Court Opinion

ID: 9734738
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 17:44:46.055267+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:26:50.892363
License: Public Domain

Concurring Opinion
Prentice, J.
I concur in the result reached by the majorty. However, I do not agree that the critical issue is whether the trial court based its judgment upon the confidential extrajudicial inquiry nor in the anomaly that so long as the trial court’s decision does not rest primarily upon the results of the private interview, it is not error to exclude the results of the interview from the record.
As stated by the majority, a judgment based upon an extrajudicial inquiry cannot stand. Watkins v. Watkins (1943), 221 Ind. 293, 47 N. E. 2d 606. However, it is not logical to me that parties may agree to such an inquiry and at the same time restrict the weight to be accorded to the findings thereof. It is as though a party permitted inadmissible evidence to go before the jury and then contended that it could not consider it or could not determine the weight to be given to it. Without discounting the potential value of a confidential interview such, as was held in this case, I see no way to avoid a decision based entirely thereon, even though it be contrary to the evidence disclosed by the record. If parties consent to an extrajudicial inquiry, they must be held to have waived the right to question the sufficiency of the evidence, because *346the entire evidence is not available for review. Whether the trial judge’s decision does or does not rest principally upon the results of the extrajudicial inquiry is immaterial. This is true, because upon appeal we are concerned only with the reasonableness of the decision, assuming the truth of the testimony and the correctness of reasonable inferences favorable to it. We do not weigh the evidence nor speculate upon the weight accorded to it by the trier of the facts. Blackburn v. State (1973), 260 Ind. 5, 291 N. E. 2d 686; Turner v. State (1972), 259 Ind. 344, 287 N. E. 2d 339; Smith v. State (1970), 254 Ind. 401, 260 N. E. 2d 558.
Note. — Reported in 303 N. E. 2d 269.