“Flight” evidence & jury instruction (M Crim JI 4.4); Evidence defendant was hiding; People v Biegajski; Evidence about the complainant’s sexual history; MCL 750.520j; People v Sharpe; Relevance; MRE 401 & 402; Former MRE 404(a)(3); People v Bone; MRE 403; People v Mills; Prosecutorial misconduct; Appeal to the jurors’ sympathies; “Vouching” by prosecution witnesses; A police witness’s testimony; MRE 701; An expert’s testimony; Distinguishing People v Thorpe; People v Sattler-VanWagoner; Ineffective assistance of counsel; Failure to make a futile objection; Cumulative error

The court held that defendant showed no plain error as to the admission of “flight” evidence and the trial court’s giving M Crim JI 4.4. It also rejected his claims related to testimony about, and the prosecution’s closing argument references to, the complainant’s sexual history. His prosecutorial misconduct and ineffective assistance of counsel claims likewise failed. Further, it found that a police witness did not give “vouching” testimony. While it concluded some statements by a prosecution expert constituted plain error, defendant did not show outcome-determinative prejudice. Finally, his cumulative error claim failed. Thus, the court affirmed his CSC III convictions. The evidence showed “that defendant was hiding in a cut out portion of the wall inside a closet when law enforcement arrived at his home with an arrest warrant for the CSC charges. There was also evidence that [he] made this hiding place and, despite [his] assertions to the contrary, that it was specifically designed to hide a person. A rational juror could conclude from this evidence that defendant was hiding from the police and attempting to evade arrest for the CSC charges, which in turn could support an inference of consciousness of guilt.” The court noted that it “reached the same conclusion under similar factual circumstances” in Biegajski. And given that the evidence demonstrated “that defendant’s actions were undertaken with the intent to evade arrest[,]” the flight jury “instruction was amply supported by a rational interpretation of the evidence.” As to the questions and testimony about the complainant’s sexual history, the evidence here did “not involve opinion or reputation evidence of” her sexual conduct. Her challenged testimony also related “to an ‘absence of conduct’ rather than a specific instance of sexual conduct. The evidence therefore does not fall within the scope of the rape-shield statute, and defendant” failed to show that its admission was plainly erroneous. The court also rejected his arguments that it was irrelevant and that it should have been excluded under MRE 403. As to the latter, it found that the evidence did “not appear to be any more inflammatory or prejudicial than the central allegation itself—that the defendant, an adult, engaged in sexual acts with a thirteen-year-old child, which forms the basis of the charged offenses.”