State v. Holt, 314 P.3d 870

Holt appeals his conviction for aggravated indecent liberties with a child; record on appeal is incomplete and not effectively reconstructable.
L.F., born June 2003, was in a blended family with Nicole (Holt’s partner) and Holt; L.F. reported abuse in 2006.
Allegations centered on Holt touching L.F. and threatening harm if she disclosed; multiple interviews and medical examinations occurred with conflicting findings.
A pretrial motion sought an independent psychological evaluation of L.F.; the motion and ruling were not properly documented due to transcription failures.
Post-trial, appellate reconstruction efforts revealed no clear basis for the trial court’s ruling on the psychological evaluation motion; memories and notes were vague.
Court found the appellate record inadequate for meaningful review and reversed the conviction, remanding for a new trial.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Adequacy of the appellate record	Holt	Holt	Record incomplete; review impeded; remand for new trial
Denial of independent psychological evaluation	Holt argued denial was potentially critical defense	State contends no abuse of discretion	Court cannot determine abuse due to missing basis in record; reversal and remand
Need for due process safeguards in appellate review	Due process requires effective, accurate transcript for meaningful review	Record reconstruction suffices for some remands	Due process requires reversal and new trial when record is too incomplete for review

Bounds v. Smith, 430 U.S. 817 (1977) (right to an adequate, complete record for review)
Entsminger v. Iowa, 386 U.S. 748 (1967) (due process requires meaningful appellate review)
Rojas-Marceleno, 295 Kan. 525 (2012) (abuse of discretion standard for psychological evaluation of a witness)
Tedford v. Hepting, 990 F.2d 745 (3d Cir. 1993) (incomplete transcripts not always reversible; cautions on remedy)
Robinson v. Smyth, 258 Fed. Appx. 469 (3d Cir. 2007) (unpublished; partial transcript issues discussed)
United States v. Wilson, 16 F.3d 1027 (9th Cir. 1994) (reversal and remand when transcript incomplete)
United States v. Cashwell, 950 F.2d 699 (11th Cir. 1992) (incomplete record not always reversible)
United States v. Selva, 559 F.2d 1303 (5th Cir. 1977) (transcript quality and record sufficiency considerations)
Ortiz-Salas v. I.N.S., 992 F.2d 105 (7th Cir. 1993) (best feasible showing required when alleging transcript deficiencies)
Al-Ghorbani v. Holder, 585 F.3d 980 (6th Cir. 2009) (considerations on procedural rights in review)
Curro v. Watson, 884 F. Supp. 708 (E.D. N.Y. 1995) (due process and transcript accuracy implications)