Court Opinion

ID: 9531671
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 04:13:48.279939+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:28:33.846702
License: Public Domain

DAVID R. LESLIE, Judge
(concurring specially).
Given the primarily credibility oriented questions the jury had to decide to reach a verdict in this case, and considering the overwhelming evidence of guilt on the record, I do not question the majority’s affirmance of the trial court. However, I concur specially to express my concern regarding those aspects of the majority decision dealing with the use of appellant’s prior conviction for impeachment purposes and particularly the precedent this decision sets for future application of Minn.Stat. § 609.13, subd. 1(2) (1986).
I.
Appellant’s 1978 felony conviction for aggravated assault was reduced to misdemeanor status pursuant to Minn.Stat. § 609.13, subd. 1(2). The majority holds that this statutory reduction of appellant’s offense is not effective regarding use of that prior conviction for impeachment purposes under Minn.R.Evid. 609(a). This is inconsistent with both the statute’s language and its apparent purpose.
The statute specifically states:
Notwithstanding a conviction is for a felony:
* * * * * *
(2) The conviction is deemed to be for a misdemeanor if the imposition of the prison sentence is stayed, the defendant is placed on probation, and the defendant is thereafter discharged without a prison sentence.
Minn.Stat. § 609.13, subd. 1 (emphasis added). The Advisory Committee Comment indicates the purpose of the statute:
It is believed desirable not to impose the consequences of a felony if the judge decides that the punishment to be imposed will be no more than that provided for misdemeanors or gross misdemeanors.
(Emphasis added.) In this case, it is not contested that appellant successfully completed the statutory prerequisites to earn a reduction of the status of his prior offense from a felony to a misdemeanor. Nor is it alleged that aggravated assault involves either the dishonesty or the false statement which would make the conviction admissible as a misdemeanor under Minn.R.Evid. 609(a)(2).
To allow impeachment of appellant with his prior conviction refuses to recognize the statutory reduction of his conviction from felony to misdemeanor status. It also imposes on appellant in this case the consequences of a prior felony despite a decision by the trial judge in the original case to treat the offense otherwise. Assuming the original trial judge had a reason for the lenient treatment in the first instance, we now frustrate that rationale by ignoring the mitigation built in to the original sentence.
The majority faults appellant’s argument by noting that the record does not contain formal notice or recognition of appellant’s rehabilitation. This is overly formalistic. Lack of official recognition of rehabilitation should not preclude reducing offense status where the party involved has met all of the statutory requirements for such a reduction and essentially achieved a “de fac-to” rehabilitation. Also, the majority’s analogy to State v. Clipper, 429 N.W.2d 698, 700-01 (Minn.Ct.App.1988) does not appear determinative. In Clipper the question of applying Minn.Stat. § 609.13 is specific to the Sentencing Guidelines which require assignment of “one [criminal history] point for every felony conviction * * * for which a stay of imposition of sentence *456was given before the current sentencing.” Minnesota Sentencing Guidelines II.B.l. No such parallel directive explicitly referring to a stay of imposition is present in Minn.R.Evid. 609. As such the analogy to Clipper is not absolute.
My concern on this issue centers on the majority’s presumption that Minn.Rule Evid. 609 and its direction to the court to look to the status of the conviction as of the date of the conviction governs over Minn.Stat. § 609.13, subd. 1(2) and its felony reduction instructions. I submit that the statute takes precedent over the rule and should be given effect before the court makes impeachment decisions under rule 609. This would avoid misleading future defendants not aware that a plea to a “misdemeanor” with a stayed sentence may have future effects much harsher than those traditionally associated with a “misdemeanor.”
II.
Also, allowing impeachment of appellant with his prior conviction leaves me with misgivings about the potential for prejudice, the age of the conviction, and the use of the cautionary instruction. All are troubling.
Despite the ten year time limit on admission of prior convictions articulated by Minn.R.Evid. 609(b), and also recognizing the breadth of the trial court’s discretion in making evidentiary rulings, the use of a nine year old conviction for aggravated assault in the present case is still disconcerting. Initially, the conviction is quite old. This does not militate for its use at trial. Secondly, given the similarity of aggravated assault and the making of terroristic threats, allowing the use of the prior conviction in this case could have produced substantial prejudice against appellant, and it is not at all obvious that such prejudice was outweighed by the probative value of the prior conviction. As already observed, aggravated assault has little to do with veracity.
Lastly, case law assumes that prejudice problems can be remedied by an appropriate cautionary instruction telling the jury not to consider something deemed inappropriate. To have such prejudice pointed out to the jury by counsel at the time of the objection, highlighted by the court in a cautionary instruction, and perhaps, in the case of a cautious judge, reiterated just before the jury retires, certainly does nothing to mitigate, and probably aggravates by cumulative effect, a defendant’s already undesirable position. Because of both the quality and quantity of other evidence already on the record implicating defendant in the events of July 3, 1987, the argument for admission of appellant’s prior conviction for aggravated assault appears far from convincing.