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CLICK v. STATE12/20/1996
d go. It was something to do.
"Q: Did Shane Click tell you to do something you didn't want to do?
"A: I didn't want to go to his grandparent's house fourth of July.
"Q: Did you go?
"A: Yes.
"Q: Do you know whether or not Shane Click told Scott Carpenter to do things in your presence that he did not want to do?
"MR. BURGESS: We object to that.
"THE COURT: I sustain."
". . . .
"Q: Were you afraid of Shane Click at that time?
"A: I don't think I was afraid of him. He was more intimidating.
"Q: And what do you mean by the difference between intimidating and afraid?
"A: I was not afraid he would hurt me, but mostly it was — we argued, you know, and I was afraid to do that. I didn't want to argue or get in a confrontation with him.
"Q: Why?
"MR. McDANIEL: We object. Immaterial and irrelevant.
"THE COURT: Overruled.
"Q: Go ahead.
"A: He is bigger than me and more powerful. I just didn't want to."
(R. 325-26, 330.)
The appellant argues that whether he decided what Charleen Bottorff and Scott Carpenter did while they were with him or whether he made them do things they did not want to was immaterial and irrelevant. The State prosecuted the appellant on a theory of complicity. The evidence tended to show that Scott Carpenter was the only person who struck the victim with the baseball
bat. The State's theory of the appellant's case was that he rendered assistance in the victim's death through acts, words, encouragement, or support. In short, the State sought to prove that the appellant was a very persuasive person who masterminded the plot to kill Ms. McClure and convinced his friends to help him.
Under the test for relevancy employed in Alabama, "a fact is admissible if it has any probative value, however slight, upon a matter in the case." Jennings v. State, 513 So.2d 91, 97 (Ala. Cr. App. 1987), citing C. Gamble, McElroy's Alabama Evidence § 21.01(1) (3d Ed. 1977). " ' "The determination of the relevancy of a particular item of evidence is left to the sound discretion of the trial judge and this court will not reverse unless that discretion has been . . . abused." ' " Jenkins v. State, 627 So.2d 1034, 1044 (Ala. Cr. App. 1992) aff'd, 627 So.2d 1054 (Ala. 1993), cert. denied, 511 U.S. 1012, 114 S.Ct. 1388, 128 L.Ed.2d 63 (1994), quoting Jennings v. State, 513 So.2d 91.97 (Ala. Cr. App. 1987), quoting, in turn, Wicker v. State, 433 So.2d 1190, 1198 (Ala. Cr. App. 1983). The court committed no error here.
The appellant's argument that the questions in the above-quoted portion of the record amounted to prosecutorial misconduct and that the cumulative effect of those questions prejudiced him is also without merit.
VIII.
The appellant argues that the trial court erred in permitting, during the guilt phase of trial, Dr. Lawrence Maier to state his opinion of the appellant's mental condition at the time of the commission of the offense. The appellant argues that Dr. Maier relied on information he received from others and was not in evidence to reach his opinion. We find that no such error occurred.
A.
The appellant objected to Dr. Maier's testimony that he had talked with Dr. Preston, who saw the appellant on the day of the murder, in order to get his impressions of the appellant on that day. When Dr. Maier was subsequently asked whether he had relied on this conversation with Dr. Preston, he replied that he had not. (R. 1062.)
However, even if Dr. Maie
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