Exam 5: Relevancy

In this Supreme Court case, the issue is whether identifying a defendant as a member of a prison gang is relevant use of character evidence or "mere abstract beliefs" that are irrelevant.

Rule 403, present in most state rules, holds that although relevant, evidence may be still be excluded if its probative value is substantially outweighed by the danger of all of the following except:

The term material remains and the term relevant is no longer used separately. This is shown in the modern definition of evidence.

The Constitution may not limit or exclude evidence seized in violation of one of its protections.

This holds that where there is any evidence, however slight, tending to support a material issue, it must be left up to the jury to decide.

Probative means that the evidence tends to prove something.

At common law, evidence had to be both relevant and material to be admissible in court. It had to tend to prove or disprove a fact for which it is being offered, and it had to be material to the fact at issue. Each was a separate concept.

Even when relevant, evidence may still be excluded if its probative value is substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice to the trier of fact.

This legal test weighs probative value of evidence against its prejudicial effect.

This case shows how evidence of mathematical probability can be taken to extremes, especially when not backed up by proper foundation or relevance.

In this Supreme Court case, the issue is whether it constitutes prejudice when a trial court "spurns" a defendant's offer to concede to a prior conviction.

In order to satisfy the relevance requirement, evidence must tend to prove something.

Evidence is relevant when it tends to prove or disprove a fact in issue. Evidence is material when it has a bearing on or relates to the issue in dispute.

A fundamental rule of evidence is that relevant evidence, unless otherwise limited or prohibited, is admissible and evidence that is not relevant is admissible only as additional proof.

The question before the court in this case was whether evidence that would be relevant in a sexual harassment case would also be relevant in a sex discrimination case.

It has often been written that although some testimony may be highly improbable, the court should still submit the case to the jury to let them decide.

Today, the concepts of relevance and materiality have been merged in most rules of evidence.

"Evidence having any tendency to make the existence of any fact that is of consequence to the determination of the action more probable or less probable than it would be without the evidence" is one state's definition of:

This type of relevance pertains to the admissibility of relevant evidence and requires that evidence not violate any other evidence rule or law.

This holds that evidence is relevant if what it tends to show would be more probable than it would be without the evidence.