Title: State v. Benson

State: kansas

Issuer: Kansas Supreme Court

Document:

1 
 
 
 
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF KANSAS 
 
No. 97,905 
 
STATE OF KANSAS, 
Appellee, 
 
v. 
 
DANIEL A. BENSON, 
Appellant. 
 
 
SYLLABUS BY THE COURT 
 
1. 
 
The Confrontation Clause of the Sixth Amendment to the United States 
Constitution requires that, in order for testimonial out-of-court statements to be admitted 
at trial, the State must prove that the person who made the statements is unavailable and 
that the defendant had a prior opportunity to cross-examine that declarant. 
 
2. 
 
Documents prepared in the regular course of equipment maintenance that show the 
certification or calibration of a breath-test machine are not testimonial statements and are 
not subject to the Confrontation Clause requirements because such documents are not 
created for the purpose of prosecuting any particular defendant or to prove a specific 
element of a particular crime. 
 
3. 
 
There is no constitutional impediment to basing the length of a sentence in part 
upon a defendant's criminal history score under the Kansas Sentencing Guidelines Act. 
 
2 
 
 
 
Review of the judgment of the Court of Appeals in an unpublished opinion filed September 26, 
2008. Appeal from Shawnee District Court; RICHARD D. ANDERSON, judge. Opinion filed November 9, 
2012. Judgment of the Court of Appeals affirming the district court is affirmed. Judgment of the district 
court is affirmed.   
 
Shawn E. Minihan, of Kansas Appellate Defender Office, argued the cause and was on the brief 
for appellant.  
 
Natalie A. Chalmers, assistant district attorney, argued the cause, and Jamie L. Karasek, assistant 
district attorney, Robert D. Hecht, district attorney, and Steve Six, attorney general, were on the brief for 
appellee.   
 
The opinion of the court was delivered by 
 
JOHNSON, J.:  Daniel A. Benson seeks review of the Court of Appeals' decision 
affirming his conviction and sentence for felony DUI. Benson's primary argument is that 
the district court violated his right of confrontation under the Sixth Amendment to the 
United States Constitution by admitting into evidence the certificate of calibration for the 
Intoxilyzer 5000 machine used to determine the level of alcohol in Benson's breath. 
Benson contends that the Confrontation Clause required that the person who completed 
the certificate had to testify in person at Benson's trial. Because we conclude that the 
certificate of calibration is not testimonial in nature, its admission did not offend the 
holding in Crawford v. Washington, 541 U.S. 36, 124 S. Ct. 1354, 158 L. Ed. 2d 177 
(2004). In a second issue, Benson challenges the use of his criminal history to enhance 
his sentence, albeit he concedes that his argument is controlled by State v. Ivory, 273 
Kan. 44, 46-48, 41 P.3d 781 (2002). Accordingly, the Court of Appeals correctly 
affirmed Benson's conviction and sentence.  
 
3 
 
 
 
FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY 
 
 
Benson was arrested for felony DUI after failing sobriety tests administered by the 
Shawnee County Sheriff's Department during a routine DUI check lane on July 18, 2004. 
After his arrest, Benson took an Intoxilyzer 5000 test that registered his blood alcohol 
concentration at .087—above the legal limit of .08. Because it was his third offense, 
Benson was charged with felony DUI. 
 
 
Before trial, Benson attempted to have the breath-test results excluded, in part by 
claiming error in the admission of the certificate of calibration indicating that the 
Intoxilyzer 5000 was in proper working order. Benson contended that in order to comply 
with the Confrontation Clause requirements of Crawford, the employee who conducted 
the calibration should have testified in person. In denying that motion, the district court 
examined the nature of the document and concluded that the certificate of calibration was 
not testimonial and therefore not subject to Crawford's Confrontation Clause 
requirements.   
 
 
The Court of Appeals panel affirmed the district court's findings based on its 
understanding of testimonial evidence as explained in Crawford and in reliance on the 
numerous other jurisdictions reaching similar conclusions. State v. Benson, No. 97,905, 
unpublished opinion filed September 26, 2008, slip op. at 4-5. Specifically, the panel 
noted that the calibration certificate was "prepared as a routine administrative matter 
required by the State and [wa]s not prepared in anticipation of any particular criminal 
proceeding." Additionally, in reliance on Ivory, the panel quickly dispensed with 
Benson's claim that his increased sentence was constitutionally infirm.  
 
