| Summary: | Consciousness of guilt is another state of mind that raises anew set of legal and psychological problems. Wigmore dramaticallystates its significance when he says: As an axe leaves its mark in the speechless tree, so anevil deed leaves its mark in the evil doer's consciousness. Again: The reliance is not upon the testimonial credit of a person,but upon psychologic forces closely analogous to theforces of external nature. As a result, we are not here concerned, as in the case of state ofmind to prove an act, with the hearsay rule or an exception toit. We need not worry about finding a necessity for the introductionof the statements, or a guarantee of their trustworthiness.We are dealing with a firmly established notion in thelaw, based on an equally well-settled axiom of common sense
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