Court Opinion

ID: 9598984
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 01:13:37.088427+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:26:05.325147
License: Public Domain

SMITH, Judge,
concurring in part and dissenting in part.
I concur fully with Division 1 but must respectfully dissent from the majority’s holding in Division 2.
Barlow sought to present expert testimony on the narrow issue of the proper method of interrogating a child. His witness’s expertise lay in the field of adolescent family therapy. She stated that she had testified as an expert in other child abuse cases, giving her opinion about videotapes, specifically stating her opinion about interview techniques used in the tapes. The witness testified concerning standards used by her in evaluating videotaped interviews. She stated that these standards, generated by the American Psychological Association and the Georgia Psychological Association, are set out in textbooks and that she had learned about them in large part by attending continuing education seminars and workshops. When asked to identify the standards, the witness stated that the interview atmosphere should be comfortable and that the interview should be done promptly after the alleged abuse is reported. She emphasized that questions should be “very open-ended, especially of children ages six and seven and older.”
It is significant that the detective who primarily conducted the interview testified that he had attended numerous interview schools and child abuse investigation schools designed to instruct in methods for interviewing alleged child abuse victims. In fact, he was an instructor at schools concerning child abuse investigation. At these schools he learned, among other things, to ask open-ended, rather than leading questions.
With respect to the videotape in this case, the expert stressed the importance of open-ended questions and gave examples of proper questioning techniques.3 She found many of the questions posed by the interviewers to be leading, rather than open-ended. In particular, she noted the interviewer twice mentioned that the victim’s mother told him “something happened” involving Barlow. In the expert’s opinion, alluding to the victim’s mother while asking these leading questions could have influenced the victim’s answers. She also opined that the victim appeared to have been coached. She testified that the detail with which the victim told her story was unusual for a seven-year-old child and that it appeared to her the victim had told her *752story several times. The witness noted that the child was reinforced by the interviewers, who would tell her she was “smart” for saying “what she thinks he wants her to say.” She testified that “[a]ll children want to be patted on the back and told they’re smart.” The witness found the interview environment to be intimidating.
The information about which the expert testified was not within the ken of ordinary people. She did not testify about the ultimate issue: whether the victim had or had not been sexually abused. The focus of her testimony outside the jury’s hearing was on the interview techniques she observed and her professional opinion about the psychological effect on a child of these techniques. Her knowledge was gleaned from a body of psychological study found in textbooks and taught in classes and seminars. She testified to specific standards developed by a limited community of professionals, standards most likely unknown to a layperson. Her training, research, and evaluation of the tape qualified her to give an opinion concerning the interview techniques used by the detectives. Indeed, the fact that the detective who was the primary interviewer attended courses in interviewing children speaks of the necessity for training and education beyond that found from the experience of everyday life.
This information would have been helpful and necessary to assist the jury in assessing the videotape. As argued by defense counsel to the trial court, the information the expert would have shared with the jury “comes from some body . . . some authority ... an authority that has been studied, considered, digested, and can be applied, and opined about by” his expert. Without this information, although the trial court ruled that counsel could argue about certain aspects of the videotape, the jury did not have the benefit of psychological information needed to evaluate the effect of the techniques. In short, the jury was deprived of a “yardstick” against which to measure the arguments of counsel.
It is important to emphasize that to the extent Barlow intended that his expert testify concerning the victim’s credibility, such testimony was clearly impermissible; any determination concerning witness credibility is a matter solely within the jury’s province. See, e.g., Gorski v. State, 201 Ga. App. 122, 123 (2) (410 SE2d 338) (1991). But insofar as Barlow sought to introduce the testimony for the limited purpose of sharing a body of knowledge concerning the proper method of interviewing a child and the possible effect of techniques such as those used here, the trial court erred in excluding the expert’s testimony.
I am authorized to state that Presiding Judge Birdsong joins in this opinion.
*753Decided December 5, 1997
Cauthorn & Phillips, Thomas E. Cauthorn III, Bruce W. Phillips, for appellant.
Thomas J. Charron, District Attorney, Frank Ft. Cox, James Albertelli, Assistant District Attorneys, for appellee.

 For example, rather than ask “What did Tim do? Did he touch you somewhere?” the expert suggested a more proper question would be “Did something happen?” According to the expert, the former type of question effectively was “putting words in [the victim’s] mouth.”