Legal Definitions - connecting-up doctrine

The connecting-up doctrine is a legal principle that allows a judge to temporarily admit a piece of evidence into a trial, even if its relevance to the case isn't immediately clear. This admission is conditional, meaning the party offering the evidence must promise to introduce additional evidence later in the trial that will demonstrate why the initially admitted evidence is important and relevant to the facts or issues being decided. If the party fails to "connect up" the evidence by showing its relevance through subsequent testimony or documents, the judge may instruct the jury to disregard it or formally remove it from the record.

Here are some examples illustrating the connecting-up doctrine:

• Contract Dispute: In a lawsuit concerning a breach of contract, the plaintiff's attorney seeks to introduce an internal company memo from the defendant that discusses unexpected budget cuts. On its own, this memo might seem irrelevant to whether a contract was breached. However, the attorney assures the judge that they will later call an executive from the defendant company to testify that these specific budget cuts directly led to the company's inability to fulfill its contractual obligations.

  This illustrates the connecting-up doctrine because the judge conditionally admits the memo, trusting the plaintiff's attorney to "connect it up" later with the executive's testimony, thereby establishing the memo's relevance to proving the contract breach.

• Criminal Arson Case: During a trial for arson, the prosecutor wants to introduce a social media post made by the defendant several months before the fire, expressing general frustration with their financial situation. The defense objects, arguing the post is too remote and irrelevant. The prosecutor, however, assures the court that they will later present bank records and expert testimony demonstrating the defendant was facing severe financial distress at the time of the fire, and that the fire occurred at a property owned by the defendant which was heavily insured.

  Here, the judge allows the social media post to be admitted conditionally, expecting the prosecutor to later establish its relevance by linking it to a specific financial motive for the arson through subsequent evidence.

• Personal Injury Claim: In a personal injury case stemming from a car accident, the plaintiff's lawyer wants to introduce a photograph of damage to the plaintiff's vehicle, taken several days after the accident, showing a specific dent that wasn't immediately apparent at the scene. The defense objects, arguing there's no clear proof the damage is from *this specific accident* and not a later incident. The plaintiff's lawyer promises to call an auto body expert who will testify that the specific dent shown in the photo is consistent with the type of impact described in the accident report and could not have occurred from any other common incident.

  This demonstrates the connecting-up doctrine as the judge permits the photo to be shown to the jury, on the condition that the plaintiff's lawyer later presents the expert testimony that establishes the photo's relevance by directly linking the damage to the accident.