Court Opinion

ID: 9747228
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-27 15:04:35.428997+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:43:40.729636
License: Public Domain

WILNER, Judge,
dissenting, in which RODOWSKY and RAKER, JJ., join.
The Court concludes today that the general preclusion against the admission of “other crimes” evidence, called for by Maryland Rule 5-404(b), applies only when such evidence is offered against the defendant in a criminal case. It further concludes, as a corollary to that limitation, that when “other crimes” evidence is offered by a defendant to show a propensity on the part of a State’s witness for criminal behavior, as an aid in establishing the defendant’s defense, it is reversible error to exclude the evidence. The Court then holds that its second precept was violated in this case when the court, in ruling on the State’s motion in limine, stated that it would not allow a police officer to testify that, while being driven home from the hospital, the victim identified a person on the street as her brother, that a person later identified as Tyrone Pittman then approached the car and complained that the person the victim just identified as her brother had robbed him, and that the victim then hedged on whether the person she had identified was, or was not, her brother.
I have a problem with the underlying legal conclusion reached by the Court — I think that the Court has gone too far in its approach and laid down a rule that is unnecessarily rigid — but the more serious problem is that the issue the Court reaches out to decide is not really in this case. For one *296thing, evidence regarding the statements made by the victim was admitted into evidence through cross-examination of the victim. The only evidence excluded was the rank hearsay accusation made by Pittman, and that was excluded because it was hearsay, irrelevant, and, on balance, unduly prejudicial to the State. There is no basis, on this record, to reverse the judgment entered by the circuit court.
The State’s case was presented largely through the testimony of Tracy and Kelly Dillon. Tracy Dillon, who was about 33 years old at the time of the event, testified that, as she was returning home from the store at around 7:00 — 7:30 on Christmas Eve, 1996, she was attacked by Sessoms, who, at knife-point, dragged her into an alley, raped her, allowed her briefly to leave — to go back onto the street — but, when he noticed other people on the street, forced her back into the alley and raped her again. Tracy said that she dropped her scarf and two dollars where the attack occurred. When she was finally released, she ran toward her home and encountered her younger brother, Kelly, and a friend of his. She had blood on her hands and dirt and leaves on her body and in her hair. The injury to her hand occurred, she said, when Sessoms tripped her as she tried to run, and she fell on a piece of glass or metal. Hysterical, she reported what had occurred, and the three went looking for the assailant. When they reached a corner several blocks away, they saw Sessoms coming up the street. Even before Tracy identified him and before anyone accused him of anything, he announced that “I didn’t do nothing to her.” Tracy said that her assailant had on a certain cologne, the scent of which got on to her during the attack. Kelly smelled Sessoms and Tracy and determined that they exuded the same scent, whereupon he and his friend proceeded to beat Sessoms severely.
The beating was apparently administered in the middle of the street, and eventually the police were summoned. As they were arriving, Kelly and his friend fled. Kelly said they left because they each had outstanding warrants against them. The police thus found Tracy standing beside Sessom’s barely conscious or unconscious body. She reported the rape and led *297the police to where it had occurred. Her scarf and two one dollar bills were found at that location; the knife was never recovered. Sessoms was arrested and taken to the hospital. Tracy also went to the hospital for examination. Although no traces of semen were found, abrasions on her neck and elbow and lacerations in her anal-genital region consistent with non-consensual sex were observed.
In the course of trial preparation, defense counsel learned that Kelly Dillon had a number of prior robbery convictions, including a conviction for a robbery that occurred on December 26 — two days after the alleged attack on Tracy. He also learned that Kelly had been charged with the robbery of Tyrone Pittman that occurred in the early morning hours of Christmas Day — just hours after the attack on Tracy — but that the charge had been nol prossed. In the police report in the Pittman file was a notation by Officer Shipp that, as he was driving Tracy home from the hospital in the early morning hours of Christmas Day, Tracy pointed out a person and identified him as her brother, that Pittman then approached the car and asserted that Kelly had just robbed him, whereupon Tracy equivocated on whether Kelly was her brother.
Counsel apparently intended to call Officer Shipp as a witness and elicit that information from him — the two statements by Tracy and the accusation by Pittman. Counsel suggested at one point that what really occurred that night was that Kelly and his friend had robbed Sessoms and then beat him and that the charge of rape was simply a fabrication. The accusation by Pittman would show that Kelly was a serial robber, that if he robbed Pittman, he probably also robbed Sessoms, and that Tracy’s inconsistent statements regarding whether the person she identified was her brother went to her credibility. The State moved in limine to exclude that evidence as being both hearsay and irrelevant. The State had no objection to counsel’s asking Kelly about his prior convictions for robbery, his asking Tracy about her identification of Kelly and her subsequent equivocation in that identification, or to allowing Sessoms to testify that he was robbed by Kelly, but it asserted that (1) eliciting statements by Tracy or Pittman *298through the officer was impermissible as hearsay, and (2) Pittman’s complaint about being robbed by Kelly was irrelevant to any issue regarding whether Sessoms raped Tracy, especially as the charge arising from that incident was later nol pressed.