4 
 
 
 
 
Benson raises the same two arguments in his petition for review. After holding the 
petition pending a decision in Melendez-Diaz v. Massachusetts, 557 U.S. 305, 129 S. Ct. 
2527, 174 L. Ed. 2d 314 (2009), we granted review. 
 
CONFRONTATION CLAUSE 
 
 
As noted, Benson's first issue requires us to determine whether the certificate of 
calibration for the breathalyzer machine is testimonial in nature. 
 
Standard of Review 
 
 
"We employ an unlimited standard of review when addressing issues pertaining to 
the Confrontation Clause of the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution." 
State v. Leshay, 289 Kan. 546, 547, 213 P.3d 1071 (2009) (citing State v. Noah, 284 Kan. 
608, 612, 162 P.3d 799 [2007]); State v. Ransom, 288 Kan. 697, 708-09, 207 P.3d 208 
(2009) (whether confrontation rights have been violated is a question of law subject to 
unlimited review).   
 
Analysis  
 
 
In Crawford, our Supreme Court held that certain out-of-court statements are 
inadmissible at trial unless the State proves that the person making the statement is 
unavailable and that the defendant had a prior opportunity to cross-examine the declarant. 
Crawford, 541 U.S. at 68. The Crawford Court explained that the admission of a hearsay 
statement implicates a defendant's rights under the Sixth Amendment's Confrontation 
Clause only when the statement is deemed to be testimonial. 541 U.S. at 68; see also 
State v. Miller, 284 Kan. 682, 711-12, 163 P.3d 267 (2007) (citing State v. Davis, 283 
Kan. 569, 575, 158 P.3d 317 [modified opinion filed March 23, 2007]). Accordingly, 
5 
 
 
 
Benson's right of confrontation argument hinges upon whether the certificate of 
calibration constitutes a testimonial statement. 
 
 
Crawford stopped short of specifically defining testimonial statements, but the 
opinion did identify the type of statements that could qualify: 
 
 
"Various formulations of this core class of 'testimonial' statements exist: 'ex parte 
in-court testimony or its functional equivalent—that is, material such as affidavits, 
custodial examinations, prior testimony that the defendant was unable to cross-examine, 
or similar pretrial statements that declarants would reasonably expect to be used 
prosecutorially,' . . . 'extrajudicial statements . . . contained in formalized testimonial 
materials, such as affidavits, depositions, prior testimony, or confessions,' [citation 
omitted]; 'statements that were made under circumstances which would lead an objective 
witness reasonably to believe that the statement would be available for use at a later trial,' 
[citation omitted]." 541 U.S. at 51-52. 
 
 
Crawford's failure to flesh out the definition of testimonial led to our attempt at 
synthesizing a list of factors from various post-Crawford cases to aid in the 
determination:   
 
 
"(1) Would an objective witness reasonably believe such a statement would later 
be available for use in the prosecution of a crime? 
 
"(2) Was the statement made to a law enforcement officer or to another 
government official? 
 
"(3) Was proof of facts potentially relevant to a later prosecution of a crime the 
primary purpose of the interview when viewed from an objective totality of the 
circumstances, including circumstances of whether 
 
(a) the declarant was speaking about events as they were actually 
happening, instead of describing past events; 
 
(b) the statement was made while the declarant was in immediate 
danger, i.e., during an ongoing emergency; 
6 
 
 
 
 
(c) the statement was made in order to resolve an emergency or 
simply to learn what had happened in the past; and 
 
(d) the interview was part of a governmental investigation?; and 
 
"(4) Was the level of formality of the statement sufficient to make it inherently 
testimonial; e.g., was the statement made in response to questions, was the statement 
recorded, was the declarant removed from third parties, or was the interview conducted in 
a formal setting such as in a governmental building?" State v. Brown, 285 Kan. 261, 291, 
173 P.3d 612 (2007). 
 
