Brooks v. State

ADKINS, J., concurring. I agree with the Majority opinion, except with respect to its finding no error in the trial court’s failure to strike Nurse Harden’s response to the prosecutor’s question, indicating she could verify the victim’s accounting of the events that transpired. I agree with Judge Harrell’s dissenting opinion when he concludes that refusing to strike this testimony was error by the trial court. I disagree, though, with Judge’s Harrell’s conclusion that this error was prejudicial.

In my opinion, there was sufficient corroborating evidence to render this error harmless. Such evidence includes the police officer’s testimony about his arrival at the victim’s house, Nurse Harden’s non-objectionable testimony about the significant physical injury to the victim, and the photographs of the victim taken at the time of the crime. I agree with Judge McDonald’s analysis when he concludes that if there were error, it was harmless. Accordingly, I join in the judgment of the Majority, and some of its rationale, but not its failure to strike Nurse Harden’s response as described above.

HARRELL, J., dissenting, which GREENE, J., joins. Technically, I dissent, although I agree with much of the Court’s opinion. The only point upon which I part company with the Majority is with regard to admitting Nurse Harden’s testimonial response (to the prosecutor’s legitimate question) that her findings from her physical examinations of Laura B. “would verify” what Laura B. told her. Contrary to the analysis and conclusion of the Majority opinion that allowing the response to be considered by the jury was not error and, if ⁷⁴⁵ error, was harmless (Maj. op. at 734-37, 98 A.3d at 257-59), I would find error and a quite harmful one, to boot.

Accordingly, I would reverse the judgment of the Circuit Court and remand the case for a new trial. As the Majority opinion concedes, “the word ‘verify’ ... might well suggest that [Nurse Harden] had assessed Laura B.’s statement to her to be the one true version of events.” Maj. op. at 734, 98 A.3d at 256. Yet, the Majority opinion engages thereafter in a rationalization, based on linguistic gymnastics, that it could have meant something else in the greater context here. Although such an analysis may beguile some jurists and lawyers, one should not lose sight of who the fact finder was at Brooks’s trial — a jury of his peers.

I do not accept that they, unpracticed most likely in the ways of legal legerdemain, would perceive what Nurse Harden said in such a caged manner as the Majority opinion imagines, nor am I willing to assume, at Brooks’s expense, that was the case here. As the Majority opinion must concede, “verify” usually means “to establish the truth.” That is the sense most often associated with that word by lay people and lexicographers. See, e.g., Merriam Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary 1312 (10th ed. 1993) (“verify” — “to establish the truth, accuracy, or reality of’). This is what, for present purposes, we must assume the jury understood.

It was prejudicial error for the jury to have been permitted to consider Nurse Harden’s answer. Her reply was more than simply saying that Laura B.’s version was not excluded as an explanation of her injuries. The use of the term “verify”