chief is “collateral” and a witness may not be impeached on a collateral matter.
I find what I understand to be the rule well summed up in W. Reynolds, Trial Evidence § 116 (1911):
“[T]he best test of whether the denial of a fact on cross-examination may be contradicted is this: ‘Would the cross-examining party be entitled to prove such fact as part of his case if it had not been alluded to in the cross-examination? ’ Hence, when a witness denies, on cross-examination, any fact tending to show that he is not impartial, such fact may be proved by other testimony, notwithstanding his denial; for the other party would have had the right to give evidence of that fact without having interrogated the witness in regard to it at all.”
The cross-examining party, Smith, would not have been able to prove by direct, substantive evidence as a part of her case 'either that the victim told the officer at the hospital some days after the event, not as a dying declaration, that the shooting was accidental, nor that the officer made such a statement to the investigator for the public defender’s office. Therefore, I would affirm. The precedent set here today by our brethren of the majority opens the door for ingenious counsel by a clever question on cross-examination of a state’s witness to suggest the whole defense and then to bolster that defense in the minds of the jury by evidence of no probative value. The majority’s ruling thus leaves unrestricted the ingenuity of counsel’s questions directed to the very heart of the defense and seriously undermines the rules of evidence.
I am authorized by Judge O’Donnell to say that he concurs in this opinion.