WA · rules
Wash. R. Evid. 404
Character Evidence Not Admissible To Prove Conduct; Exceptions; Other Crimes
(a) Character Evidence Generally. Evidence of a person's character or a trait of character
is not admissible for the purpose of proving action in conformity therewith on a particular
occasion, except:
(1) Character of Accused. Evidence of a pertinent trait of character offered by an accused,
or by the prosecution to rebut the same;
(2) Character of Victim. Evidence of a pertinent trait of character of the victim of the crime
offered by an accused, or by the prosecution to rebut the same, or evidence of a character trait of
peacefulness of the victim offered by the prosecution in a homicide case to rebut evidence that
the victim was the first aggressor;
(3) Character of Witness. Evidence of the character of a witness, as provided in rules 607,
608, and 609.
(b) Other Crimes, Wrongs, or Acts. Evidence of other crimes, wrongs, or acts is not
admissible to prove the character of a person in order to show action in conformity therewith. It
may, however, be admissible for other purposes, such as proof of motive, opportunity, intent,
preparation, plan, knowledge, identity, or absence of mistake or accident.
History
[Amended effective September 1, 1992.] Comment 404 [Deleted effective September 1, 2006.]
Provenance
- Source
- www.courts.wa.gov
- Retrieved
- 2026-09-16
- Edition
- 2026-09-16
- Content hash
8f670d0b86509f339cc53e197e0432c2c66da05effac8df13fd0bad0d2a27e04
The link goes to the issuing authority’s own document — the one we read to produce this record. Where a source publishes whole titles rather than sections, your browser may need a moment to jump to the provision.
Unofficial copy of government-published law, reproduced from official sources with full provenance. Not an official publication; verify against official sources before relying on it in a filing. Records in the 'guidance' corpus, and only that corpus, are sub-regulatory (interpretive guidelines, survey procedures) and are not binding law. Validity bounds follow each jurisdiction's declared temporalBasis.