## Facts

- Three armed men robbed a Connecticut bank, and the 84-second robbery was captured on surveillance film.
- The identities of two robbers were not disputed: one pled guilty; the other remained at large.
- The trial centered on whether William Eugene Robinson was the third robber shown in the surveillance images.
- FBI agents showed a surveillance photograph to a correctional officer and staff at a local jail to aid identification.
- The correctional officer would have testified that, after reviewing jail files, he and staff concluded the photographed robber resembled a specific person, Eli Turner.
- The defense also sought to introduce related evidence (by stipulation) that Turner was suspected of two recent armed robberies and was still at large.
- The trial court excluded the correctional officer’s identification testimony, citing concern that it would lead to extensive lay-opinion comparisons about who the photograph resembled.
- Robinson presented an alibi defense.
- The government impeached the alibi using an unemployment office employee’s testimony suggesting records did not show Robinson received a benefit check on the date he claimed.
- The first trial ended in a mistrial due to a hung jury; the second trial resulted in Robinson’s conviction for bank robbery under 18 U.S.C. §§ 2113(a) and (b).

## Issues

1. Whether excluding defense evidence that the surveillance photograph resembled an identified third party (and related evidence linking that person to similar crimes) was reversible error where identity was the central disputed issue.
2. Whether admitting “no record” testimony to impeach the defendant’s alibi was error when the underlying record search was not shown to be sufficiently complete and diligent.

## Decision

- The Second Circuit reversed the conviction and remanded for a new trial.
- The trial court erred by excluding the defense evidence pointing to Eli Turner as a possible third robber because it was highly probative of mistaken identity and not fairly excludable on a generalized fear of cumulative lay opinions.
- The trial court erred by admitting the unemployment records impeachment because it rested on incomplete records and an insufficiently diligent search, making the negative inference unreliable.
- The combined evidentiary errors were prejudicial in a case turning on identification and credibility and were not harmless.

## Legal Principles

- When identity is the central issue, a defendant must be permitted to present relevant, non-speculative evidence that another identifiable person may have committed the offense; exclusion is improper where the evidence directly supports a mistaken-identity theory.
- Lay-opinion identification evidence may be especially probative when grounded in a witness’s particular familiarity with persons in relevant files and when the jury cannot make the same comparison because the alternative suspect is unavailable.
- “No record” or negative-records testimony is admissible to prove nonoccurrence only if supported by a reasonably thorough, diligent search of complete and relevant records.
- Impeachment that materially attacks an alibi must rest on reliable foundations; deficient recordkeeping or a cursory search cannot support a fair negative inference.

## Conclusion

Because the trial court both prevented Robinson from presenting probative third-party misidentification evidence and allowed unreliable negative-records impeachment of his alibi, the Second Circuit found prejudicial error and ordered a new trial.


United States v. Robinson, 544 F.2d 110 (2d Cir. 1976)