Rule 605 Judge’s Competency as a Witness

Maine Restyling Note [November 2014]

Maine Rule 605 and Federal Rule 605 are substantively identical, and therefore the Advisory Committee recommends adoption of the language of the restyled Federal Rule.

Federal Restyling Committee Note

The language of Rule 605 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. 605

(February 2, 1976)

This broad rule of a judge’s incompetency as a witness in a trial at which he is presiding is plainly sound if the highly unlikely occasion for its use should arise. The automatic objection in the last sentence makes an actual objection unnecessary so that an objector’s rights are preserved without the possible risk of antagonizing the judge before whom the trial would continue.