Rule 611. Mode and Order of Examining Witnesses and Presenting Evidence

(a) Control by the court; purposes. The court must exercise reasonable control over the mode and order of examining witnesses and presenting evidence so as to:

(1) Make those procedures effective for determining the truth;

(2) Avoid wasting time; and

(3) Protect witnesses from harassment or undue embarrassment.

(b) Scope of cross-examination. Cross-examination may address matters relevant to any issue in the case, including the credibility of any witness. The court may limit cross-examination about matters that were not addressed on direct examination.

(c) Leading questions. Leading questions should not be used on direct examination except as necessary to develop the witness's testimony. Ordinarily, the court should allow leading questions:

(1) On cross-examination; and

(2) When a party calls a hostile witness, an adverse party, or a witness identified with an adverse party. A hostile witness or a witness identified with an adverse party may be cross-examined by the adverse party, but only as to matters that the witness testified to during his or her examination in chief.

(d) Cross-examination relating to signatures. If a witness's examination in chief addresses only the signature to or execution of a paper, cross-examination must be limited to that signature or execution.

Committee Notes

Maine Restyling Note [November 2014] Maine Rule 611 is similar to its federal counterpart, but does not limit cross-examination to the subject matter of direct unless the witness was the adverse party, was identified with the adverse party, or testified only to the signature to or execution of a paper. This distinction has been carried over in the restyling process.

Federal Restyling Committee Note The language of Rule 611 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. 611 (February 2, 1976) This rule states Maine law. It preserves the wide-open rule permitting cross-examination on any issue in the case, subject to a discretionary right to limit it in the interests of justice. Falmouth v. Windham, 63 Me. 44 (1873). The trial of a multi-count indictment might present a suitable occasion for exercising a discretionary limitation. The reference to "direct and crossexamination" is designed to emphasize the scope of the court's control over the order of proof. This rule is contrary to that in the federal courts and many state courts which limits cross-examination to the subject matter of the direct examination. The Federal Rule retains the traditional federal view limiting cross-examination to the scope of the direct. Subdivision (c) incorporates the rule laid down in M.R.C.P. 43(b) on examination of hostile witnesses. The third sentence of the Federal Rule reads: "When a party calls a hostile witness, an adverse party, or a witness identified with an adverse party, interrogation may be by leading questions." This rule has a greater degree of precision. This subdivision in merely stating that leading questions should not be used on direct examination except as may be necessary to develop the testimony lacks the precision of most of the rules. In taking it from the Federal Rule the Court was aware of this imprecision but concluded that it was unwise to set out all the exceptions to the rule against leading questions that came to mind. In practice objection on this ground is rarely made to preliminary stage-setting questions and is given short shrift if it is made. Leading questions when the memory of the witness has been exhausted are permissible as "necessary to develop his testimony." In short, the generalization that leading questions "should not be used" (not, it is to be noted, a flat prohibition of the use) is not to be taken as changing the areas where leading has traditionally been permitted.