Court Opinion

ID: 9559154
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 17:23:34.95957+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:09:51.895129
License: Public Domain

TRAYNOR, J.
I concur in the judgment. I cannot agree, however, with that part of the majority opinion holding that the store books and the two other books reflecting the financial transactions between Puls and the plaintiff are admissible in evidence in absence of proof that the entries on which defendants rely were made at or near the time of the transactions in question. Section 1953f of the Code of Civil Procedure, enacted in this state in 1941 as part of the Uniform Business Records as Evidence Act provides: “A record of an act, condition or event shall, in so far as relevant, be competent evidence if the custodian or other qualified witness testifies to its identity and the mode of its preparation, and if it was made in the regular course of business, at or near the time of the act, condition or event, and if, in the opinion of the court, *670the sources of information, method and time of preparation were such as to justify its admission.” (Italics added.) This statute not only requires preliminary proof in all cases that the record was made “at or near the time” of the transaction, it also vests in the trial court authority to determine, before such records are admitted in evidence, whether the time of its preparation was near enough to the transactions to be proved to justify the admission of the record. The uniform act was formulated after years of discussion (see 5 Wig-more, Evidence (3d ed.) 362) and its draftsmen undoubtedly weighed the disadvantage of the rule to estates against the dangers of admitting records whose trustworthiness was not established, when they did not deem it advisable to relax the requirements of preliminary proof in the case of the books of a decedent. (See Barrow, Business Entries Before the Court, 32 Ill.L.Rev. 334; 5 Wigmore, Evidence (3d ed.) 363.)
In -abandoning the requirement of proof that the record was made at or near the time of the transaction, if the person who made it is dead, the majority opinion opens the door for the admission of records that might be made at a time so remote from their occurrence as to lack trustworthiness. The justification for admitting records as evidence is that they can be regarded as trustworthy when they have been prepared in the ordinary course of business and at or near the time of the transaction. (Palmer v. Hoffman, 318 U.S. 109, 115 [63 P. 477, 87 L.Ed. 645, 144 A.L.R. 719]; same case 129 F.2d 976, 982; Roge v. Valentine, 280 N.Y. 268 [20 N.E.2d 751, 755].) “The entry should have been made at or near the time of the transaction recorded,—not merely because this is necessary in order to assure a fairly accurate recollection of the matter, but because any trustworthy habit of making regular business records will involve the making of the record contemporaneously.” (5 Wigmore, Evidence (3d ed.) 375.) “This is another circumstance very properly required as tending to accuracy, and is similar to the requirement . . . as to entries by deceased persons.” (5 Wigmore, Evidence (3d ed.) 405.) There is particular need of such proof when the entries of a deceased person are presented and there is no opportunity to examine those in whose favor the entries speak. Any doubt as to the requirement of such proof is dispelled by section 1946 of the Code of Civil Procedure, which relates specifically to the entries' and other writings of a decedent: “The entries and other writings of a decedent, made *671at or near the time of the transaction, and in a position to know the facts stated therein, may be read as prima facie evidence of the facts stated therein, in the following cases. . . (Italics added.) Thus both section 1946 of the Code of Civil Procedure and the Uniform Business Records as Evidence Act require proof that the entry was made at or near the time of the transaction, and there is no reason for construing them differently.
The cases cited in the majority opinion relate to the shop-book rule of the common law rather than to the uniform act. Under the common law the two books in the present case (Exhibits M and N), which were not store books but books reflecting the financial transactions between Puls and plaintiff, would not have been admissible to show the alleged loans by Puls, for account books were inadmissible to show transactions concerning the paying or lending of money. (Collin v. Card, 2 Cal. 421; Yick Wo v. Underhill, 5 Cal.App. 519 [90 P. 967]; see Le Franc v. Hewitt, 7 Cal. 186; 84 A.L.R. 147, 148; 5 Wigmore, Evidence (3d ed.) 396.)
Respondent’s petition for a rehearing was denied Aug. 29, 1946.