No Abuse of Discretion in Admitting Evidence of Defendant's Abuse of Children in Parental Kidnapping Case

U.S. v. Rizvanovic, 2009 WL 2105231 (7/17/09) (Published) - Where the defendant was charged with international parental kidnaping, it was not an abuse of discretion to allow the government to cross and present evidence regarding the defendant's alleged physical abuse of the children. The evidence helped the government counter the defendant's claim that he took the children to protect them from the abusive mother, since the evidence indicated he was not interested in protecting the children from harm. And the defendant's failure to report the mom's abuse during the prior custody proceedings undermined the credibility of his current allegations against the mother. Rule 608, which precludes extrinsic evidence for impeachment purposes, was not in play because the evidence was admissible for substantive reasons.

Any error in the trial court's instruction to use the state court's finding of defendant's abuse only for impeachment purposes inured to the defendant's benefit and was therefore harmless.