CRIMINAL LAW
Jacob Keohane
In Komakhuk v. State, the court of appeals held that law enforcement testimony about the violent character of a man accused of third-degree assault unfairly prejudiced the jury. Under Alaska Evidence Rule 404(a)(2), the state may introduce evidence of a defendant’s aggressive character to rebut a claim that he acted in self-defense, but only after the trial court weighs the probative value of that evidence against its potential to prejudice a jury. Here, Komakhuk, accused of punching a man in the face, testified that he only did so after the man had already swung at him. At trial, the court allowed the state to introduce two character witnesses against Komakhuk, an Anchorage Safety Patrol employee and an Anchorage Police Department officer, neither of whom knew Komakhuk personally. Instead, each character witness based their respective appraisal of Komakhuk’s alleged aggressive tendencies on a single interaction. On appeal, the court observed that using law enforcement officers as character witnesses raises substantial due process concerns. It found that the trial judge had not weighed the depth and nature of the witnesses’ relationships to Komakhuk against their potential to prejudice the jury. The court of appeals reversed, holding that law enforcement testimony about the violent character of a man accused of third-degree assault, based purely on a single, unrelated prior interaction, prejudiced the jury.
