Title: Dearing v. Commonwealth

State: virginia

Issuer: Virginia Supreme Court

Document:

Present: Carrico, C.J., Lacy, Hassell, Keenan, Koontz, and 
Kinser, JJ. and Poff, Senior Justice 
 
ALFRED DEARING 
 
 
 
OPINION BY 
v.  Record No. 992215 
SENIOR JUSTICE RICHARD H. POFF 
 
 
 
November 3, 2000 
COMMONWEALTH OF VIRGINIA 
 
 
FROM THE COURT OF APPEALS OF VIRGINIA 
 
 
Alfred Lovell Dearing, Jr., was convicted by a jury of 
robbery and the use of a firearm in the commission of a felony.  
The Circuit Court of Arlington County imposed the jury's 
verdict, and the Court of Appeals affirmed the judgment in an 
unpublished opinion.  Dearing v. Commonwealth, Record No. 1233-
98-4 (August 17, 1999) [hereinafter Dearing I].  We awarded 
Dearing an appeal.  The Commonwealth now concedes that the trial 
court erred in admitting into evidence a co-defendant’s 
statements to police.  Cf. Dearing v. Commonwealth, 259 Va. 117, 
123, 524 S.E.2d 121, 124 (1999)(addressing similar issue from a 
different conviction).  Thus, the dispositive issue is whether 
the Court of Appeals erred in holding that any error in 
admitting these statements was harmless beyond a reasonable 
doubt. 
 
"Applying well-established principles of appellate review, 
we must consider the evidence and all reasonable inferences 
fairly deducible therefrom in the light most favorable to the 
Commonwealth [the prevailing party in the circuit court]."  Derr 
v. Commonwealth, 242 Va. 413, 424, 412 S.E.2d 662, 668 (1991). 
 
At approximately 1:30 a.m. on August 7, 1997, Danny Neil, a 
pedestrian, was stopped on the sidewalk by two men in a white 
Honda automobile.  The passenger in the front seat pointed a gun 
at Neil and commanded Neil to give him all his money.  When Neil 
emptied his pockets to show that he had no money, the gunman 
required Neil to give him a gold chain fastened around his 
Neil’s neck.  After the men in the Honda drove away, Neil placed 
a 911 emergency call. 
 
Police officers on night patrol in the community, who had 
been following a white Honda automobile occupied by Dearing and 
Leroy Vernoise Dorsey, learned that a car matching that 
description may have been involved in the robbery and stopped 
the car.  When an officer brought Neil to the place where 
Dearing and Dorsey were being detained, Neil identified Dearing 
as the Honda passenger with a gun and noted that his gold chain 
was around Dearing's neck.  Neil testified that a gun found by 
the officers on a shoulder of a road traveled by the white Honda 
was the weapon Dearing had pointed at him. 
 
Dearing and Dorsey were tried jointly.  Over Dearing's 
objection, Detective Paul Larson was allowed to testify that 
Dorsey first denied any involvement in the crime, but after 
Larson told him that "honesty is always the best policy", Dorsey 
 
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stated that he had come over "from Maryland into Virginia to 
commit a robbery with his cousin . . . Alfred Dearing".  Larson 
also testified that Dorsey had told him that he saw his cousin 
using a small black handgun to perform the crime. 
 
The Sixth Amendment of the Constitution of the United 
States provides that "[i]n all criminal prosecutions, the 
accused shall enjoy the right . . . to be confronted with the 
witnesses against him", and this provision was held applicable 
to the states under the Fourteenth Amendment in Pointer v. 
Texas, 380 U.S. 400, 406 (1965).  "[B]efore a federal 
constitutional error can be held harmless, the court must be 
able to declare a belief that it was harmless beyond a 
reasonable doubt."  Chapman v. California, 386 U.S. 18, 24 
(1967); accord Rose v. Clark, 478 U.S. 570, 576 (1987). 
 
"Whether such an error is harmless in a particular case 
depends upon a host of factors, all readily accessible to 
reviewing courts.  These factors include the importance of the 
witness' testimony in the prosecution's case, whether the 
testimony was cumulative, the presence or absence of evidence 
corroborating or contradicting the testimony of the witness on 
material points, the extent of cross-examination otherwise 
permitted, and, of course, the overall strength of the 
prosecution's case."  Delaware v. Van Arsdall, 475 U.S. 673, 684 
(1986); accord Neder v. United States, 527 U.S. 1, 18 (1999). 
 
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Significantly, the Chapman–Van Arsdall harmless error 
standard has been applied expressly by the Supreme Court of the 
United States in appeals in which the constitutional 
Confrontation Clause had been violated.  Brown v. United States, 
411 U.S. 223 (1973); Schneble v. Florida, 405 U.S. 427 (1972); 
Harrington v. California, 395 U.S. 250 (1969).  We apply that 
standard here. 
 
While it is true that the challenged testimony was 
incriminating, this testimony was merely cumulative of the other 
evidence adduced by the Commonwealth.  The Commonwealth's 
cardinal witness at the jury trial, an eyewitness to the robbery 
and criminal use of a gun, was the victim of the crime.  In the 
presence of investigating officers, and later at trial, Danny 
Neil identified Dearing as the principal criminal agent, the gun 
found discarded on the shoulder of the road as the criminal 
instrument, and the victim's necklace as the fruit of the crime. 
 
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We declare, therefore, that the evidentiary error committed 
at trial was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.∗  Accordingly, 
we will affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeals. 
Affirmed.  
                     
∗ Appellant contends on brief that his assignments of error 
raise a question presented "whether admission of co-defendant's 
statements as a declaration against appellant's penal interest 
constitutes reversible error under Virginia law."  We agree with 
the following ruling in the opinion of the Court of Appeals: 
 
Having concluded that any error was harmless 
under the more rigorous "beyond a reasonable doubt" 
standard applicable to constitutional error, we need 
not consider whether the admission of Dorsey's 
statement violated Virginia's hearsay rule and, if 
error, whether that error was harmless under the less 
exacting standard applicable to errors of state law.  
See generally Lavinder v. Commonwealth, 12 Va. App. 
1003, 1005, 407 S.E.2d 910, 911 (1991) (en banc) 
(finding that the "federal standard is not required 
. . . for non-constitutional error").  Dearing I, slip 
op. at 6 n.1. 
 
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