 
Later, Melendez-Diaz held that the sworn statements of laboratory analysts made 
in contemplation of litigation were testimonial statements and, thus, subject to Crawford's 
confrontation requirements. 557 U.S. at 308-11; see also State v. Laturner, 289 Kan. 727, 
733-34, 750-51, 218 P.3d 23 (2009) (relying on Melendez-Diaz in finding a Kansas 
statute unconstitutional where it authorized the admission of a sworn forensic lab report 
in lieu of the preparer's in-court testimony). Even more recently, in Bullcoming v. New 
Mexico, 564 U.S. ___, 131 S. Ct. 2705, 2717, 180 L. Ed. 2d 610 (2011), the Supreme 
Court determined that a forensic laboratory report certifying the defendant's blood-
alcohol concentration was, like the report in Melendez-Diaz, testimonial in nature. 
Bullcoming found it significant that while the analyst who prepared the report may not 
have had to exercise any independent judgment in creating it, the certification he signed 
included more than the "raw, machine-produced data" regarding Bullcoming's blood 
alcohol level, such as the specific protocols followed by the analyst and information 
regarding the chain of custody. 131 S. Ct. at 2714. The Court suggested that it was those 
additional "representations, relating to past events and human actions" as to which cross-
examination was most indicated. 131 S. Ct. at 2714.   
 
 
In the present case, Benson reasons that the certificate of calibration is a 
testimonial statement because it was created in contemplation of trial, notwithstanding 
that the certificate was generated by an independent agency after it completed repairs on 
the machine some 3 weeks before it was used to test Benson. While this court has not 
7 
 
 
 
previously addressed Benson's argument, the Court of Appeals has ruled on the question 
in two other cases since Crawford and Brown. In those cases, the Court of Appeals held 
that documents showing the certification or calibration of a breath-test machine are not 
testimonial statements because they do not address a specific trial and do not tend to 
prove a specific element of a particular crime. State v. Johnson, 43 Kan. App. 2d 815, 
826, 233 P.3d 290 (2010); State v. Dukes, 38 Kan. App. 2d 958, 962, 174 P.3d 914 
(2008), aff'd 290 Kan. 485, 231 P.3d 558 (2010) (affirming the Court of Appeals' opinion 
on other grounds but not addressing the panel's analysis declaring the certificate 
testimonial because the issue was not properly preserved).    
 
 
Dukes placed significant reliance on the fact that 14 other jurisdictions had 
determined that proof of a breath-test machine's calibration was not testimonial evidence. 
38 Kan. App. 2d at 961. However, those decisions, like Dukes, were issued before 
Melendez-Diaz—an argument raised in Johnson. But the Johnson panel distinguished 
Melendez-Diaz because the certificate it was reviewing only contained information 
related to the operation of the machine; it did not deal with a specific element of the 
crime. Johnson, 43 Kan. App. 2d at 826; see also Melendez-Diaz, 129 S. Ct. at 2531 
(certificates at issue reported that the tested substance was in fact cocaine). Moreover, the 
Melendez-Diaz majority specifically limited its holding in a footnote: 
 
"Contrary to the dissent's suggestion, . . . we do not hold, and it is not the case, that 
anyone whose testimony may be relevant in establishing the . . . accuracy of the testing 
device, must appear in person as part of the prosecution's case. . . . [D]ocuments prepared 
in the regular course of equipment maintenance may well qualify as nontestimonial 
records." 129 S. Ct. at 2532 n.1.   
 
 
The same distinction has been cited by other jurisdictions addressing this issue 
after Melendez-Diaz, and most jurisdictions uniformly agree that documents certifying 
maintenance records of breath-test machines are not testimonial in nature. See, e.g., 
8 
 
 
 
United States v. Forstell, 656 F. Supp. 2d 578, 580-82 (E.D. Va. 2009); State v. Lindner, 
227 Ariz. 69, 71-72, 252 P.3d 1033 (Ct. App. 2010); Jacobson v. State, 306 Ga. App. 
815, 817-18, 703 S.E.2d 376 (2010); People v. Jacobs, 405 Ill. App. 3d 210, 216-17, 939 
N.E.2d 64 (2010); Ramirez v. State, 928 N.E.2d 214, 219-20 (Ind. App. 2010); 
Commonwealth v. Zeininger, 459 Mass. 775, 788-89, 947 N.E.2d 1060 (2011). The most 
common rationale for these holdings is that the certificate of calibration is not created for 
the purpose of prosecuting any particular defendant, but rather it is designed for use in 
criminal prosecutions generally. See Melendez-Diaz, 129 S. Ct. at 2539-40 (explaining 
that the reason business records are nontestimonial and thus proper hearsay exceptions is 
because the documents are created for the administration of an entity's affairs and not for 
the purpose of establishing or proving some fact at a specific trial); Dukes, 38 Kan. App. 
2d at 961-62. As the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court recently stated: 
 
