Christian v. State

In Christian v. State, 6 Ark. App. 138, 639 S.W.2d 78 (1982), the appellant claimed the trial court abused its discretion by not granting appellant's motion for continuance where a witness for the State was not at trial. Id. The court stated: Appellant should have given the court the evidence that he expected to offer through the witness's testimony. Only then would the court be in the position to properly weigh such proffered evidence in light of appellant's own self-incriminating statement and the other evidence that were available to prove the charges against him. Appellant was not prevented from offering testimony that he honestly expected to elicit from the witness if he had been available to testify at the trial. It was his burden to do so, and he failed. Because of this fact, the trial court was in no position to weigh the prejudicial impact of the witnesses's absence. Consequently, we are unable to say it abused its discretion in denying appellant's motion to continue. Since appellant proffered no testimony, it is just as easy to speculate that he did not know what testimony the witness would give . . .(Christian, 6 Ark. App. at 141-42, 639 S.W.2d at 80.)