The justices ruled 5-4 on Thursday that a defendant seeking to offer expert medical testimony about his accuser's medical history had failed to make a sufficient proffer, despite the fact that defense counsel stated in open court that the expert would testify that migraine patients like the accuser sometimes suffer delusional episodes. The majority, whose opinion Justice Pierce wrote, remained unsatisfied that the defense had put enough detail into the record to allow it to make a decision.

Joined by three others, Justice Graves dissented with a persuasive analysis of Rule 103 and relevant caselaw; there's no need for me to copy his homework, but suffice it to say that, based at least on traditional treatment, he has the better end of the argument. Proffers are inherently informal creatures, and the only thing that Abernathy's attorney could have done to create a more detailed record would have been to put the expert on the stand -- a tactic that certainly will waste many a trial judge's time but which seems the only safe route from now on, if the Court is going to treat proffers to such exacting scrutiny.