Also known as: religious belief
Written by attorneys — see sources below.
An evidentiary prohibition that bars admission of a witness's religious beliefs or opinions to attack or support the witness's credibility. The rule prevents jurors from assessing truthfulness on the basis of faith rather than the substance of the testimony.
Rhea Reynolds sued a store after slipping on a wet floor. An eyewitness testified the floor was wet and unmarked. On cross-examination the defense sought to ask the witness about membership in a religious group boycotting the store for Sunday hours, hoping to show bias. The court sustained the objection because the inquiry would use religious beliefs to attack credibility.
Robert Rivera was on trial for robbery. The prosecution called an eyewitness who testified about seeing the defendant. On cross-examination defense counsel asked whether the witness's religious beliefs would prevent truthful testimony. The court sustained the objection and barred any further inquiry into religious beliefs to attack credibility.
On January 10, 2000, a shooting occurred outside a mall in Southfield, Michigan, in which Samuel Morris died from multiple gunshot wounds and Frederick France was injured but recovered. Van Chester Thompkins was identified as a suspect and fled; he was arrested in Ohio approximately one year later. Two Southfield police officers, including Detective Helgert, traveled to Ohio to interrogate Thompkins while he awaited transfer to Michigan. The interrogation began around 1:30 p.m. in an 8-by-10-foot room and lasted about three hours, with Thompkins seated in a chair resembling a school desk. At the outset, Detective Helgert presented Thompkins with a written Miranda rights form derived from the standard warnings. Thompkins read the fifth warning aloud, after which Helgert read the remaining warnings; Thompkins declined to sign the form to acknowledge understanding his rights, though there was conflicting evidence about whether he verbally confirmed understanding. During the interrogation Thompkins remained largely silent and uncommunicative, giving only occasional one-word answers such as “yeah,” “no,” or “I don’t know,” nodding his head at times, and stating that he did not want a peppermint offered by the officers and that the chair he was sitting in was hard. Approximately two hours and forty-five minutes into the interrogation, Helgert asked Thompkins whether he prayed to God to forgive him for shooting the boy; Thompkins answered “yes,” made eye contact, and his eyes welled with tears. Thompkins refused to provide a written confession, and the interrogation ended about fifteen minutes later. Thompkins was charged with first-degree murder, assault with intent to commit murder, and firearms-related offenses; he moved to suppress the statements made during the interrogation. The trial court denied the suppression motion. At trial the prosecution called Eric Purifoy, who had driven the van during the shooting and had been acquitted of murder and assault charges in a prior trial but convicted of firearms offenses; the jury convicted Thompkins on all counts, and he was sentenced to life in prison without parole. The Michigan Court of Appeals rejected Thompkins’s Miranda and ineffective-assistance claims and affirmed the conviction; the Michigan Supreme Court denied discretionary review. Thompkins filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan, which denied relief; the Sixth Circuit reversed on both the Miranda and ineffective-assistance claims, and the Supreme Court granted certiorari.
View caseRavi Reddy sued a performer for breaching a concert agreement. A stagehand testified about contract terms. Defense counsel tried to ask the stagehand about membership in a religious group that condemns secular music to imply bias. The court excluded the questions because they sought to attack credibility through religious beliefs.
