U.S. v. McDonald, 59 M.J. 426

Core Criminal Law Subjects: Evidence: Other Acts

1. this Court relies upon the following three-part test in United States v. Reynolds, 29 M.J. 105 (C.M.A. 1989) to determine the admissibility of “other acts” evidence under MRE 404(b): (1) Does the evidence reasonably support a finding by the court members that appellant committed prior crimes, wrongs, or acts?; (2) What fact of consequence is made more or less probable by the existence of this evidence?; and (3) Is the probative value substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice?
2. the first and second prongs of the Reynolds test address the logical relevance of the evidence; the third prong ensures that the evidence is legally, as well as logically, relevant; the moving party must satisfy all three prongs for the evidence to be admissible
3. MRE 404(b) evidence is relevant only if the jury can reasonably conclude that the act occurred and that the defendant was the actor; the threshold inquiry a court must make before admitting similar acts evidence under MRE 404(b) is whether that evidence is probative of a material issue other than character, such as plan or intent; finally, a court must determine whether the probative value of the evidence is substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice
4. applying the second prong of Reynolds, we hold that evidence of appellant’s uncharged acts was not logically relevant to show either a common plan or appellant’s intent; the common plan analysis considers whether the uncharged acts in question establish a plan of which the charged act is an additional manifestation, or whether the acts merely share some common elements; the question as applied to the facts of this case, is whether the uncharged acts evidence shows that appellant had a plan to commit indecent acts that manifested itself on two occasions: first, when appellant was 13 years old with his stepsister, and second, 20 years later, with his adopted daughter; in answering such a question, we have examined the following factors: the relationship between victims and the appellant; ages of the victims; nature of the acts; situs of the acts; circumstances of the acts; and time span; viewing the facts of this case under that framework, we conclude that the military judge abused his discretion in admitting the uncharged acts to establish a common plan; indeed, the uncharged acts in this case are extremely dissimilar to the charged offenses: Appellant was 13 years of age at the time of the uncharged acts, rather than a 33-year-old adult; the uncharged acts were committed in the home of his stepsister, where he was visiting, while the charged acts occurred where he was the head of the household; the uncharged acts were with a stepsister who was about five years younger, rather than with a young stepchild under his parental control, who was about 20 years younger; the intent analysis considers whether appellant’s state of mind in the commission of both the charged and uncharged acts was sufficiently similar to make the evidence of the prior acts relevant on the intent element of the charged offenses; in this case, appellant was a 13-year-old child at the time of the uncharged acts, and a 33-year-old married adult at the time of the charged acts; absent evidence of that 13-year-old adolescent’s mental and emotional state, sufficient to permit meaningful comparison with appellant’s state of mind as an adult 20 years later, the military judge’s determination of relevance on the issue of intent was fanciful and clearly unreasonable

Trial Stages: Appeals: Harmless / Prejudicial Error

1. in evaluating whether erroneous admission of government evidence is harmless, this Court uses a four part test, weighing: (1) the strength of the government’s case, (2) the strength of the defense case, (3) the materiality of the evidence in question, and (4) the quality of the evidence in question
2. after applying the harmless error test to the facts of this case, we cannot be confident that the findings of the court-martial were not substantially influenced by the improperly admitted evidence of the appellant’s childhood conduct where the childhood acts were not only irrelevant and highly inflammatory, but indistinguishable from propensity evidence, and could only have harmed appellant in the eyes of the members

Trial Stages: Appeals: Standards of Review, Burdens, etc.

1. a military judge’s decision to admit or exclude evidence is reviewed under an abuse of discretion standard; we will not overturn a military judge’s evidentiary decision unless that decision was arbitrary, fanciful, clearly unreasonable, or clearly erroneous; a military judge abuses his discretion if his findings of fact are clearly erroneous or his conclusions of law are incorrect