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Chaney v. State12/18/2001
e an unusual evidentiary rule in workers' compensation cases would not be extraordinary, especially considering that claims are to be viewed through the filter of the "beneficent purposes of the act." McCrary v. City of Biloxi, 757 So. 2d 978, 981 (Miss. 2000). Whatever that means, it at least requires some liberality in considering the claim. However, if a rule that requires witnesses' unimpeached statements to be accepted actually exists for all civil cases, then surely it cannot be ignored for any criminal cases. It would be nonsensical in trials for which the jury must find facts beyond reasonable doubt, to allow convictions despite unimpeached, plausible testimony exonerating the accused in whole or part, while similar testimony in a civil case in which the burden is only a preponderance of the evidence must be accepted as true.
. I conclude that there is in fact a fairly universally applied rule in Mississippi, universal at least once it is noted and discussed. It applies in all criminal cases though likely not in many civil suits. It largely arises from the review standard applicable to criminal cases. That review is premised on considering all the evidence, both direct and circumstantial, in a light most favorable to the verdict, accepting that the jury makes the credibility choices. When the evidence is so considered, the court must be able to conclude that reasonable jurors could have found the accused guilty. Harveston, 493 So. 2d at 370-71. Witnesses may be disbelieved, but to find guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, there must be some basis on which to disbelieve. Since the same review standard applies to all criminal convictions, this rule is not homicide-specific.
. Therefore, if the only eyewitnesses to the offense present a version of the events that is reasonable, consistent with innocence entirely or as to some element of the crime charged, and there is no contradiction of that version in the physical facts, facts of common knowledge or other credible evidence, then the jury may not reject that version. I would hold that this rule cannot apply if the relevant issue is something objectively unknowable such as the intent of the accused. That is a matter usually only proved by inferences from circumstances, and therefore a statement denying the necessary intent or knowledge is simply evidence to be weighed by the jury.
. When the issue is what action the accused took, the sole eyewitness evidence on that controls if it conforms to this statement of the rule. If the issue is what was in the defendant's mind, the accused's descriptions of his thoughts are not controlling, in part because contemporaneous actions can speak louder than later words as to what an accused had in mind.
. This iteration includes quite a few qualifiers. The civil rule such as in Lucedale Veneer includes the phrase "unless shown to be untrustworthy . . . ." Lucedale Veneer Co., 53 So. 2d at 75. The supply and buy precedents sometime state that the evidence must be "unimpeached." Pulliam, 592 So. 2d at 27. It is unlikely that this means that every general credibility challenge to the witness prevents application of this rule. Since the demeanor of the witness is always a possible reason that a jury might not believe testimony, if demeanor issues prevent this rule from applying, then the rule would in practical terms not even exist. But it does exist. Besides demeanor, impeachment can occur if the witness's general credibility, a matter to be distinguished from the State's presentation of evidence, conflicts with the witness's evidence about events. If general credibility is attacked such as through evidence of character or by showing conviction of prior crimes, perhaps that is the imp
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