Court Opinion

ID: 9714822
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 05:46:22.088141+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:23:28.871642
License: Public Domain

DeBRULER, Justice,
dissenting.
Without hubris, I dissent. In the cases which have considered the evidentiary value of the defendant's notices of alibi, the Court has concluded that they are prior statements of the defendant, and are to be treated as such. This Court has authorized their use as evidence by the prosecution upon a proper foundation to impeach the defendant's own trial testimony. Mengon v. State (1987), Ind., 505 N.E.2d 788. Randall v. State (1983), Ind., 455 N.E.2d 916. This Court has not authorized their use as evidence by the prosecution for other purposes, and I would not do so.
The majority concludes that the defendant's prior statements within his formal notices of alibi, are admissible to rebut the testimony of his alibi witnesses. I disagree. Such use does not square with the fifth amendment. In Williams v. Florida, 399 U.S. 78, 90 S.Ct. 1893, 26 LEd.2d 446 (1970), the Supreme Court held that alibi notices are legally obtained by the prosecution. However the Court was quick to point out that such notices had not been used as evidence against the defendant in that case. The case does not approve the direct use of such notices as rebuttal evidence.
The purpose of our alibi statute is to prevent the prosecution from being taken by a surprise defense. This purpose can be fully served without according the alibi notice evidentiary value, apart from its use as a prior inconsistent statement to impeach the defendant's own alibi testimony. In fact, because it is a pleading serving a notice function and is partly the work of the defendant and partly the work of the defense counsel, it has very little direct evidentiary value, while carrying a significant propensity to confound and confuse the jury. That propensity looms large here, as the conflict between the notices provides the basis for a jury inference that the defendant is a liar and cheat and probably guilty.
KRAHULIK, J., concurs.