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S.D. Codified Laws § 19-19-608

A witness's character for truthfulness or untruthfulness

Applied in 4 court decisions — leading case State v. Hankins (2022)

Most recently applied in Estate of Mack (February 2025)

Source: SL 1979, ch 358 (Supreme Court Rule 78-2, Rule 608); SDCL §§ 19-14-9 to 19-14-11; SL 2016, ch 239 (Supreme Court Rule 15-41), eff

How often courts cite this section

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Court decisions citing this, by year. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.

(a) Reputation or opinion evidence. A witness's credibility may be attacked or supported by testimony about the witness's reputation for having a character for truthfulness or untruthfulness, or by testimony in the form of an opinion about that character. But evidence of truthful character is admissible only after the witness's character for truthfulness has been attacked.

(b) Specific instances of conduct. Except for a criminal conviction under § 19-19-609, extrinsic evidence is not admissible to prove specific instances of a witness's conduct in order to attack or support the witness's character for truthfulness. But the court may, on cross-examination, allow them to be inquired into if they are probative of the character for truthfulness or untruthfulness of:

(1) The witness; or

(2) Another witness whose character the witness being cross-examined has testified about.

(c) Privilege against self-incrimination not waived by testimony on credibility. By testifying on another matter, a witness does not waive any privilege against self-incrimination for testimony that relates only to the witness's character for truthfulness.

Official source: South Dakota Legislature. Reproduced from public-domain South Dakota statutes; confirm against the official source for the current text. Not legal advice.