Christmas v. Sanders
| Decision Date | 12 April 1985 |
| Docket Number | No. 83-3230,83-3230 |
| Citation | 759 F.2d 1284 |
| Parties | 18 Fed. R. Evid. Serv. 531 Stanley CHRISTMAS, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Lolita SANDERS, Defendant-Appellant. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Seventh Circuit |
Patrick Hart, Chicago, Ill., for plaintiff-appellee.
Jennifer A. Keller, Asst. Corp. Counsel, Chicago, Ill., for defendant-appellant.
Before CUDAHY and POSNER, Circuit Judges, and SWYGERT, Senior Circuit Judge.
In this appeal from a civil judgment entered against her, defendant Lolita Sanders asks this court to grant her a new trial on the grounds that the district judge erroneously excluded certain evidence and that the verdict was against the manifest weight of the evidence. We affirm.
This case arises from a series of events that took place on the night of September 26, 1980. The facts are sharply disputed, but we will attempt to provide a fair summary of the different versions.
According to plaintiff, Stanley Christmas, on the night of September 26, he and a male colleague, Al Ruffian, together consumed one-half pint of cognac. Desiring to purchase more cognac before the liquor stores closed, Christmas and Ruffian drove to a liquor store on the corner of Clark Street and Chicago Avenue, in Chicago. They parked their car in front of the liquor store on the southeast corner of the intersection between Clark and Chicago. The pair got out of the car and, before entering the liquor store, encountered a friend, Emmett Hill. The three engaged in conversation. While talking, Christmas and Hill were facing east other, Hill facing northwest and Christmas facing southeast. During their conversation, Hill said to someone standing behind Christmas, "Hello--what's happening baby?--Mother fuck you." When Christmas turned around to see who Hill was addressing, he saw a young black woman, the defendant Lolita Sanders, dressed in a blue jacket and blue jeans. Sanders "spinned around" and said, "What you say?" to Christmas. In response to Sanders' question, Christmas threw his hands up in the air and backed up; even though Christmas did not speak to or touch Sanders, she shot him in the abdomen from a distance of approximately three feet. Christmas collapsed on the curb, unconscious, and subsequently was taken to the hospital where he was treated for the bullet wound. He spent approximately two months in the hospital and accumulated at least $20,000 in medical bills.
Sanders testified to a different series of events. She is a Chicago police officer. Sometime after 11:00 p.m., on September 26, Sanders changed from her police uniform into civilian clothes and left work at the 18th Street Precinct. That district is a high-crime area. As she was walking east on Chicago Avenue toward the State Street Subway, she saw two or three men on Chicago Avenue at the intersection of Chicago and Clark Street. One of the men was Christmas. As she crossed the intersection the men began to make suggestive remarks to her. At first she ignored them, but after she crossed the intersection between Clark and Chicago and the men still persisted in harassing her, she withdrew her police badge from her coat pocket, informed the men that she was a police officer, and stated that she would arrest them for disorderly conduct if they continued their abusive remarks. She was approximately two or three feet from the men when this occurred. The two other men then left, but Christmas remained. Christmas called her a "bitch," dared her to arrest him, and then resisted her attempts to arrest him by striking her in the face and chest. Sanders grabbed Christmas' collar to subdue him and place him under arrest, and the two began to struggle. When Christmas' friends reappeared, Sanders felt her life was threatened. She withdrew her service revolver from her purse and pointed it down to the ground hoping to calm the situation. She did not have her finger on the trigger. Christmas attempted to wrest the gun from her control. The two continued to struggle and moved to the center of the intersection when the gun accidentally discharged into Christmas' abdomen, causing Christmas to collapse in the middle of the street. Sanders later filed battery charges against Christmas. Those charges were subsequently dropped when Sanders failed to appear to testify against Christmas. Sanders claimed that she failed to appear because she had not been notified of the court date, although she admitted that she could have easily ascertained that information.
Christmas filed the instant action pursuant to 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983. He claimed that Sanders' unprovoked assault deprived him of liberty without due process of law, constituted a use of excessive force, and resulted in an arrest without probable cause. The trial judge instructed the jury that if it believed Christmas' version of the events, it should find in favor of Christmas. The jury returned a verdict in favor of plaintiff for $20,000.
