Court Opinion

ID: 9551982
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 19:02:54.249566+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:25:17.835859
License: Public Domain

Gunderson, C. J., and Batjer, J.,
dissenting:
We would remand for a new trial.
From appellant’s drug use some six months prior to the killing in question, the trial court permitted the prosecution to suggest the inference that appellant remained a narcotic user.
*101From the inferred fact that appellant remained a narcotic user, the prosecution was permitted to suggest the further inference that appellant had a present need for narcotic paraphernalia.
From a showing that the victim’s son had hidden narcotic paraphernalia in his mother’s home with appellant’s knowledge, and from the supposition that appellant had a need for the paraphernalia, the prosecution was permitted to suggest the further inference or supposition that such need provided a motive for the entry of Mrs. Nosler’s home.1
From the inferred fact or supposition that appellant had a motive to invade Mrs. Nosler’s home to satisfy his supposed continuing habit, the prosecution was permitted to suggest the ' further inference that he did so.
From the inferred fact or supposition that appellant invaded the victim’s home to satisfy his “narcotic habit,” the prosecution was permitted to suggest the further inference that, somehow, Mrs. Nosier caught appellant flagrante delicto, that she tried to prevent him from purloining the paraphernalia, and that a fatal altercation ensued between them.
Essentially, the prosecution was permitted to build inference upon inference, to suggest the ultimate inference that appellant was a narcotic user at the time of the killing, and therefore killed Mrs. Nosier while seeking to satisfy his need for drugs.
1. We think such reasoning, by which the prosecution would justify admitting highly inflamatory evidence of appellant’s prior drug use, intolerably remote under the weighing process which NRS 48.035 mandates. “To repeat an oft-quoted phrase, this was a case ‘where the minute peg of relevancy will be entirely obscured by the dirty linen hung upon it.’ State v. Goebel, 36 Wash.2d 367, 218 P.2d 300, 306 (1950), cited in McCormick, supra at 333 n. 28; United States v. Kahaner, supra, 317 F.2d at 472; and Lucero v. Donovan, supra, 354 F.2d at 22 n. 7.” DeVore v. United *102States, 368 F.2d 396 n. 4 (9 Cir. 1966). We find that reasoning process to which the majority accords evidentiary significance no more than rampant speculation. “The right of persons accused of crime to have the evidence confined to the issues on trial cannot be nullified by any such unrealistic hypothesis.” Lovely v. United States, 169 F.2d 386 (4 Cir. 1948).
2. We will not attempt to delineate all constitutional problems posed by the majority’s ruling. As one writer has noted, “a body of constitutional doctrine concerning the use of prior offenses evidence is in the making. That network of constitutional decisions will very likely form the basis for increasing consideration of the constitutional limits of the use of prior offenses evidence.” Bray, Evidence of Prior Uncharged Offenses and the Growth of Constitutional Restrictions, 28 U. Miami L. R. 489 (1974). We do, however, wish to notice one constitutional concern, prominent in the case before us.
The United States Supreme Court has held it unconstitutional to stigmatize drug addiction as a crime. Robinson v. California, 370 U.S. 660 (1962). Here, however, the majority in effect hold that a defendant’s status as a former drug addict may be shown to stigmatize him as crime-prone, thereby rendering him especially susceptible to conviction whenever other crimes may be charged against him. Cf. United States v. Burkhart, 458 F.2d 201 (10 Cir. 1972). “[A]n obvious truth is that once prior [offenses] are introduced the trial is, for all practical purposes, completed and the guilty outcome follows as a mere formality.” Id. at 204.
3. The prosecution suggests any error in admission of the evidence in question is harmless because other evidence linking appellant to the killing is overwhelming. We must reject such a rationale. Even were we to agree that the evidence overwhelmingly linked appellant to the killing, a proper new trial should be ordered. As we understand the majority to recognize, absent evidence of appellant’s drug-related activity a conviction for some lesser offense than first degree murder might result.
It is unnecessary to reach other issues.

 Contrary to the majority opinion, we find nothing in the testimony of the victim’s son to indicate that appellant knew where the son had hidden drugs prior to his imprisonment. The victim’s son referred repeatedly and solely to “outfits,” i.e., the paraphernalia by which addicts administer drugs to themselves. Transcript, pp. 367, 379, 380. Such paraphernalia, the victim’s son testified, is easy to obtain. Transcript, p. 379. In fact, the victim’s son testified, he never told his friends he had drugs “stashed” at his mother’s home, “because I didn’t never have that much.” Transcript, p. 379. He went on to say: “Well, like friends don’t look for your outfits.” Transcript, p. 380.