People v. Snook, No. 86SC353

• Docket Nº: No. 86SC353
• Citation: 745 P.2d 647
• Case Date: November 02, 1987
• Court: Supreme Court of Colorado

Page 647

745 P.2d 647 The PEOPLE of the State of Colorado, Petitioner,
v.
Roland SNOOK, Respondent. No. 86SC353. Supreme Court of Colorado,
En Banc. Nov. 2, 1987.
Rehearing Denied Dec. 7, 1987.

Duane Woodard, Atty. Gen., Charles B. Howe, Chief Deputy Atty. Gen., Richard H. Forman, Sol. Gen., David R. Little, Asst. Atty. Gen., Denver, for petitioner.

David F. Vela, State Public Defender, Thomas M. Van Cleave, III, Deputy State Public Defender, Denver, for respondent.

ERICKSON, Justice.

The defendant, Roland Snook, was convicted by a jury of sexual assault on a

Page 648

child, section 18-3-405, 8 C.R.S. (1978 & 1983 Supp.). The court of appeals reversed the conviction under CRE 608(a) because the victim's character for truthfulness had not been attacked prior to admission of expert opinion testimony about the capacity of children to fabricate claims of sexual assault. People v. Snook, 729 P.2d 1026 (Colo.App.1986). We granted the prosecution's petition for certiorari and now affirm the court of appeals, and return the case to the court of appeals with directions to remand to the district court for a new trial.

I.

Sometime in June 1983, the victim, who was then ten-years-old, stayed at the defendant's home with his daughter. The victim, T.B., testified that during the night Snook made four visits to the bedroom occupied by her and his daughter, and that Snook touched her breasts and genitalia. Following her testimony, the prosecution, as part of its case-in-chief, offered expert testimony of a social worker, who had never interviewed T.B., that children do not fabricate erotic experiences. The district court admitted the testimony over the defendant's objection on the condition that the social worker would not offer testimony as to her personal evaluation of T.B.'s veracity.

On direct examination, the social worker, who was qualified without objection as an expert witness, obeyed the court's order and confined her testimony to the psychological capacity of children in general. ¹ She testified in relevant part that:

General attitudes, accepted attitudes as far as the literature concerning children is that children tend not to fabricate stories of sexual abuse and in giving reports tend to reproduce their experiences and your statement about children having had the erotic experience when young, in order to make these things up, there has to be a basis for that experience and unless it happened to them in this area, then in fact the description would be what had been done to them.

In his case-in-chief, Snook denied sexually assaulting the victim. He testified that he merely entered the bedroom where his daughter and T.B. were sleeping and moved T.B. over to her side of the bed to separate the girls. His wife corroborated his story.

The court of appeals reversed Snook's conviction and remanded to the district court for a new trial. People v. Snook, 729 P.2d 1026 (Colo.App.1986). The court of appeals, relying on CRE 608(a), stated that "[n]o ... attack on the complainant's veracity justified the admission of the [expert's] testimony." Id. at 1027. It, therefore, concluded that the admission of "the expert's testimony, the sole purpose of which was to support the complaining witness' testimony, was improper." Id.

II.

Absent an abuse of discretion, the ruling of the trial judge regarding the scope of expert testimony will not be disturbed. People v. Davis, 187 Colo. 16, 19, 528 P.2d 251, 253 (1974). The...