State v. Patton, 287 Neb. 899

Background

On July 6, 2011, Marqus J. Patton was charged with first degree murder and related weapon use after a home-invasion robbery of Kristopher Winters; several participants (Emily, Northrop, Ely, Elseman) testified for the State.
Emily (a minor) and Northrop were prosecution witnesses who had pending first-degree murder charges and testified that they hoped to obtain favorable treatment by cooperating but denied any express promises.
Detective testimony revealed Emily changed her story after being told others were implicating her and that she faced life imprisonment, which came before the jury.
Patton sought to cross-examine Emily and Northrop about the specific penalties they faced and sought testimony from their defense attorneys about alleged tacit plea agreements; the court limited those inquiries.
Patton also sought to question witness Cassandra Moyers about whether she believed Winters’ family blamed her, and to introduce evidence that Emily and Elseman had committed prior robberies without Patton. The court sustained objections to these lines of inquiry and excluded the prior-robberies evidence.

Issues

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument (Patton)	Defendant's Argument (State)	Held
Whether limiting cross-examination of cooperating witnesses about the specific penalty they faced violated Confrontation Clause	Patton: asking the witnesses what sentence they sought to avoid was necessary to show bias and motive to lie	State: eliciting specific defendant-penalty would unduly inform jury of defendant’s exposure and was unnecessary because witnesses already admitted hope for leniency	Court: No violation — jury already learned of life-penalty from another witness and both witnesses were extensively impeached on motive, so further specifics would not have changed credibility assessment
Whether forbidding inquiry into Moyers’ belief that Winters’ family blamed her violated confrontation rights	Patton: Moyers’ belief would show motive to fabricate or exaggerate	State: current relationship/belief was irrelevant and speculative	Court: No violation — record lacked proof Moyers held that belief and jury had basis to assess bias from her admitted closeness to the family
Whether Patton could call defense attorneys to prove tacit plea agreements (attorney testimony admissibility)	Patton: attorneys would show a tacit “wink-and-nod” deal, impeaching witnesses’ denials of promises	State: attorney testimony would not contradict witnesses’ own testimony denying promises; thus irrelevant	Held: Court excluded attorneys’ testimony as irrelevant because it did not contradict witnesses’ testimony denying any promise or agreement
Whether the State violated Brady/Bagley by failing to disclose tacit agreements	Patton: nondisclosure deprived him of impeachment material	State: no Brady violation because no evidence of express or implied agreements existed to disclose	Court: No Brady violation — record did not establish tacit agreements, only witnesses’ expectations of leniency
Whether evidence that Emily and Elseman committed similar prior robberies without Patton was admissible	Patton: shows others committed similar crimes and supports his noninvolvement defense	State: inadmissible propensity evidence and irrelevant to whether Patton participated	Court: Excluded — prior robberies by others were not relevant to whether Patton participated in the charged offense

Key Cases Cited

Berghuis v. Thompkins, 560 U.S. 370 (2010) (standards for invoking right to remain silent)
State v. Stark, 272 Neb. 89 (Neb. 2006) (limits on cross-examination about witness’s motive and prior deals)
State v. Privat, 251 Neb. 233 (Neb. 1996) (Confrontation Clause and trial-court discretion over collateral credibility inquiry)
State v. Morales, 120 Ariz. 517 (Ariz. 1978) (permitting cross-examination about penalties witness avoided where plea-agreement context disclosed)
Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83 (1963) (prosecution duty to disclose favorable/exculpatory evidence)
United States v. Bagley, 473 U.S. 667 (1985) (impeachment evidence falls within Brady rule)
State v. Ely, 287 Neb. 147 (Neb. 2014) (prior-acts evidence by co-participants not probative of defendant’s noninvolvement)