Rule 410 Pleas, Plea Discussions, and Related Statements

Maine Restyling Note [November 2014]

Maine’s Rule 410 is structurally much simpler and less comprehensive than the current version of the federal counterpart. The proposed restyled Maine Rule attempts to adopt the federal structure but retain the smaller and simpler scope of the Maine Rule. The various exceptions in the Federal Rule and the references to plea negotiations appear to go substantively beyond the Maine Rule. Even though they may have merit, consideration of such changes is beyond the scope of the restyling project.

Federal Advisory Committee Note

The language of Rule 410 has been amended as part of the restyling of the Evidence Rules to make them more easily understood and to make style and terminology consistent throughout the rules. These changes are intended to be stylistic only. There is no intent to change any result in any ruling on evidence admissibility.

Advisers’ Note to former M.R. Evid. 410

(February 2, 1976)

There is no Maine case dealing with the admissibility of a withdrawn plea. In Massachusetts a guilty plea to drunken driving was later withdrawn and the defendant was acquitted at trial, but the guilty plea was held admissible in an action for personal injuries. Morrissey v. Powell, 304 Mass. 268, 23 N.E.2d 411 (1939). Cases elsewhere are in conflict.

Exclusion of offers to plead guilty makes plea bargaining in a criminal case somewhat easier.

This rule is concerned only with withdrawn pleas. An accepted plea of nolo contendere is not admissible in a civil action. State v. Fitzgerald, 140 Me. 314, 37 A.2d 799 (1944).

The Federal Rule adds a final sentence reading: “This rule shall not apply to the introduction of voluntary and reliable statements made in court on the record in connection with any of the foregoing pleas or offers where offered for impeachment purposes or in a subsequent prosecution of the declarant for perjury or false statement.”42 The primary reason for not including it is that the use of such a statement “for impeachment” raises again the ineffectiveness of a limiting instruction. The jury would almost certainly consider it as an admission of guilt.