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2.5-3 Informant Testimony
Revised to December 1, 2007
A witness testified in this case as an informant. An informant is someone who has information regarding the crime and agrees to testify in exchange for some benefit from the state. In evaluating an informant's testimony, you should consider the benefits that the state has promised the informant in exchange for (his/her) cooperation. It may be that you would not believe a person who is receiving benefits in exchange for testimony as well as you might believe other witnesses. An informant may have such an interest in the outcome of this case that (his/her) testimony may have been colored by that fact. Therefore, you must look with particular care at the testimony of an informant and scrutinize it very carefully before you accept it. You should determine the credibility of that witness in the light of any motive for testifying falsely and inculpating the accused.
If you find that the witness is an informant who has been promised a reduction in (his/her) sentence or other valuable consideration by the state in return for (his/her) testimony, you must decide whether you will believe or disbelieve the testimony of a person who is testifying in exchange for some benefit from the state. Like all other questions of credibility, this is a question you must decide based on all the evidence presented to you.
Commentary
In State v. Ortiz, 252 Conn.
533, 561 (2000), the Supreme Court noted that the trial court generally should
not instruct the jury on the credibility of a particular witness. The court
recognized, however, that there are exceptions. One is when "a complaining
witness could himself have been subject to prosecution depending only upon the
veracity of his account of the particular criminal transaction." Id., 562.
Another is the accomplice exception. Id. See
Accomplice Testimony, Instruction 2.5-2. In State v. Patterson, 276
Conn. 452 (2005), the Supreme Court recognized a third exception for the
testimony of an informant. "Because the testimony of an informant who expects
to receive a benefit from the state in exchange for his or her cooperation is no
less suspect than the testimony of an accomplice who expects leniency from the
state, we conclude that the defendant was entitled to an instruction
substantially in accord with the one that he had sought." Id., 470. This
instruction is only required when the witness has actually been promised a
benefit in return for his or testimony. State v. Arroyo, 104 Conn. App.
167, 173, cert.
granted in part, 284 Conn. 938
(2007) (witness testified only in the hope that he might receive
something in return).