Court Opinion

ID: 9477008
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 06:11:01.95576+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:45:37.837666
License: Public Domain

NELSON, Circuit Judge,
concurring in part and dissenting in part.
Pool sought to introduce expert testimony relevant to whether he recognized Connolly as an officer. The expert witness would have explained the standard police procedures used by officers to identify themselves to frightened suspects. From this evidence, the jury might have inferred that reasonable people do not always recognize police officers. This insight might have led the jury to conclude that Pool did not recognize Connolly as an officer because Connolly failed to use the standard procedure to identify himself.
Excluding the relevant expert testimony was constitutionally valid. The sixth amendment does not require the admission of all relevant evidence. Rather, courts may constitutionally exclude evidence if society’s interest in fair and efficient trials outweighs the defendant’s interest in presenting the evidence. Perry v. Rushen, 713 F.2d 1447, 1451-52 (9th Cir.1983), cert. denied, 469 U.S. 838, 105 S.Ct. 137, 83 L.Ed.2d 77 (1984). In this case, the state’s interest in excluding evidence on collateral issues was legitimate. The trial court could reasonably have feared that the expert testimony would divert the jury’s attention from the issue of Pool’s guilt to the collateral issue of Connolly’s improper method of identifying himself.
Against the State’s interest in preventing jury confusion we must weigh Pool’s interest in presenting the evidence. This was quite small. The jury could have concluded that Pool did not recognize Connolly as an officer from other much more direct evidence, such as the darkness, the shining headlights, Connolly’s clothes, and Connolly’s failure verbally to identify himself. The inference from the expert testimony to the conclusion that Pool did not recognize Connolly as a police officer was indirect and problematic. I therefore conclude that the trial court reasonably excluded the relevant expert testimony. I agree that no sixth amendment violation occurred.
I disagree, however, that excluding evidence and cross-examination on Connolly’s reprimand was constitutionally permissible. The confrontation clause secures a defendant’s right to cross-examine witnesses in order to expose their motivation for testifying. Davis v. Alaska, 415 U.S. 308, 316-17, 94 S.Ct. 1105, 1110-11, 39 L.Ed.2d 347 (1974). Although this right does not preclude trial judges from imposing “limits on defense counsel’s inquiry into the potential bias of a prosecution witness,” Delaware v. Van Arsdall, 475 U.S. 673, 106 S.Ct. 1431, 1435, 89 L.Ed.2d 674 (1986), neither does it allow the trial court to prohibit all inquiry into the possibility that an event might have furnished the witness with a motive for favoring the prosecution. See id.
In this case, Pool sought to cross-examine Connolly on evidence “about an event that the State conceded had taken place and that a jury might reasonably have found furnished the witness a motive for favoring the prosecution in his testimony.” Van Arsdall, 106 S.Ct. at 1435. The jury might have found that the reprimand gave Connolly a motive to lie based on any one of several reasonable inferences. Having learned that officer Connolly was punished for his moonlighting, the jury might have concluded that Connolly sought to regain his lost comp, time, or to avoid more severe action by helping the prosecution to obtain *782a conviction. The jury might also have realized that the officer would have reason to make his infraction seem less serious to his superiors by avoiding the further charge that in addition to moonlighting and using state property without permission, he handled the arrest inappropriately. Finally, learning that Connolly had been sanctioned, and presumably that, the department would no longer permit Connolly to earn the extra income using department property, the jury might have developed further reason to suspect that Connolly disliked Pool and had reason to seek revenge. Because a jury might have found that the reprimand gave Connolly an incentive to lie, excluding the evidence and precluding all cross-examination on the issue violated Pool’s confrontation clause rights. See United States v. Garrett, 542 F.2d 23 (6th Cir.1976).
Although trial courts may exclude cumulative evidence of bias, see, e.g., United States v. Jackson, 756 F.2d 703 (9th Cir. 1985) (allowing limitation of cross-examination regarding a witness’s paid cooperation with law enforcement officials because evidence had already been admitted regarding the witness’s payment in exchange for cooperation), the evidence of bias excluded in this case was not cumulative. Other facts might have suggested that Connolly had reason to dislike Pool. But these other facts are not cumulative of the additional and independent motive for lying created by the reprimand. To the contrary, the reprimand constitutes an independent incentive for Connolly to lie. Pool had a constitutional right to expose this incentive for the jury.
I would reverse Pool’s conviction based on this constitutional error. I cannot conclude beyond a reasonable doubt that the error was harmless. See Van Arsdall, 106 S.Ct. at 1438. The case was based largely on Connolly’s testimony, and therefore on his credibility. Because his testimony was important, not cumulative, and uncorroborated, and because the prior trial ended in deadlock, indicating that the prosecution’s case was not overwhelmingly strong, even a small increase in the evidence of Connolly’s bias might have altered the outcome of this case.