Legal Question in Civil Litigation in New York

Re: Why can a judge limit an answer you give in court

Because allowing a witness to add all the information he wants may include 1) prejudicial information, 2) Irrelevant information 3) Misleading information or 4) Information that is improper for a jury to consider.

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Re: Why can a judge limit an answer you give in court

The jury system is in many ways a game. That's not intended to trivialize the system, but it is meant to emphasize that it is governed by a set of rules, the players take turns, and there is usually a winner and a loser. The most visible sets of rules, so far as lay spectators are concerned, are the rules of evidence, all of which are intended to improve the likelihood that the jury will find "truth" as that concept is understood by the law. The central tenet is that relevant evidence will be received if its "probative value" outweighs the "prejudicial potential" of the evidence. Let us say that a party is trying to prove "X." Any evidence that makes it more or less likely that "X" is true is said to be probative of "X." However, if "X" consists of proof that the complaining witness had consensual sex with the defendant (who is now charged with rape) at some point in the past, most states now say that the probative value of the evidence is slight in comparison to the likelihood that it will unfairly prejudice the jury against the charge of rape. Hence it is excluded.

When the judge limits an answer in a non-jury case, it is simply a matter of expediting the case: the judge has made a threshhold finding that he does not need to hear the evidence being proferred, either because it is worthless, redundant, or otherwise a waste of time.