## Facts

- On March 9, 1987, Guy McFarland drove to a Louisiana National Bank branch in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, to make a deposit.
- McFarland carried a bank-deposit bag containing roughly $4,000 in cash and checks.
- Outside the bank, McFarland noticed a young Black man later identified as James Mosby; McFarland made eye contact with him, and the man quickly looked away and walked off.
- Inside the bank lobby, while McFarland stood in line, the same person came up from behind, grabbed the deposit bag from McFarland, and ran toward the exit.
- McFarland immediately chased the robber. During the escape, the robber struck and shattered a locked glass door, then exited, ran through the parking lot toward nearby apartments, and fled in a maroon, late-model Chevrolet Nova.
- McFarland obtained a partial license plate number and gave police a description of the robber and the getaway car.
- A few weeks later, a detective showed McFarland a photographic lineup of six Black males that included a suspect named Michael Jackson; McFarland did not identify anyone from that lineup.
- After Mosby’s former girlfriend, Diane Johnson, contacted police and reported that Mosby had robbed a bank, the detective prepared a second photographic lineup of six Black males that included Mosby.
- McFarland identified Mosby from the second lineup and later identified Mosby at trial.
- Johnson provided information that Mosby admitted committing the robbery; at trial, she testified that she had heard Mosby committed it and that when she confronted him, he “laughingly” admitted doing it.
- Mosby’s defense at trial was misidentification. To support the claim that someone else committed the offense, Mosby sought to introduce evidence that Michael Jackson—similar in age and build—had been arrested and charged with two similar bank robberies at nearby banks in January and April 1987.
- The trial court excluded the evidence about Jackson’s other robberies, reasoning that it would confuse the jury.
- The jury found Mosby guilty of simple robbery. The court adjudicated him a second-felony habitual offender and imposed a 14-year hard-labor sentence without benefits.
- Mosby appealed, challenging the exclusion of the Jackson evidence and arguing the ruling prevented him from presenting his misidentification defense.

## Issues

1. Whether the trial court erred by excluding defense evidence that a third party (Michael Jackson) had been charged with two similar bank robberies near the charged offense, offered to show mistaken identity.
2. If the exclusion was error, whether it was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.

## Decision

- The court held the proffered evidence about Jackson’s similar robberies was relevant to Mosby’s identity defense and should not have been excluded solely on the stated ground that it would confuse the jury.
- The court concluded the exclusion was legal error.
- The court nonetheless found the error harmless beyond a reasonable doubt in light of the evidence presented, including McFarland’s identification of Mosby and Johnson’s testimony about Mosby’s admission.
- The court affirmed Mosby’s conviction, habitual offender adjudication, and sentence.

## Legal Principles

- A defendant may offer evidence pointing to a third party as the perpetrator when it tends to make the defendant’s guilt less likely, including evidence bearing on identity.
- Even relevant defense evidence may be excluded if its admission would create a substantial risk of jury confusion, misdirection from the issues to be decided, or undue delay; a trial court’s stated reason for exclusion is reviewable on appeal.
- When a trial court improperly excludes defense evidence, reversal is not required if the reviewing court determines the error was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt based on the whole record.

## Conclusion

State v. Mosby, 581 So. 2d 1060 (La. Ct. App. 1st Cir. 1991) affirmed a simple-robbery conviction after holding that the trial court wrongly excluded Mosby’s proposed evidence that another suspect, Michael Jackson, had been charged with similar robberies nearby around the same time, but that the exclusion did not affect the verdict because the State’s identification and admission evidence was strong enough to render the error harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.


State v. Mosby, 581 So. 2d 1060 (1991)