SUPREME JUDICIAL COURT DIRK GKEINEDER - Mass Cases

they render the trial fundamentally unfair. Dowlina v.
United States, 493 U.S. 342, 352 (1990) I
2. Extramarital. sexual activity i6 relevant to
motive to commit murder only when combined
with overt evidence of hostility.
This Court has held that ll[e]vidence of a hostile
relationship between a defendant and his spouse may be
admitted as relevant to the defendant’s motive to kill
the victim spouse. ‘‘ Commonwealth v. Rosenthal, 432 Maas.
124, 127 (2000). However, sexual infidelity alone has
never been equated with a “hostile relationship. ‘I Tn
every case where the Court has treated prior bad acts of
extramarital sexual activity as relevant evidence of
hostility, the defendant also engaged in physical abuse
or expressed disdain towards the victim.’ As other
jurisdictions have recognized, evidence of extramarital
sexual relationships is not, without more, probative of
a motive to commit uxoricide.l’
9
See, m, Commonwealth v. DeMarCO, 444 Mass. 678, 683
(2005); Commonwealth v. Mas raw, 426 Mass. 589, 596 n.9 (1998);
Commonwealth v. Bonomi, 335 MaSS. 327, 340 (1957); Commonwealth v.
Howard, 205 Mass. 128, 133 (1310).
10 ~n casterline v. Scats, 736 S.W.2d 207, 211-212 (TeX.
Ct. App. 1987), the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals held:
Evidence of a troubled marriage alone does not establish
a motive to kill. Spouses in a troubled marriage may be
neither jealous nor emotional, and even if they are,
that jealousy or emotion need not necessarily create a
homicidal motive. It would be highly speculative to
infer that marital infidelity. standing alone. created
a homicidal motive.
See Peoule v. Hendricks, 137 Ill. 31, 54-55, 560 N.E.2d 661 (1990).
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