State v. Kistle
| Decision Date | 07 December 1982 |
| Docket Number | No. 821SC332,821SC332 |
| Citation | 297 S.E.2d 626,59 N.C.App. 724 |
| Court | North Carolina Court of Appeals |
| Parties | STATE of North Carolina v. Jeffrey J. KISTLE. |
Atty. Gen. Rufus L. Edmisten by Asst. Atty. Gen. Lucien Capone, III, Raleigh, for the State.
D. Keith Teague, Elizabeth City, for defendant-appellant.
Defendant contends that the State failed to establish a complete chain of custody for the photographs and that the trial court erred when it admitted them into evidence. Since we find that the State adequately established the authenticity of the photographs, we hold that the trial judge properly admitted them into evidence.
The purpose behind the evidentiary rule requiring that a chain of custody be established is to insure that "the object offered is the object which was involved in the incident and further that the condition of the object is substantially unchanged." McCormick's Handbook of the Law of Evidence § 212 (E.W. Cleary ed. 2d ed. 1972). A detailed chain of custody need only be established when the evidence offered is not readily identifiable or is susceptible to alteration. "If the offered item possesses characteristics which are fairly unique and readily identifiable, and if the substance of which the item is composed is relatively impervious to change, the trial court is viewed as having broad discretion to admit merely on the basis of testimony that the item is the one in question and is in a substantially unchanged condition." Id. In State v. Brooks, 15 N.C.App. 367, 190 S.E.2d 338 (1972), this court held that a complete chain of custody need not be established where an investigating officer, who discovered the burglary tools which were offered into evidence at trial, recognized and identified the tools from memory of marks he made on them. In the present case, as in Brooks, the State need not establish a complete chain of custody. A witness who had inspected the film immediately after processing testified that the photographs introduced at trial were the same as those he had inspected immediately after processing. That testimony sufficiently established the authenticity of the exhibits in question when taken in conjunction with the testimony of another witness who stated that the undeveloped film had been brought to the Coast Guard Exchange by the defendant.
Defendant also contends that the photographs were erroneously admitted into evidence because the State could not produce evidence indicating that the photographs were a true representation of the scenes, objects, people and position of the people they purported to portray. Since the photographs were introduced as evidence of the crime...
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State v. Gladden
...to have a witness testify that they fairly and accurately represent the scene described by the testimony. See State v. Kistle, 59 N.C.App. 724, 297 S.E.2d 626 (1982), disc. rev. denied, 307 N.C. 471, 298 S.E.2d 694 (1983). Also, since the photographs were not introduced as illustrative evid......
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USA v. Chuvala Vann
...108 N.C.App. 648, 424 S.E.2d 687 (1993) (prosecuting videotaping of disrobing teenager under subsection (a)(1)); State v. Kistle, 59 N.C.App. 724, 297 S.E.2d 626 (1982) (prosecuting photographing of unclothed child under subsection (a)(2)). Moreover, contrary to the majority's interpretatio......
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United States v. Vann
...108 N.C.App. 648, 424 S.E.2d 687 (1993) (prosecuting videotaping of disrobing teenager under subsection (a)(1)); State v. Kistle, 59 N.C.App. 724, 297 S.E.2d 626 (1982) (prosecuting photographing of unclothed child under subsection (a)(2)). Deference to the North Carolina courts in this ins......
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State v. Lawrence
...liberties, but on one occasion the defendant fondled the child and also took pornographic pictures of her. See State v. Kistle, 59 N.C.App. 724, 727, 297 S.E.2d 626, 628 (1982) (holding that taking pictures of a child in a sexually provocative pose is the evil the statute sought to protect ......