"[C]ertification records are outside the orbit of the 'common nucleus' of the various 
definitions of 'testimonial' set forth in Crawford . . . . [Citations omitted.] Whereas 
certificates of drug analysis were offered as direct proof of an element of the offense 
charged, [as in Melendez–Diaz,] the [] certification records bear only on the admissibility 
or credibility of the evidence. The [] certification records are offered, first, as proof that 
the Commonwealth has met a foundational predicate to admissibility of the breathalyzer 
test results and, then, either through direct testimony or by implication, as evidence 
bolstering the reliability of those results. [Citations omitted.] We agree with the Court of 
Appeals of Oregon, which concluded that such records 'bear a more attenuated 
relationship to conviction: They support one fact (the accuracy of the machine) that, in 
turn, supports another fact that can establish guilt (blood alcohol level).' State v. Bergin, 
[231 Or. App. 36,] 41[, 217 P.3d 1087 (2009)].  
 
. . . . 
 
". . . That the [] certification records are generalized and performed prospectively 
in primary aid of the administration of a regulatory program makes all the difference." 
Zeininger, 459 Mass. at 786-88. 
 
9 
 
 
 
 
As noted above, Bullcoming intimated the same reasoning when the majority 
opinion alluded to the possibility that a report containing only "raw, machine-produced 
data" might not be considered a testimonial statement. Bullcoming, 131 S. Ct. at 2714 
(noting that it was the analyst's sworn "representations, relating to past events and human 
actions" that justified the certificate's testimonial status). While it could be argued that 
under the test in Brown the certificate in the present case is testimonial because the only 
reason for calibrating the machine was to assure the reliability of information specifically 
used at trial, the report was not generated in contemplation of Benson's specific criminal 
proceeding—a fact required by other courts addressing this issue before finding a 
certificate to be testimonial. See, e.g., Zeininger, 459 Mass. at 786-87; Dukes, 38 Kan. 
App. 2d at 961-62. Rather, when the certificate was created, its primary purpose was to 
establish that the machine was in compliance with administrative regulations in effect at 
the time. See K.A.R. 28-32-1 (revoked March 14, 2008). Thus, the certificate served a 
purpose at the time it was created, regardless of whether there ever would be a 
prosecution in the future at which it would be utilized.  
 
 
In summary, the certificate of calibration in this case was routinely generated as 
part of the regular equipment maintenance. It was not created to establish a specific 
element in the prosecution of Benson's case. Further, the certificate speaks only to the 
reliability of the evidence that Benson's blood alcohol level was above the legal limit, it 
does not prove or disprove that element. Consequently, we hold that the certificate of 
calibration is not a testimonial statement and is not subject to the Confrontation Clause 
requirements of Crawford. The district court did not violate Benson's Sixth Amendment 
rights by admitting the certificate.   
 
10 
 
 
 
SENTENCING 
 
 
Benson argues that the district court violated his rights under the Sixth and 
Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution by imposing an enhanced 
sentence, based on prior convictions, without proving those convictions to the jury 
beyond a reasonable doubt. This court has consistently rejected this argument. See, e.g., 
State v. Bennington, 293 Kan. 503, Syl. ¶ 9, 264 P.3d 440 (2011); State v. Riojas, 288 
Kan. 379, 388, 204 P.3d 578 (2009); State v. Fewell, 286 Kan. 370, 394-96, 184 P.3d 903 
(2008); Ivory, 273 Kan. at 46-48.   
 
Standard of Review 
 
"To the extent our decision involves . . . the interpretation and application of . . . 
court precedent, we are resolving questions of law and, thus, exercising unlimited 
review." State v. May, 293 Kan. 858, 862, 269 P.3d 1260 (2012); accord Johnson v. 
Brooks Plumbing, 281 Kan. 1212, 1213, 135 P.3d 1203 (2006).   
 
Analysis 
 
 
In Ivory, this court found that Apprendi v. New Jersey, 530 U.S. 466, 120 S. Ct. 
2348, 147 L. Ed. 2d 435 (2000), did not prohibit basing the length of a sentence in part 
upon a defendant's criminal history score under the Kansas Sentencing Guidelines Act, 
K.S.A. 21-4701 et seq. 273 Kan. at 44. Benson fails to propound any argument that 
would persuade us to revisit that holding. Accordingly, we affirm the Court of Appeals 
on this issue as well. 
 
 
Affirmed.