California, United States of America
The following excerpt is from People v. Dunbar, B259122 (Cal. App. 2015):
Third, the fact that the trial court was confused about whether vehicle theft-taking is a crime involving moral turpitude is beside the point. What matters is whether the trial court abused its discretion in excluding all cross examination about the vehicle theft-taking (both the conviction and the facts underlying that conviction). A trial court has broad discretion under Evidence Code section 352 to "'exclude evidence if its probative value is substantially outweighed by the probability that its admission will (a) necessitate undue consumption of time or (b) create substantial danger of undue prejudice, of confusing the issues, or of misleading the jury.'" (People v. Lewis (2001) 26 Cal.4th 334,
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372, fn. 7.) This discretion gives the trial court broad power to control the presentation of proposed impeachment evidence "'"to prevent criminal trials from degenerating into nitpicking wars of attrition over collateral credibility issues."'" (Id. at pp. 374-375.) A trial court's discretion "'must not be disturbed on appeal except on a showing that the court exercised its discretion in an arbitrary, capricious or patently absurd manner that resulted in a manifest miscarriage of justice.'" (People v. Rodrigues (1994) 8 Cal.4th 1060, 1124.)
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