Court Opinion

ID: 9526191
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 03:13:59.133701+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:09:15.015011
License: Public Domain

Dissenting Opinion
DeBruler, J.
I dissent and would reverse the verdict of of the trial court, because of the admission into evidence of the color photograph of decedent lying on the autopsy table. The majority opinion has described the subject matter of the photograph. The photograph is not material or relevant, nor does it tend to prove or disprove any material fact in issue. Kiefer v. State, (1958) 239 Ind. 103, 153 N.E.2d 899, 903, and cases cited therein.
The decedent’s chest laid open has no remote relevance to any issue in this case. The heart held in a hand is not instructive to the jury. While a clear photograph of the heart alone, focused on the point of entry of the bullet, would have some relevance to cause of death, this photograph, unexplained, distracts the viewer because it includes so much that is irrelevant and does not show the point of entry clearly. It is not possible to determine anything about the circumstances or cause of death, the condition of the victim’s body or the wounds of the victim from this photograph. On the other hand, such a distorted photograph unquestionably shocks anyone who looks at it. Although the jury may intellectually know that appellant had nothing to do with the wounds to the body made by the scalpel, such a photograph emphasizes the horror of the death of the victim. Seeing the victim in pieces tends to make it seem impossible that she could have shot first, before appellant who, though wounded, is very much alive.
In this case, where the question of self-defense was a close one, since the decedent fired shots at appellant, the error in admitting an irrelevant photograph, showing the victim in a physical condition far worse than the condition caused by the *712bullet, could not be harmless error. The effect of a very-prejudicial photograph on a jury must be weighed against its relevancy, and where the relevance is minimal and the prejudice to the particular theory of defense is great, to admit the photograph is reversible error.
Note. — Reported at 338 N.E.2d 264.