Res To The Bottom

An opinion of the Indiana Supreme Court in a case where the defendant has the rather dichotomous name of Summer Snow

Every crime has a story. But when that story is told at trial, each part must be admissible under Indiana’s Rules of Evidence—simply being part of the story is not enough. We thus reiterate today our holding from over twenty years ago: res gestae—the common-law doctrine that made evidence admissible when it was part of a crime’s story—is no more.

Here, Summer Snow carried a handgun as she battered Officer Terry Peck and resisted law enforcement. Though she was not charged with a firearm-related offense, the State introduced her gun into evidence at trial. Without res gestae as grounds for admission, our question becomes whether the gun is admissible under Indiana’s Rules of Evidence. We hold that it is. The trial court acted within its discretion in finding the gun relevant to Snow’s aggressive state of mind and in determining that the danger of unfair prejudice did not substantially outweigh that relevance. We affirm the trial court.

Holding

Because res gestae is no more, we consider evidentiary admissibility under our Rules of Evidence. Under those rules, the trial court was within its discretion in deciding that Snow’s handgun was relevant to her aggressiveness, and that the danger of unfair prejudice did not substantially outweigh its probative value. We affirm the trial court.

(Mike Frisch)