Court Opinion

ID: 9859651
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 22:15:42.051957+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T10:59:58.108498
License: Public Domain

*696Dissenting Opinion
Hunter, J.
I must respectfully dissent to the opinion of the majority in this case.
I do not believe that the prolonged testimony by the state’s witness regarding the amount of time he spent in various hospitals is relevant in proving that his assailant had the requisite intent to kill at the time of the alleged offense. I concede that the character or severity of the victim’s wounds may be shown to establish such an intent, but the length of stay at a hospital may be determined by factors which have no immediate bearing on the assault, itself. For example, if a laceration had become infected, the hospitalization of the witness would have to have been prolonged, and yet this infection would have absolutely no relevancy as to the intent of the assailant when he inflicted the laceration. On the other hand, I can well understand how the witness’s having undergone a lengthy period of hospitalization could inflame and prejudice the jurors against a defendant who has been accused of intentionally causing such a mishap.
I disagree that this court’s decision in Gayer v. State (1965), 247 Ind. 113, 210 N. E. 2d 852, lends support to the position of the majority. The testimony in question in that case read as follows:
“Q. What is your opinion, if any, as to how his condition will remain? What it will become?
A. Of course, I haven’t seen him since September when he was discharged from the hospital, but in my opinion he will never improve satisfactorily enough, if he improves at all, to carry on any duties on his own as far as taking care of himself. In my opinion it’s a permanent injury.” Gayer v. State, supra, at 115-16.
This question, and the answer it sought to evoke, did not relate to the period of hospitalization, but rather to the severity of the injury. The case at bar is a significant ex*697tension of that case. I believe we should try an accused on the crime with which he is charged and restrict the evidence admissible at his trial to facts which tend to prove the requisite elements of that crime.
Note. — Reported in 244 N. E. 2d 912.