Hiner v. State

470 N.E.2d 363, 1984 Ind. App. LEXIS 3028
CourtIndiana Court of Appeals
DecidedNovember 8, 1984
DocketNo. 3-1083A348
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 470 N.E.2d 363 (Hiner v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Indiana Court of Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Hiner v. State, 470 N.E.2d 363, 1984 Ind. App. LEXIS 3028 (Ind. Ct. App. 1984).

Opinions

GARRARD, Judge.

Following a jury trial in the Elkhart Circuit Court, Terry L. Hiner was found guilty of rape, a Class B felony. He brings this appeal raising seven issues which we rephrase as follows:

I. Whether the court erred by denying cross-examination of the complaining witness as to her general drug use.
II. Whether the court erred by excluding evidence of the existence of [366]*366another person fitting Hiner's description.
III. Whether a pretrial identification procedure was impermissibly suggestive and, if so, whether it taint ed an in-court identification.
IV. Whether the conviction was supported by sufficient evidence.
V. Whether certain jury instructions were erroneously given.
VI. Whether the state failed to disclose exculpatory evidence.
VIL. Whether the court improperly refused to include certain information in and excise other information from the pre-sentence report.

I. Cross-examination of complaining witness as to drug usage.

Hiner contends it was error for the court to sustain the state's objection to Hiner's cross-examination of the prosecu-trix as to her drug usage prior to June 4, 1982, the date of the rape. Hiner's counsel argued at trial that such a line of inquiry was relevant:

"... because we believe that we can offer evidence in this case through witnesses who have been listed as witnesses to the effect that the periodic usage of controlled substances can affect one person's ability to observe, to relate that which they observed, to affect their short- and long-term memory and recall, all of which would go to the credibility of this witness."

Record at 448. Hiner contends the court's action denied him the right of full, adequate and effective cross-examination guaranteed by the federal and state constitutions. Pointer v. Texas (1965), 380 U.S. 400, 85 S.Ct. 1065, 13 L.Ed.2d 923; Lagenour v. State (1978), 268 Ind. 441, 376 N.E.2d 475.

The prosecutrix testified on direct examination that she left her house on the morning of June 4, 1982 to walk to the house of a friend, Joann Myers. During her walk, Hiner drove up in his pickup truck and asked the prosecutrix where she was going and if she wanted a ride. She first refused but then accepted the ride after Hiner asked if she would like to smoke some marijuana. Hiner did not drive the prose-cutrix to Myers' house but instead drove to an area away from town where the rape occurred.

Hiner and the prosecutrix did not smoke marijuana together that day. The only testimony in the record as to the prosecutrix' drug usage was her negative response to a question asked on cross-examination as to whether she had had any controlled substances on the morning of June 4, 1982. The court sustained the state's objection to questions concerning her drug usage prior to that date.

We were presented with a similar issue in Finney v. State (1979), 179 Ind.App. 316, 385 N.E.2d 477 (Staton, J., dissenting). In Finney:

"[Oln direct examination, the prosecutor asked the witness whether she had smoked marijuana on the day she was raped, and she replied that she had not. On eross-examination, the defendant sought to elicit from the witness whether she had ever smoked marijuana to which the State objected as being outside the scope of direct examination. The trial court properly sustained the State's objection. Clearly, the trial judge has broad control over the scope and content of cross-examination when it is directed into such highly emotive areas as narcotics use, which carry with their very nature serious dangers of undue prejudice. Questions pertaining to the use of drugs when asked for the purpose of attacking the credibility of the witness are proper to show that at the time of the event to which the witness testified, her powers of observation and memory were impaired so that her recollection and account of the experience might be inaceu-rate. In Commonwealth v. Gaddy (1976), 468 Pa. 303, 362 A.2d 217, prohibiting defense counsel from asking the prosecutrix 'Do you take drugs? was held not to be an abuse of discretion on the grounds that testimony of that sort [367]*367only serves to interject an extraneous issue into the trial, thereby diverting the jury from its principal duty-the determination of the guilt or the innocence of the accused. See also 65 A.LR.3d 705; 81 Am.Jur.2d Witnesses Section 546 for cases excluding questions on general drug usage."

885 N.E.2d at 481.

Hiner is correct in stating that "if a defendant is not allowed to impeach a crucial state witness' credibility, a constitutional error has been committed." However, Hiner has not shown he was denied effective cross-examination as was shown in cases he cites. In Lusher v. State (1979), 181 Ind.App. 63, 390 N.E.2d 702, the prosecution witness was an informant who made the purchase of controlled substances from Lusher. On voir dire examination of the witness out of the presence of the jury it was established that the witness' own heavy drug usage was causing him to hallucinate on occasion. We held it was an abuse of the court's discretion to prevent the defendant from presenting to the jury evidence of the witness' hallucinations so that the jury might better assess his eredi-bility. In both Davis v. Alaska (1974), 415 U.S. 308, 94 S.Ct. 1105, 39 L.Ed.2d 347 and Pfefferkorn v. State (1980), Ind.App., 413 N.E.2d 1088 the court's error in restricting the scope of the cross-examination was with respect to the testimony of a witness who the defense intended to show had ulterior motives for his testimony. "A witness' bias, prejudice or ulterior motives are always relevant in that they may discredit [the witness] or affect the weight of his testimony." - Pfefferkorn, supra, 413 N.E.2d at 1089.

Here, Hiner was not attempting to expose the prosecutrix' ulterior motives as in Davis and Pfefferkorn. Hiner also had not made any preliminary showing, as in LusAer, that the witness' prior drug usage had a definite impact on the witness' mental processes thereby outweighing the prejudice caused by interjecting this collateral issue.

Hiner was permitted to vigorously cross-examine the prosecutrix exposing numerous inconsistencies between her pretrial statements and her in-court testimony. The prosecutrix said she did not know the answer to many of the questions asked by Hiner on cross-examination concerning the details of the events surrounding the rape. Hiner effectively reached his goal of impeaching the witness' credibility by exposing gaps in her memory. The prosecutrix' prior drug usage, even had it been established, would have been cumulative as to the issue of her memory and would have been unduly prejudicial. The court, in the exercise of the discretion vested in it, Schalkle v. State (1979), 272 Ind. 134, 396 N.E.2d 384, properly sustained the state's objection to questions relating to the extraneous issue of the prosecutrix' prior drug usage.

IL Evidence of existence of person fitting Hiner's description.

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Related

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156 F. Supp. 2d 791 (E.D. Michigan, 2001)
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475 N.E.2d 677 (Indiana Supreme Court, 1985)

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Bluebook (online)
470 N.E.2d 363, 1984 Ind. App. LEXIS 3028, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/hiner-v-state-indctapp-1984.