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okay let's get into the nitty-gritty of character evidence under 404 a when it's offered to show conformity therewith when it's a pertinent character trait of the accused or victim all right in order to do this we've got to look at Federal Rule of Evidence 404 and federal evidence 405 and there's literally a flowchart that I can go through the first question that I ask myself is it evidence of a character trait other crime wrong or act if it is the next question that I ask is character at issue in the trial what do I mean by that I mean is the offense or the defense that has been raised or the cause of action if it's a civil trial does it involve character as a core component so for example a defamation case character is a component of the case itself so if it's an element of the offense the defense under 405 I can offer character any way I want on director cross-examination and there is no limitation in the way in which I can admit the character because I know that it is relevant to the proceedings but most of the time when I asked myself is character or core component of the cause of action or the law that has been violated the fact the matter is it is and that puts me into the much more narrow category of determining whether or not character evidence is admissible and that's 404 a 1 and 404 a 2 now 404 a 1 gives with pertinent character traits of the accused and 404 a 2 deals with pertinent character traits of the victim I want you to think of it in this fashion if it is character evidence character evidence is not involved in the cause of action or the crime that is contemplated and the character trait is the character trait of the accused and a criminal trial the only person who can reach out and put the key in the door and open character and make it relevant at the trough is the defense counsel and the defense counsel can do this through cross-examination questions or by offering reputation or opinion testimony on the pertinent character trait through the testimony of a witness that's how the defense counsel can open that door when the defense counsel opens the door to the pertinent character trait of the accused by doing this the prosecution now has the ability on rebuttal to offer evidence rebutting that character trait or establishing another character trait that is different from that one and the prosecution has the ability to do that through reputation testimony opinion testimony or specific instances of conduct when cross-examining a witness as to the basis of their testimony there is a saying another door for o4a2 which is the character of the victim because the defense could go after the character of the victim as opposed to the character of the defendant when the...