Summary
The Supreme Court of Montana affirmed Gilbert Russette’s misdemeanor conviction for driving with a blood alcohol concentration of 0.10 or more. The court held that the district court did not abuse its discretion by excluding expert testimony challenging the validity of an Intoxilizer 5000 result because the proposed expert lacked sufficient knowledge of the device and its operation. The court declined to address due-process and compulsory-witness arguments raised for the first time on appeal.
Topics
Practice areas
Questions Presented
- Whether the District Court abused its discretion under Rule 702 of the Montana Rules of Evidence by excluding Russette's proposed expert testimony challenging the validity of the Intoxilizer 5000 analysis.
- Whether the District Court violated Russette's constitutional rights to due process and to call witnesses by excluding the proposed testimony.
Holdings
- The District Court did not abuse its discretion in excluding the testimony because Russette failed to establish that Christek had adequate knowledge of the Intoxilizer 5000 or its operation to provide an expert opinion challenging the validity of the test result.
- The Court declined to address the constitutional claims because Russette raised them for the first time on appeal.
Key quotations
“The party presenting a witness as an expert must establish, to the satisfaction of the trial court, that the witness possesses the requisite knowledge, skill, experience, training, and education to testify as to the issue in question.” (53 P.3d at 1259)
“In short, Russette failed to lay any foundation which showed that Christek had adequate knowledge upon which to challenge the "fact in issue," which was the validity of the Intoxilizer 5000 test result.” (53 P.3d at 1259)
Factual background
At approximately 1:00 a.m., a highway patrol officer stopped Russette after observing him speeding and detecting an odor of alcohol. After field sobriety testing, Russette was arrested and provided a breath sample to an Intoxilizer 5000, which reported a blood alcohol concentration of .176. Russette sought to present chemistry professor Robert Christek as an expert to testify that scientific validity requires at least two analyses, but Christek lacked specific knowledge of the Intoxilizer 5000 and its operation.
Procedural history
Russette was initially convicted in Justice Court of driving with a blood alcohol concentration of .10 or greater. He appealed to the Twelfth Judicial District Court and requested a jury trial. Before the jury trial, the District Court excluded testimony from Russette's proposed expert, Robert Christek, and the jury subsequently convicted Russette. The Montana Supreme Court affirmed.