Respondent John Abel and two cohorts were indicted for robbing a savings and loan in Bellflower, Cal., in violation of 18 U. S. C. §§ 2113(a) and (d). The cohorts elected to plead guilty, but respondent went to trial. One of the cohorts, Kurt Ehle, agreed to testify against respondent and identify him as a participant in the robbery. Respondent informed the District Court at a pretrial conference that he would seek to counter Ehle’s testimony with that of Robert Mills. Mills was not a participant in the robbery but was friendly with respondent and with Ehle, and had spent time with both in prison. Mills planned to testify that after the robbery Ehle had admitted to Mills that Ehle intended to implicate respondent falsely to receive favorable treatment from the Government. The prosecutor in turn disclosed that he intended to discredit Mills’ testimony by calling Ehle back to the stand and eliciting from Ehle the fact that respondent, Mills, and Ehle were all members of the “Aryan Brotherhood,” a secret prison gang that required its members always to deny the existence of the organization and to commit perjury, theft, and murder on each member’s behalf. Defense counsel objected to Ehle’s proffered rebuttal testimony as too prejudicial to respondent. After a lengthy discussion in chambers the District Court decided to permit the prosecutor to cross-examine Mills about the gang, and if Mills denied knowledge of the gang, to introduce Ehle’s rebuttal testimony concerning the tenets of the gang and Mills’ and respondent’s membership in it. At trial Ehle implicated respondent as a participant in the robbery. Mills, called by respondent, testified that Ehle told him in prison that Ehle planned to implicate respondent falsely. When the prosecutor sought to cross-examine Mills concerning membership in the prison gang, the District Court conferred again with counsel outside of the jury’s presence, and ordered the prosecutor not to use the term “Aryan Brotherhood” because it was unduly prejudicial. Accordingly, the prosecutor asked Mills if he and respondent were members of a “secret type of prison organization” which had a creed requiring members to deny its existence and lie for each other. When Mills denied knowledge of such an organization the prosecutor recalled Ehle. Ehle testified that respondent, Mills, and he were indeed members of a secret prison organization whose tenets required its members to deny its existence and “lie, cheat, steal [and] kill” to protect each other. Ehle then further described the organization and testified that “in view of the fact of how close Abel and Mills were” it would have been “suicide” for Ehle to have told Mills what Mills attributed to him. Respondent’s counsel did not request a limiting instruction and none was given. The jury convicted respondent. On his appeal a divided panel of the Court of Appeals reversed. 707 F. 2d 1013 (1983).
View caseRalph Richardson challenged a state law restricting contraceptive access. A witness testified about enforcement practices. Opposing counsel sought to introduce the witness's religious beliefs to undermine credibility. The court excluded the evidence under the rule prohibiting religious beliefs to attack or support credibility.
Estelle Griswold served as Executive Director of the Planned Parenthood League of Connecticut. Dr. C. Lee Buxton served as the League's Medical Director and was a professor at Yale Medical School. Together they opened and operated a center in New Haven that was open from November 1 to November 10, 1961. At the center they gave information, instruction, and medical advice to married persons as to the means of preventing conception. They examined the wife and prescribed the best contraceptive device or material for her use. Fees were usually charged, although some couples were serviced free. The statutes involved were sections 53-32 and 54-196 of the General Statutes of Connecticut (1958 rev.). Section 53-32 made it a crime to use any drug, medicinal article or instrument for the purpose of preventing conception. Section 54-196 punished accessories as principals. The appellants were found guilty as accessories and fined $100 each. The Appellate Division of the Circuit Court affirmed the convictions. The Supreme Court of Errors of Connecticut affirmed that judgment in State v. Griswold, 151 Conn. 544, 200 A. 2d 479. The United States Supreme Court noted probable jurisdiction. The appellants asserted standing to raise the constitutional rights of the married persons with whom they had a professional relationship. A criminal conviction for serving married couples removes doubts about case or controversy. The rights of husband and wife would be diluted unless considered in a suit involving those who have this kind of confidential relation to them.
View caseRiley Rivera was prosecuted under a firearms statute. A defense witness testified about historical practices. The prosecution attempted to introduce the witness's religious beliefs to attack credibility. The court sustained the objection and barred the inquiry as prohibited by the evidentiary rule.
