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Page Number: 20

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HEMPHILL v. NEW YORK 

ALITO, J., concurring 

Our precedents establish that a defendant can impliedly
waive the Sixth Amendment right to confront adverse wit-
nesses through conduct.*  The cause of implied waiver can 
be a “failure to object to the offending evidence” in accord-
ance  with  the  procedural  standards  fixed  by  state  law. 
Melendez-Diaz  v.  Massachusetts,  557  U. S.  305,  314,  n. 3 
(2009).  But implied waiver can also occur when a defendant 
engages in a course of conduct that is incompatible with a 
demand to confront adverse witnesses.  In Illinois v. Allen, 
397 U. S. 337 (1970), for instance, we held that a defendant 
may relinquish his right to confront adverse witnesses by
“conducting himself in a manner so disorderly, disruptive, 
and disrespectful of the court that his trial cannot be car-
ried on with him in the courtroom.”  Id., at  343. 

The problem with the New York rule at issue in this case 
is  that  its  application  is  predicated  on  neither  conduct 
evincing intent to relinquish the right of confrontation nor 
action inconsistent with the assertion of that right.  The in-
troduction of evidence that is misleading as to the real facts 
does  not,  in  itself,  indicate  a  decision  regarding  whether
any given declarant should be subjected to cross-examina-
tion.  Nor  is  that  kind  of  maneuver  inconsistent  with  the 
assertion of the right to confront a declarant whose out-of-
court statements could potentially set the record straight.

There are other circumstances, however, under which a 
defendant’s introduction of evidence may be regarded as an
implicit waiver of the right to object to the prosecution’s use 

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* The conduct relevant to waiver may be the defendant’s or that of trial 
counsel.  As a rule, for decisions “pertaining to the conduct of the trial,
the  defendant  is  ‘deemed  bound  by  the  acts  of  his  lawyer-agent’ ”  and
charged with the knowledge of trial counsel. New York v. Hill, 528 U. S. 
110,  115  (2000)  (quoting  Link  v.  Wabash  R.  Co.,  370  U. S.  626,  634 
(1962)).  The exceptions to this rule are few, and they do not encompass
decisions  regarding  what  arguments  to  pursue  at  trial.    See  Hill,  528 
U. S., at 115.