Court Opinion

ID: 9716172
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 06:29:35.346874+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:23:42.543630
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE KUEHN, specially concurring: I concur. However, I disagree with our reliance upon an earlier decision of this court that was, in my opinion, wrongly decided. I believe that all of the cross-examination questions that the State employed in order to elicit the defendant’s opinion about other testimony were improper and prejudicial. We have never tolerated such questioning of other witnesses and should not allow for it in the case of the criminally accused. Indeed, it appears that many prosecutors engage in such impropriety on a routine basis. Because of the overwhelming evidence of this defendant’s guilt, a reversal is unnecessary. Notwithstanding, we should not countenance the kind of questioning that this defendant was made to endure. The majority correctly points out that we have drawn a distinction between asking a defendant to opine about the honesty of a witness and asking a question designed to merely elicit an opinion about whether that witness was wrong or mistaken. People v. Morse, 33 Ill. App. 3d 384, 391, 342 N.E.2d 307, 313 (1975). Rather than perpetuate a distinction without meaning, I would prefer that we seize this opportunity to dispatch a decidedly poor opinion. No doubt, other defendants will share in the kind of improper ridicule heaped upon this defendant, because of the Morse decision. We should expose the ill-conceived nature of the decision instead of perpetuating its myth. Morse completely ignores the reason for prohibiting this form of cross-examination. Instead of focusing upon the real reason behind the rule, Justice Karns found that the only problem in asking for opinions about the truthfulness of other witnesses was one of characterization. According to him, asking for an opinion about another witness’s truthfulness would fail to allow for the possibility that the witness could be mistaken. Since this was the only problem that he was able to discern, he could not understand what was wrong with asking a defendant to judge whether other testimony was wrong or mistaken. However, even under his misguided logic, asking a defendant whether a witness was mistaken in the testimony that he gave would be similarly improper. After all, it would fail to allow for the possibility that the witness was lying. Thus, we held that defendants could be asked their opinions about whether other witnesses were worthy of belief, so long as the question did not specifically inquire into a defendant’s opinion on a witness’s honesty. Of course, this conclusion was totally mindless of the reason this kind of cross-examination is infirm. The problem that underlies this kind of inquiry exists whether the question asks for an opinion of another witness’s honesty or for an opinion about other testimony’s accuracy. The defendant is being asked to judge someone else’s testimony and give his opinion that the testimony is unworthy of belief. This method of cross-examination serves only one purpose—to improperly prejudice the accused with questions designed to elicit irrelevant testimony. A defendant’s opinion about whether a witness lied or, for that matter, whether a witness testified inaccurately neither proves nor tends to prove anything. People v. Hicks, 133 Ill. App. 2d 424, 434, 273 N.E.2d 450, 458 (1971). Rather, it invades the province of the jury and places the defendant in the impossible position of being the judge of another witness’s worth. Hicks, 133 Ill. App. 2d at 434, 273 N.E.2d at 458. Whether the questions draw opinion on how witnesses testified falsely or draw opinion on how they gave testimony that was simply inaccurate, the questions ask for a defendant to opine that someone else’s testimony should not be credited. We can see from the cross-examination in this case how a line of questioning that asks a defendant to judge the testimony of others can do damage. Basically, the questions ridicule the defendant by having him judge others who testified adversely to him. As each of the State’s witnesses gets judged, the defendant’s stature as a witness is slowly, and effectively, diminished. And all this is done under the guise of gathering information relevant to the jurors’ task. However, the prosecutor is not attempting to elicit relevant evidence. He has no real interest in knowing the defendant’s opinions about other testimony. The method is far more argument than legitimate inquiry. It appears that this methodology is extensively employed by prosecutors afforded the opportunity to cross-examine defendants. We see it used time and time again. On many occasions, just like here, prosecutors cannot resist the use of questions that even Justice Karns would not condone. I wonder how many fledgling prosecutors have been schooled on this method of ridiculing defendants when they testify—how many have learned the mystery of semantics spawned by this court. I wonder if any of them have deciphered some reason we would find it permissible to ask whether a defendant thought another witness testified accurately but would frown upon asking whether he thought another witness testified truthfully. I believe that the entire line of questioning that had this defendant judge the testimony of others was improper and unfair. We should overrule Morse, recognize this kind of inquiry for what it is, and end the practice of posing questions designed to elicit irrelevant opinions judging the testimony of others.