Court Opinion

ID: 9577047
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 21:31:11.771917+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:19:52.947774
License: Public Domain

Fletcher, Justice,
concurring specially.
I agree fully with the analysis and conclusion of Justice Sears’ special concurrence; admission of the prior act evidence here was error, but harmless.
The majority’s opinion has taken whatever little viability remained in the rule that a defendant’s prior bad acts are generally inadmissible. Evidence that the defendant “ ‘committed another crime wholly independent from that for which he is on trial, even though it be a crime of the same sort, is irrelevant and inadmissible’ ” unless a logical connection exists between the two.2 Rarely, will mere similarity be sufficient to establish a logical connection between a prior act and the charged offense.3 We have recognized that allowing prior crimes to show intent solely because of similarity would abolish the general rule of admissibility because intent is an essential element in nearly every crime.4 *The majority, by focusing on Farley’s “ ‘bent of mind’ or ‘course of conduct’ in initiating or continuing such encounters”5 allows the state to prove intent with a prior bad act if any remote similarity connects it to the charged offense. The similarities the majority seizes upon in this case, however, are not a logical link between the two incidents. Thus, the court is permitting the exceptions to swallow the rule.
Additionally, the majority’s assertion that a “finding that ‘other transactions’ evidence is relevant necessarily constitutes an implicit finding that the probative value of that evidence outweighs its prejudicial impact”6 is an incorrect statement of the law of evidence. Prejudice is not a consideration in determining relevancy. It is a consideration in determining admissibility only after the court determines that the evidence is relevant.7 And “[r]elevancy is determined *628by answering the following question: ‘[D]oes the evidence offered render the desired inference more probable than it would be without the evidence?’ ”8
The majority also incorrectly asserts that “evidence ... so attenuated and dissimilar as to lack relevancy . . . should be excluded because its prejudice outweighs its probative value.”9 Under such circumstances, it is not necessary to weigh the prejudicial impact. Rather, the evidence is inadmissible because it does not tend to prove any material issue in the case; therefore, it has no probative value and should be excluded as irrelevant.10

 Bacon v. State, 209 Ga. 261, 262 (71 SE2d 615) (1952).

 “Signature” crimes such as manual strangulation may provide that rare exception. See Lundy v. State, 265 Ga. 30 (453 SE2d 466) (1995).

 Bacon at 263-264.

 Majority op. at 623.

 Majority op. at 625.

 See Smith v. State, 255 Ga. 685, 686 (341 SE2d 451) (1986) (“[wjhere an issue is raised, as to whether the probative value of evidence is outweighed by its tendency to ‘unduly arouse the jury’s emotions of prejudice, hostility or sympathy’ the trial judge has discretion to be exercised in determining admissibility”), quoting McCormick on Evidence (2d ed.) p. 439, § 185; Shaw v. State, 241 Ga. 308, 311 (245 SE2d 262) (1978) (trial judge has discretion to exclude evidence if “its prejudicial impact substantially outweighed its probative value”).

 Smith, 255 Ga. at 686, quoting McCormick on Evidence (2d ed.) p. 437, § 185.

 Majority op. at 625.

 OCGA § 24-2-1 (“Irrelevant matter should be excluded”).