State of Maine v. Gray

Maine Superior

State of Maine v. Gray

DecidedJune 4, 2008

DocketKENcr-07-743

StatusUnpublished

This text of State of Maine v. Gray (State of Maine v. Gray) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Superior Court of Maine primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook

State of Maine v. Gray, (Me. Super. Ct. 2008).

Pincite

Opinion

STATE OF MAINE SUPERIOR COURT CIVIL ACTION KENNEBEC, ss. DOCKET NO. CR-07-743 I' ( . 20D8JUN - Lf A If: 'Lf iI, J:' t: l .

STATE OF MAINE

v. DECISION AND ORDER

CHAD GRAY,

Defendant

In front of the court is Defendant's proffer of expert testimony for trial and

suppression motion.

Factual & Procedural Background:

Defendant is charged with aggravated assault. The State's evidence is based

greatly on eye-witness identifications of the defendant as the person who stabbed the

victim.

Defendant seeks suppression of the evidence on the theory that the identification

procedure was unnecessarily suggestive.

Defendant seeks funds to admit expert testimony of Bates College Associate

Professor of Psychology, Amy Bradfield Douglass pertaining to the lack of reliability of

eye-witnesses particularly defendant seeks Douglass's testimony regarding: 1) cross-

racial or own race bias which impairs the ability of a witness of one race to make correct

identifications of persons of a different race; 2) the fact that the confidence of a witness

does not necessarily imply correctness of a witness' identifications; 3) the phenomenon

of weapons focus; 4) that high levels of stress negatively affect accuracy of eyewitness

recall; 5) that consumption of alcohol by a witness can diminish the accuracy of 2

eyewitness identification and increase possibilities of susceptibility to suggestiveness;

and 6) the presence of multiple witnesses identifying the suspect creates influence by

one witness upon the others.

Standard of Review:

The admissibility of expert evidence is set forth in M.R. Evid. 702: "If scientific, technical, or other specialized knowledge will assist the trier of fact to understand the evidence or to determine a fact in issue, a witness qualified as an expert by knowledge, skill, experience, training, or education, may testify thereto in the form of an opinion or otherwise." In State v. Williams, 388 A.2d 500, 504, we stated: The controlling criteria regarding the admissibility of expert testimony, so long as the proffered expert is qualified and probative value is not substantially outweighed by the factors mentioned in Rule 403, are whether the sound judgment of the presiding Justice the testimony to be given is relevant and will assist the trier of fact to understand the evidence or to determine a fact in issue. State v. Irving, 2003 ME 31,

Discussion:

1. Motion to Suppress

After extensive hearings at which four officers and four eyewitnesses testified,

this court finds that there was no evidence adduced showing that procedures used were

likely to increase the risk of misidentification, thus the defendant has failed to carry his

burden of proof to show by a preponderance of the evidence that the identification

procedure was unnecessarily suggestive. State v. True, 463 A.2d 946,950 (Me. 1983);

Neil v. Biggers, 409 U.s. 188, 198 (1972).

II. Admission of Expert Testimony

Defendant notes from the outset that there is not precedent in Maine supporting

the contention that failure to allow this expert testimony would create reversible error.

In fact to the contrary, defendant points to three cases in which the Law Court found 3

that exclusion of such testimony was not in error. See State v. Lewisohn, 379 A.2d 1192,

1203 (" Absent a 'medical' condition affecting the ability of the witness to tell the truth,

evidence may not be received to discredit the testimony of a witness in the nature of an

expert's opinion that the events were such as to have so affected the mental capacity of

such witness that his ability to make an accurate observation of the facts and to retain a

true recollection thereof has been impaired and that his assertions respecting the details

of the occurrence will necessarily or most probably be a distortion."); State v. Fernald,

397 A.2d 194, 197 (holding that trial court's exclusion of expert testimony regarding the

effects of stress on eyewitnesses was not error.); and State v. Rich, 549 A.2d 742, 743

(holding that exclusion of expert testimony on 1) effects of stress; 2) effects of alcohol; 3)

effects of post-incident confusion; 4) e{fects of identification by other witnesses; 5) lack

of relationship between certainty and accuracy in identification, was not in error).

Nonetheless, defendant argues that the trend of admitting this expert testimony

reveals a change from when these cases were decided. He cites a number of out of

jurisdiction cases to reveal this trend of reversing trial court exclusion of defense expert

testimony on eyewitness identification. See e.g. U.S. v. Brownlee, 454 F.3d 131 (3rd Cir.

2006); U.S. v. Smithers, 212 F.3d 306 (6th Cir. 2000).

The First Circuit has been "'unwilling to adopt a blanket rule that qualified

expert testimony on eyewitness identification must be routinely admitted or excluded."'

U.S. v. Stokes, 388 F.3d 21, 26 (lst Cir. 2004) (quoting U.S. v. Brien, 59 F.3d 274, 276 (lst

Cir. 1995)). The proper course instead is to "examine each case one by one, taking into

account such concerns as 'the reliability and helpfulness of the proposed expert

testimony, the importance and the quality of the eyewitness evidence it addresses, and

any threat of confusion, misleading the jury, or unnecessary delay."' !d. 4

The Court is convinced that the issues of weapons focus, effects of stress, and

effects of alcohol on identification are well within the ken of the normal juror, and will

easily be brought out on cross-examination. Further the issuse of cross-racial

identification, confidence correlation and the effects of multiple witnesses do not here

present a situation where expert testimony is beneficial and runs the risk of confusing

the jury and creating unnecessary delay. The court is particularly convinced of this

based on the strength of the testimony of Jillian Bolduc who will testify she was 3-5 feet

away from the defendant, was not intoxicated, had seen the defendant weeks earlier,

heard him identify himself by name, identified him at the scene as the individual who

had stabbed the victim. Additionally, the court notes that Stacey Libby, the victim and

Jessica Wheeler all identified the defendant not based on characteristics likely to

implicate the veracity of their cross-racial identifications, but instead based on his

clothing, including a red bandana or dew-rag.

The court is aware that this is not the situation in which corroborating physical

evidence is present. See State v. Kelly, 2000 ME 107, 752 A.2d 188. While such

corroborating evidence would make this an easier decision it is not a necessity to the

court's finding that expert testimony would not be helpful in this case.

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