Court Opinion

ID: 9787209
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 00:12:40.023029+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:36:53.487774
License: Public Domain

CHAPEL, Presiding Judge,
concur in results.
T1 I concur in reversing the conviction in this case and in remanding for a new trial. I would, however, explicitly abandon the "requirement" of proof of an overt act in admissibility determinations concerning third party perpetrator evidence. - Certainly, there should be "some quantum of evidence, which is more than mere suspicion and innuendo, that connects the third party to the commission of the crime."1 However, as this case shows, that is all that ought to be required.
12 If the State is allowed, as it should be allowed, to convict someone upon cireumstan-tial evidence without the requirement that it prove an overt act, I see no reason to deny a person, in defense, the right to present circumstantial evidence without proof of an overt act, that a third party committed the crime. In determining the admissibility of such evidence, I would apply the test set forth above.
T3 I am authorized to state that Judge Arlene Johnson joins in this concur in result opinion.

. Majority opinion, pg. 1276.