## Facts

- George Watson was charged with stealing merchandise from a Walmart store.
- The prosecution’s theory was that Watson acted with a second perpetrator in a coordinated theft: expensive items were selected and then carried out of the store as though they had been paid for.
- Nancy Jenski, a Walmart employee, watched the store’s security-camera footage and noticed the second perpetrator acting suspiciously.
- Watson was arrested after he walked out of the store with the merchandise.
- The second perpetrator was not immediately identified or apprehended at the time of the incident.
- Before Watson’s trial, Jenski later identified Christopher Stetson—Watson’s friend—as the second perpetrator using a photograph.
- The State used Jenski’s identification to support its theory that Watson worked with an accomplice.
- Watson was convicted and appealed, arguing that the security footage was the best evidence of the second perpetrator’s identity and that the trial court should not have relied on Jenski’s photo identification.

## Issues

1. Whether the best evidence rule required the State to produce the store’s security footage, rather than permit testimony about the accomplice’s identity based on a witness’s photographic identification.
2. Whether admitting and considering the witness’s photo-identification testimony (despite the existence of the security recording) was error requiring reversal.

## Decision

- The Alaska Court of Appeals affirmed Watson’s conviction.
- The court rejected Watson’s argument that the best evidence rule barred or limited Jenski’s testimony identifying Stetson from a photograph when security footage existed.
- The court treated Watson’s claim that the security footage would be more accurate than the witness’s identification as a matter for the factfinder in assessing the strength of the evidence, not a basis for exclusion under the best evidence rule.

## Legal Principles

- The best evidence rule applies when a party seeks to prove the contents of a writing, recording, or photograph; it does not automatically require production of an existing recording whenever a witness testifies about events that were captured on video.
- Testimony identifying a person involved in an event may be admissible even when a recording of that event exists, so long as the testimony is offered to prove identity and related facts rather than to prove the recording’s contents as a substitute for the recording itself.
- Disputes about whether a recording is more reliable or persuasive than a witness’s identification generally affect the weight of the evidence and credibility determinations, not admissibility under the best evidence rule.

## Conclusion

Watson v. State affirmed Watson’s Walmart-theft conviction and held that the best evidence rule did not require the State to introduce the store’s security footage as the exclusive proof of the accomplice’s identity, permitting the State to use a Walmart employee’s photographic identification testimony even though surveillance video existed.


Watson v. State, No. A-7878, 2002 Alas. App. LEXIS 97 (2002)