Exam 5: Relevancy and Materiality

An alleged victim has made an identification of a defendant at a pretrial lineup and is prepared to testify at trial that she recognized the defendant during the lineup. During the lineup, a police officer told her that the police thought it was the man later identified by the woman. She was not sure of her identification until the officer told her which man in the lineup was the guilty party. At trial, her testimony identifying the defendant should be:

Generally, physical or photographic evidence that tends to establish the identity of persons involved in criminal cases are:

Assume that a defendant had voluntarily consumed a large quantity of alcohol to the point of extreme intoxication and was alleged to have committed a criminal act. Evidence concerning voluntary intoxication of the accused at the time of the crime:

Under what circumstances is evidence of conduct following the criminal act relevant? How relevant would the use of a false name, refusal to allow police to enter, or giving a false address be relevant in a criminal prosecution?

The prosecution in Commonwealth v. Prashaw had been permitted to introduce a couple of pictures of the defendant in which she was shown naked posed in sexually provocative positions holding objects that might have been firearms. The prosecution's charge involved illegal possession or storage of firearms and did not involve any sexual criminal activity. On appeal, the reviewing court determined that:

Assume that a defendant had told several persons that he was going to kill Wanda and the witnesses observed him sharpening a hunting knife that he said was going to be used to kill Wanda. Assume that Wanda's body was discovered near the defendant's home with stab wounds. The people who heard the defendant's threats and saw him sharpening the knife could:

Where an objection to the admission of evidence has been made at a trial, the determination of logical relevancy, legal relevancy, and admissibility is the function of the:

Generally, evidence of a person's character or a trait of his or her character is not admissible for the purpose of proving that the defendant acted in the predicted manner on the occasion in question. Under Federal Rule 404(a), there are several exceptions mentioned. Define these exceptions to the general rule, and explain the circumstances under which these exceptions apply.

There are circumstances when a prosecutor wants to introduce evidence of a defendant's legal prior difficulties or prior convictions because the prosecutor considers prior conduct as relevant. The Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit suggested following a two-step approach in determining the admissibility of evidence of other crimes. What is this two-step test? Enumerate at least four purposes for which evidence of other crimes is admissible. Discuss the rationale for admitting such evidence.

In a criminal prosecution, the prosecutor has evidence that the defendant has committed many other crimes other than the one for which he is presently on trial. Under the rules of evidence regulating the use of character evidence, the general rule is that evidence of other prior crimes or misconduct by the defendant:

What is the general rule concerning the admissibility of relevant evidence? Who makes the final decision as to whether an item of evidence is relevant and, therefore, admissible?

Photographic evidence of a gruesome crime scene may be:

Explain the evidence concepts of materiality and relevancy, and give some examples of each.

Is evidence of conduct of the accused shortly before the offense, which is either consistent with innocence or consistent with a defendant's guilt, considered relevant and admissible? If so, what are the limitations concerning the admissibility of such evidence?

In some situations, logically relevant evidence can be excluded. In a rape prosecution,

The defendant in the case of Commonwealth v. Prashaw contended that the introduction of naked photographs of her in sexually provocative poses, during a case involving firearms violations, created unfair prejudice to her defense and that the photographs were not relevant in any sense to the theory of guilt proffered by the prosecution. Did the appellate court agree with the defendant, or did it believe that the provocative photographs were relevant to the proof of the prosecution's case? Should the court have decided this case in the manner in which it did? Why or why not?

In Wise v. State, the trial court allowed the admission of several pictures of child pornography that police discovered on the hard drive of his computer over the defendant's objections that, in substance, the pictures were not relevant. The forensic investigator testified that she could not tell when the pictures were added to the computer's hard drive or when, if ever, they had been viewed or accessed and that the pictures were in the unallocated part of the hard drive. The defendant purchased the computer at a flea market in a secondhand situation. With respect to the counts of child pornography that were related to the pictures on the free space of the hard drive, the appellate court: