Court Opinion

ID: 9704713
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 00:44:00.469285+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:22:04.604157
License: Public Domain

HENDERSON, Justice
(concurring in result).
I agree with the entirety of this opinion. However, I would strike the reference, as authority, to State v. Schwartzmiller, 107 Idaho 89, 92, 685 P.2d 830, 833 (1984), as (a) it is obiter dicta and inapposite to this decision, and (b) the holding therein is too extreme. It is not requisite to this holding. Further, I have dissented in some South Dakota cases cited as authority and do not desire to retroactively marry myself to their liberal “bad acts” holdings. This Court, I believe, was judicially erroneous in some of its “bad acts” decisions. In this case, I am firmly convinced that the trial court did not abuse its discretion by admitting evidence of other sexual contact between the defendant and the victim in Michigan. In my opinion, evidence of a pattern of conduct establishing (a) a regular and frequent sleeping arrangement and (b) resultant sexual contact perpetrated by the defendant demonstrates a common scheme, intent, and objective by the defendant to sexually contact his daughter. These “bad acts” were not remote in time. Roden, cited in the majority opinion, is recent and controlling authority in this Court to sustain the trial court’s ruling on admission of this evidence. There was no abuse of discretion in its evidentiary decision; thus, I join the majority opinion.