Abstract
The jury trial, which is a hallmark of the Anglo-American adversary system, requires close attention to the evidence that it is permissible for the lay jurors to hear. No evidentiary issue has proved more contentious than the admissibility of witnesses’, especially defendants’, prior criminal history because of concern that the lay jurors might prejudicially infer present guilt from past criminality. This article explains the complex evidentiary rules for admitting criminal history to prove guilt and to impeach witness credibility. It suggests that inquisitorial trial procedure, which historically has been unconcerned that judges know about the defendant’s prior criminal history while they are determining present guilt may have to restrict admissibility of such evidence as lay juries become more common.
Highlights
“The State may not show defendant’s prior trouble with the law, specific criminal acts, or ill name among his neighbors, even though such facts might logically be persuasive that he is by propensity a probable perpetrator of the crime
Common law exceptions were clearly explained in an influential 1901 decision by the prestigious New York State Court of Appeals: a defendant’s prior crimes and bad acts were ordinarily inadmissible at trial, except when they “tend to establish 1) motive; 2) intent; 3) the absence of mistake or accident; 4) a common scheme or plan embracing the commission of two or more crimes so related to each other that proof of one tends to establish the others; 5) the identity of the person charged with the commission of the crime on trial”
Federal Rules of Evidence (FRE) 403 provides that even though prior convictions and bad acts are relevant, they should not be admitted at trial if the trial judge finds that the past crimes evidence’s “probative value is substantially outweighed by a danger of one or more of the following: unfair prejudice, confusing the issues, misleading the jury, undue delay, wasting time, or needlessly presenting cumulative evidence.”
Summary
“The State may not show defendant’s prior trouble with the law, specific criminal acts, or ill name among his neighbors, even though such facts might logically be persuasive that he is by propensity a probable perpetrator of the crime. Common law exceptions were clearly explained in an influential 1901 decision by the prestigious New York State Court of Appeals: a defendant’s prior crimes and bad acts were ordinarily inadmissible at trial, except when they “tend to establish 1) motive; 2) intent; 3) the absence of mistake or accident; 4) a common scheme or plan embracing the commission of two or more crimes so related to each other that proof of one tends to establish the others; 5) the identity of the person charged with the commission of the crime on trial” The rule proceeds to enumerate exceptions that allow prior convictions and bad acts to be introduced at trial if they constitute proof of motive, opportunity, intent, preparation, plan, knowledge, identity or absence of mistake or accident
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