In 1995 Samuel Mullet purchased land in Jefferson County, Ohio. That land became the Bergholz Amish community in 2001 when a sufficient number of ordained ministers qualified it as a separate Amish church district. The new community appointed Mullet as its bishop. As bishop, Mullet controlled all aspects of life in the Bergholz compound and had the ability to order the shunning of community members who failed to follow the tenets of their Amish faith. In 2006 Mullet excommunicated several church members who questioned Bergholz community practices and his leadership. Included in the group were Lavern and Mattie Troyer, whose son Aden was married to Mullet's daughter Wilma, as well as Melvin and Anna Shrock, whose son Emanuel was married to Mullet's daughter Linda. The excommunications led to family divisions, including a divorce and a custody dispute. Amish bishops from across the country met and voted unanimously to reverse the excommunications. From September 6 to November 9, 2011, several Bergholz community members committed five separate attacks on nine different individuals connected to the community by family or religious ties. The assailants sliced off the men's beards and cut the women's hair. The victims were seen as Amish hypocrites by the assailants. A federal grand jury indicted sixteen members of the Bergholz community for violating and conspiring to violate the Hate Crimes Prevention Act, as well as other charges. At trial, the government presented evidence that the assaults were motivated by the victims' religion, while the defendants presented evidence of personal and family disputes as alternative motives. The jury convicted all sixteen defendants of at least one hate-crime violation. The district court instructed the jury that the victims' religion need only be a significant motivating factor even if other reasons existed. The defendants twice requested a but-for causation instruction, which the court rejected. The defendants appealed their convictions to the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit.
View caseRonald Reed sought to introduce polygraph results in a criminal trial. A witness was prepared to testify about the test results. The government objected to any exploration of the witness's religious beliefs to support or attack credibility. The court excluded the line of questioning under the rule while ruling on the polygraph separately.
In March 1992, Edward G. Scheffer, an airman stationed at March Air Force Base in California, volunteered to work as an informant on drug investigations for the Air Force Office of Special Investigations. His OSI supervisors advised him that they would ask him to submit to drug testing and polygraph examinations from time to time during his undercover work. In early April, one of the OSI agents supervising Scheffer requested that he submit to a urine test. Shortly after providing the urine sample, but before the results were known, Scheffer agreed to take a polygraph test administered by an OSI examiner, who concluded that the test indicated no deception when Scheffer denied using drugs since joining the Air Force. On April 30, Scheffer unaccountably failed to appear for work and could not be found on the base. He remained absent without leave until May 13, when an Iowa state patrolman arrested him following a routine traffic stop and held him for return to the base. OSI agents later learned that Scheffer's urinalysis revealed the presence of methamphetamine. Scheffer was tried by general court-martial on charges of using methamphetamine, failing to go to his appointed place of duty, wrongfully absenting himself from the base for 13 days, and, with respect to an unrelated matter, uttering 17 insufficient funds checks. At trial Scheffer testified on his own behalf, relying upon an innocent ingestion theory and denying that he had knowingly used drugs while working for OSI. On cross-examination the prosecution attempted to impeach him with inconsistencies between his trial testimony and earlier statements he had made to OSI. Scheffer sought to introduce the polygraph evidence in support of his testimony that he did not knowingly use drugs, but the military judge denied the motion and excluded the evidence pursuant to Military Rule of Evidence 707. Scheffer was convicted on all counts and sentenced to a bad-conduct discharge, confinement for 30 months, total forfeiture of all pay and allowances, and reduction to the lowest enlisted grade. The Air Force Court of Criminal Appeals affirmed in all material respects. By a 3-to-2 vote the United States Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces reversed. The Supreme Court granted certiorari.
View caseYes. The rule categorically excludes religious beliefs or opinions when offered to attack or support credibility, including attempts to show bias through religious affiliation. Courts must sustain objections to such inquiries regardless of the label placed on the evidence.
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No. The rule prohibits the use of religious beliefs to attack credibility irrespective of the purpose label. Counsel may explore actual bias shown through specific conduct, but religious affiliation itself supplies no permissible basis for impeachment.
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The prohibition applies at any stage. The rule focuses on the purpose of the evidence rather than the timing or the party offering it, so religious beliefs remain inadmissible to attack credibility whether asked on direct or cross.
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…in the relationship of marriage should be left to personal and private choice, based upon each individual's moral, ethical, and religious beliefs. As a matter of social policy, I think professional counsel about methods of birth control should be available to all, so that each individual's choice can be meaningfully made. But we are…