The court agreed with the State. It said that it would allow the defense to bring out any inconsistencies in Tracy’s statements and to impeach Kelly with relevant past convictions, but could not see the relevance of the evidence proffered by counsel. Counsel’s response was that he wanted to show that Kelly was “a serial robber” — “he basically is a predator in this area, robbing and assaulting people, has a tremendous amount of arrests.... ” When the court questioned the admissibility of mere arrests, counsel replied that the proffered incident was “in the middle of a pattern of events” and was relevant because it explained why “they would lie about what happened to Mr. Sessoms.” The court responded again that it had no concern with questioning Kelly about his record, but “[m]y problem is, the hearsay that comes from the victim [Pittman], he runs up to the car and says that guy just robbed me.” Counsel suggested that the statement would constitute an excited utterance, but the court concluded that, even if it were, it would have no relevance and would be more prejudicial than probative.
At the conclusion of the argument on the motion, defense counsel said that, although he had not summoned either Officer Shipp or Mr. Pittman, he wanted the officer as a witness in the event Tracy denied the statements attributed to her in the police report. The prosecutor gave counsel the officer’s telephone number, and there appeared to be no impediment to counsel calling the witness for that purpose if he chose to do so. In fact, on cross-examination, Tracy admitted seeing Kelly on the street as Officer Shipp was driving her home and first telling Officer Shipp that Kelly was her brother and then adding “I ain’t saying it is my brother or isn’t my brother.” With those admissions, counsel never called Officer Shipp to testify. The only evidence that was not *299actually admitted, therefore, was the accusation by Pittman that Kelly had robbed him.1
In his brief in this Court, Sessoms urges that he proffered below that he “was the victim of a robbery perpetrated by Kelly Dillon, that Tracy Dillon concocted an allegation of rape to obscure her brother’s crime,” and that “[i]n support of this defense, counsel proffered relevant corroborative evidence of Tracy Dillon’s reaction to the report of a separate robbery committed by Kelly Dillon which occurred in the same general area and several hours after Petitioner was beaten.” (Emphasis added). It is this contention — that Sessoms himself was robbed by Kelly — that the Court seizes on to find Pittman’s hearsay allegation relevant and admissible. The Court states that “[t]his information was all related to petitioner’s defense that he was a victim of robbery at the hands of Kelly Dillon and that Tracy Dillon had falsely accused him of rape to cover for her brother’s involvement in the robbery and assault on petitioner and the robbery of Pittman.”
The problem is that that was not really the nature of Sessoms’s defense; the suggestion that Sessoms was robbed by Kelly Dillon was almost an afterthought. The thrust of counsel’s argument on the motion in limine was that Pittman’s accusation would help establish Kelly’s predatory nature, which, in turn, would explain why Sessoms was beaten. The argument was that Kelly beat Sessoms not because of any rape but because Kelly was a predator. Counsel argued: “in this situation, they have to explain to the police officer, why this man is lying unconscious in the street.” The only reference, in the 24 pages of transcript of the argument on the motion, to Sessoms’s being robbed was the one passing statement of counsel, near the end of the debate:
*300“It’s relevant to Defense contention that what really is happening is these people that is Mr. Dillon and his friend are in this area ... robbing people and they robbed him, Mr. Sessoms and others. And not only that, but it goes to their whole credibility in terms of, again, motive and bias. They flee, but they later come back after the police is clear and continue to rob people.”
At no point in counsel’s opening statement to the jury did he suggest that Sessoms was robbed by Kelly Dillon. His focus, rather, was on the assault. He told the jury:
“What happened to Mr. Sessoms, that we absolutely know about, is that he was left unconscious in the street, after being violently assaulted by two people who fled the scene, that he was taken to the hospital and treated, and he ultimately was taken from the hospital straight to jail to await trial for this case, charged with rape.”
At no point in his very brief direct examination did Sessoms contend that he was robbed. He admitted that he was intoxicated on the night in question. He said that, as he was proceeding down the street after having purchased two lottery tickets and a bottle of vodka, he encountered two men and a woman, that the woman told her companions that he, Sessoms, had robbed (not raped) her, that he denied the accusation but was then beaten unconscious by the two men. His next recollection was waking up in the hospital. That was the extent of his direct examination testimony.