Defendant raises three issues on appeal: (1) whether the trial judge erroneously excluded two police reports that were offered as prior consistent statements; (2) whether the trial judge erred in not granting Sanders a judgment notwithstanding the verdict because the verdict was against the manifest weight of the evidence; and (3) whether the trial judge erroneously excluded evidence of Christmas' prior conviction for rape. We consider each of these issues separately.
Sanders first argues that she is entitled to a new trial because the trial judge erroneously excluded two police reports. These two reports contained statements made by Sanders on the night of the shooting to the effect that two men, one of them Christmas, made lewd remarks to her and physically resisted her efforts to place them under arrest. She stated that Christmas was injured as her revolver accidentally discharged when Christmas attempted to wrest the revolver from Sanders' control.
On cross-examination of the two police officers who made these reports, Sanders attempted to introduce into evidence these two reports as prior consistent statements. The trial judge refused to admit them because there was no foundation laid for the introduction of prior consistent statements and because Sanders' attorney "through a proper series of questions ... [could] have elicited the evidence sought to be introduced by the defendant." Memorandum Opinion and Order at 2.
Federal Rule of Evidence 801(d) provides that out-of-court statements by a witness are not hearsay if "the declarant testifies at the trial or hearing and is subject to cross-examination concerning the statement and the statement is ... (B) consistent with his testimony and is offered to rebut an express or implied charge against him of recent fabrication." The trial judge is granted broad discretion in determining the admissibility of evidence under this rule. United States v. Herring, 582 F.2d 535, 541 (10th Cir.1978); McCormick, Evidence Sec. 49 (2d ed. 1970). In the instant case, there is no dispute that the declarant, defendant Sanders, testified at the trial and that she was available for cross-examination concerning the two police reports. Thus, the only questions for our review on this issue is whether the trial judge found that there had been no express or implied charge of recent fabrication and, if so, whether she abused her discretion in so finding.
Sanders argues that the trial judge did find that the charge of recent fabrication had been made. In support of her argument, Sanders cites a portion of the trial judge's post-trial Memorandum Opinion and Order at 1-2. In rejecting Sanders' motion for a new trial on the basis of the exclusion of the two police reports, the judge stated that the court "had made clear to [defense] counsel that the defendant's prior consistent statements set forth in the reports could be put into evidence through a proper series of questions." We do not believe that the trial judge's characterization of the remarks made in those reports as prior consistent statements compels the conclusion that she found that Christmas had charged recent fabrication. One statement in an entire record cannot be taken out of context and distorted to mean something that it does not.
The entire paragraph from which the trial judge's statement is taken reads:
The defendant also complains of the court's ruling denying introduction into evidence of certain police reports. The reports were offered as prior consistent statements. The reports themselves were not admitted, but the court made clear to counsel that the defendant's prior consistent statements set forth in the reports....
In our view, the judge may merely have been repeating Sanders' characterization of those reports or acknowledging that some remarks in the reports made by the defendant were consistent with her trial testimony. They do not compel in the least the conclusion that the reports complied with all of the requirements of Fed.R.Evid. 801(d).
Were we to adopt the position espoused by Sanders, we would be directly ignoring and, in effect, reversing outright the trial judge's explicit ruling that the police reports did not qualify as prior consistent statements. After all of the evidence had been presented, the trial judge raised the issue of the admissibility of the disputed reports, on which she had previously reserved ruling. After much discussion among the parties and the court over the issue of whether the reports fell within Fed.R.Evid. 801(d), the judge stated:
It doesn't come in as a prior consistent statement.
* * *
* * *
Well, I think that's the correct evidentiary ruling. Those prior reports do not come in as prior consistent statements. I don't think the defense is a recent fabrication of trial testimony.... Much of this could have come in through proper question and answer. It didn't come in, but that's that.
Thus, we believe that the judge unequivocally ruled that Christmas had not made a...
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Table of Authorities
...v. North Carolina , 637 F.2d 213 (4th Cir. 1980) ............................................................. 118 Christmas v. Sanders , 759 F.2d 1284 (7th Cir. 1985) ............................................................. 33 Chrysler Corp. v. General Motors Corp. , 596 F. Supp. 416 ......