What is the test for admissible evidence of a prior crime or bad act?

California, United States of America


The following excerpt is from People v. Thompson, B221794 (Cal. App. 2011):

Where the defendant's mental state is at issue, evidence of a prior crime or bad act may be admissible to show that the defendant harbored the requisite intent. "'"[T]he recurrence of a similar result . . . tends (increasingly with each instance) to negative accident or inadvertence or self-defense or good faith or other innocent mental state, and tends to establish (provisionally, at least, though not certainly) the presence of the normal, i.e., criminal, intent accompanying such an act . . . ." [Citation.] In order to be admissible to prove intent, the uncharged misconduct must be sufficiently similar to support the inference that the defendant "'probably harbor[ed] the same intent in each instance.' [Citations.]" [Citation.]'" (People v. Kelly, supra, 42 Cal.4th at p. 783.)

Page 12

Defendant first claims evidence as to the incident with Early was inadmissible because it lacked reliability. People v. Ewoldt (1994) 7 Cal.4th 380, 404, on which defendant relies, does not support this claim.

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