The suggestion that Sessoms may have been robbed arose during cross-examination when he was asked what happened to the two lottery tickets he had purchased. He said that, when he awoke in the hospital, his girlfriend, who never testified, came to visit, that he wanted to give her the things in his pocket, that the police had put his clothes in a plastic bag in his hospital room but the officer standing guard unshackled him and allowed him to retrieve his pants and go through the pockets, and that the lottery tickets and two five dollar bills were missing. Twice he said, directly, that he did not know *301what happened to the lottery tickets.2 The prospect that the lottery tickets and the $10 were taken by Kelly Dillon or his friend was one of pure speculation. When asked, on cross-examination, whether the people that beat him took anything, Sessoms said, “I’m assuming, the officers said they didn’t take it, I’m assuming they didn’t; people whoever beat me up had to take it.” Later, when asked whether the men who beat him went into his pocket and took anything, he replied, “I don’t know. As far as I know, they must had did it while I was unconscious.” On the heels of that assumption, Sessoms was asked on redirect examination, “So it’s also, sir, your assertion, that these people not only beat you, but they also robbed you; it that what your assertion is,” to which Sessoms replied, “That’s what I’m saying.”
That one statement, on redirect examination, buttressed only by the surmise and speculation noted, is the sum and substance of what the Court now concludes was the essence of Sessoms’s defense. It holds that not allowing Officer Shipp to testify about the unsubstantiated hearsay accusation made by Mr. Pittman — an accusation that led to a charge that was later nol prossed — somehow crippled Sessoms’s defense.
I agree that the strong policy this Court has adopted against the use of “other crimes” evidence, except as filtered through a State v. Faulkner analysis, should ordinarily be limited to the use of that evidence against a defendant in a criminal case. As the Court correctly points out, it is the perceived trustworthiness of that evidence that makes it so particularly dangerous when offered against the defendant— the fear that the jury may convict for reasons other than a belief beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant committed the crime for which he or she is standing trial. It is in that setting that the policy confirmed by us in Harris v. State, *302324 Md. 490, 597 A.2d 956 (1991), of generally excluding such evidence, subject to limited inclusionary exceptions, rather than including such evidence subject to exclusionary exceptions, has particular meaning.
That does not mean, however, that “other crimes” evidence, when used solely to imply propensity, should be freely admissible in all other circumstances. The provision in Maryland Rule 5-404(b) that evidence of other crimes, wrongs, or acts is not admissible to prove the character of a person in order to show action in conformity therewith, is merely an application of the more general principle stated in § (a) of the Rule. Rule 5-404(a) provides, generally, that “[ejvidence of a person’s character or a trait of character is not admissible for the purpose of proving action in conformity therewith on a particular occasion.” Section (a) then states three exceptions, one dealing with the character of an accused, one with the character of a victim, and one with the character of a witness. We are not concerned here with the character of the accused. The Rule allows evidence of a “pertinent trait of character of the victim of a crime offered by an accused” and evidence of the character of a witness with regard to credibility, as provided in Rules 5-607, 5-608, and 5-609. None of those exceptions apply in this case. Sessoms has not identified any “pertinent trait of character” of Tracy Dillon to which Pittman’s accusation was relevant; nor would such evidence fall within Rules 5-608 (character of witness for truthfulness or untruthfulness) or Rule 5-609 (prior conviction of crime).
The only possible basis for Pittman’s hearsay statement, to show propensity for violence or robbery on the part of Kelly Dillon would be as an attack on his credibility, allowed by Rule 5-607. As noted, however, Dillon’s past criminal record was fully exposed to the jury. He admitted to being convicted of armed robbery in 1997, of robbery committed the day after the alleged rape of Tracy, and of robbery committed in 1988. What Pittman’s unsubstantiated hearsay accusation would have added to this attack on Kelly’s credibility is a mystery to me. Rule 5-403, which sits atop nearly all rules of admissibility, provides that even relevant evidence may be excluded if its *303probative value is substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice or by considerations of needless presentation of cumulative evidence. The trial judge determined that Pittman’s accusation was irrelevant and, to the extent it had any probative value, that value was outweighed by undue prejudice to the State. That is quintessentially a judgment call, to which great deference is due, and, on the state of this record, I cannot see how that call represented an abuse of discretion or legal error of any kind. For these reasons, I dissent. I would, at the very least, dismiss the writ of certiorari as improvidently granted.
Judges RODOWSKY and RAKER have authorized me to state that they join in this dissent.

. The court made clear, in ruling on the motion in limine that, while it had no objection to the questioning of Tracy, “I'm going to deny any opportunity to question as to a third party’’ — that "I don’t want this third party testimony.” I take that statement as a final ruling on the matter, thus rendering it unnecessary for counsel to have proffered the evidence at trial. See Prout v. State, 311 Md. 348, 535 A.2d 445 (1988) and compare Reed v. State, 353 Md. 628, 728 A.2d 195 (1999).

. At transcript, p.25, he was asked, "So you don’t know what happened to this lottery ticket, is that correct, sir,” to which he replied, "No, I do not.” At transcript p.43, he was asked again, “And you don’t know what happened to those things,” to which he replied, "No, I do not. I know before I went unconscious, I had it; when I woke up in the hospilal the next day, they were gone.”