State v. Kotsimpulos

Peter Kotsimpulos (defendant), a federal meat inspector, was charged by the State of Maine (plaintiff) with stealing pork from a grocery store's meat plant. Kotsimpulos claimed he was framed by Carver, a store supervisor, and sought to introduce evidence that Carver had threatened to get him fired from his inspector job. The trial court excluded this evidence as irrelevant and as more confusing to the jury than probative under Federal Rule of Evidence 403; the superior court affirmed, and Kotsimpulos appealed.