Case Name: William LANGLEY v. STATE of Maryland
Court: Court of Appeals of Maryland
Jurisdiction: Maryland
Decision Date: 2011-09-19
Citations: 421 Md. 560
Docket Number: No. 51
Parties: William LANGLEY v. STATE of Maryland.
Judges: 
Reporter: Maryland Reports
Volume: 421
Pages: 560–595

Head Matter:
28 A.3d 646
William LANGLEY v. STATE of Maryland.
No. 51,
Sept. Term, 2008.
Court of Appeals of Maryland.
Sept. 19, 2011.
Brian L. Zavin, Assistant Public Defender (Nancy S. Forster, Public Defender, Baltimore, MD), on brief, for Petitioner.
Gary E. O’Connor, Asst. Atty. Gen. (Douglas F. Gansler, Atty. Gen. of Maryland, Baltimore, MD), on brief, for Respondent.
Argued before BELL, C.J., HARRELL, BATTAGLIA, GREENE, ADKINS, BARBERA and JOHN C. ELDRIDGE, (Retired, Specially Assigned), JJ.

Opinion:
HARRELL, J.
At the time we granted certiorari and heard oral argument here, this case presented an emerging issue that plagued courts nationwide: determining whether the content of 9-1-1 telephone calls made following the apparent completion of a discrete crime or crimes is considered "testimonial," and thus inadmissible under Crawford v. Washington, 541 U.S. 36, 124 S.Ct. 1354, 158 L.Ed.2d 177 (2004), when offered without a live witness—the caller. The Supreme Court's recent Michigan v. Bryant, — U.S. -, 131 S.Ct. 1143, 179 L.Ed.2d at 93 (2011), however, provides some clarity in what theretofore was a murky jurisprudential crystal ball. This case calls for a relatively straightforward application of Bryant.
William Langley ("Langley") appeals from the judgment of the Court of Special Appeals, which affirmed the convictions entered against him in the Circuit Court for Baltimore City. Pertinent to the present posture of this case, the panel of the intermediate appellate court held that certain statements telephoned to police by an eye-witness to portions of events related to a murder-robbery (1) describing an individual alleged to be Langley exiting the crime scene; and (2) identifying features, such as color and license-plate number, of an automobile that another witness at trial testified that Langley had access to, were not "testimonial" within the contemplation of Confrontation Clause jurisprudence, and thus admissible. For reasons to be explained more fully infra, we hold that applying Bryant to the facts of the present case leads us to conclude that these statements were non-testimonial, and, therefore, Langley's confrontation rights were not impaired by their admission at his trial. Accordingly, we affirm the judgment of the Court of Special Appeals.
EVIDENTIARY AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND
The State's case at trial demonstrated that, on the evening of 3 October 2005, Nae Chun Pak, the owner of the Cherry Hill Carry-Out on Cherry Hill Road in Baltimore City, was shot and killed in his store. An employee of the store, who testified that Langley was a regular customer of the store, identified Langley at trial as the assailant. The employee testified that he first saw Langley that evening at around 6:00 pm, when he was arguing with Pak at the security window in the store where customers order their food; apparently, Langley was demanding a refund for a cheesesteak sandwich he purchased that was not to his liking. Pak obliged, and Langley left the store. The employee testified further that Langley returned less than an hour later. Pak, with the store busy at the time, was taking orders from a line of customers. Langley pushed one customer aside, raised his arm, and fired one shot at Pak. The employee, having dove to the floor behind the counter, rose to assess the situation and noticed Pak laying on the floor.
As Langley was leaving the store, one Herbert Stokes was waiting on the street in his tow-truck for an acquaintance to get him a bottle of water from a store across the street from the Cherry Hill Carry-Out. After hearing a gunshot, Stokes saw people streaming out of the Cherry Hill Carry-Out, one of whom he identified in the courtroom at trial as Langley. He witnessed Langley get in what he believed to be a white Oldsmobile and drive away. Subsequently, Stokes selected Langley's photograph from a photo array as the person who "looked like the man" who came out of the store and got in the white car.
Additional evidence about the presence of a white car and a description of the assailant were recounted to a 9-1-1 dispatcher by another person, apparently a female located outside the Carry-Out (who, for some unknown reason, was not produced to testify at trial). Over defense objection, a recording of the 9-1-1-tape recording was admitted into evidence and played for the jury. The following was heard on the recording:
9-1-1 Operator: Baltimore City operator number 1316. What would you like, [police], fire or ambulance?
Caller: I just want to give some information on a shooting that just occurred at Cherry Hill Shopping Center.
9-1-1 Operator: Okay. Let me call the District for that. Let me give you a District number because I don't have that information here.
Caller: Go ahead. [Hurry up. It just happening.]
9-1-1 Operator: Are you—
Caller: I seen the guy get in the car. Will you give me the number or not?
9-1-1 Operator: Ma'am, you can—(phone rings)
Caller: Hello?
9-1-1 Operator: Ma'am, you just told me that you had to give information not get information.
Caller: I mean—
9-1-1 Operator: Where do you want to have the Officer sent to?
Caller: I don't want them sent nowhere. They already going out to the store. But the guy, I seen him get in the car. Tag number MRG 908.
9-1-1 Operator: Do you know what type of car it was?
Caller: No, I don't know the type of car. All I know it's white.
9-1-1 Operator: Four door?
Caller: Look like it might have been a four door. I did look at the tag number and it looked like MRG 908.
9-1-1 Operator: Do you know what he was wearing?
Caller: No. Looked like jeans or something in a T-shirt.
9-1-1 Operator: T-shirt, was it dark or light?
Caller: Kind of light. He didn't have no mask, he didn't have no hat, he didn't have nothing on.
9-1-1 Operator: Was he a light-complected man?
Caller: Kind of brown skinned. I didn't know what kind of ear it was.
9-1-1 Operator: Now, he was wearing a light top and he was a brown complected man?
Caller: Don't quote me on the color.
9-1-1 Operator: Yes, ma'am.
Caller: I just will tell you about the tag because I looked at it, MRG 908.
9-1-1 Operator: Maryland tag?
Caller: Yes, I believe so. I didn't even look at that.
9-1-1 Operator: What hundred block is that?
Caller: It's in the Cherry Hill Shopping Center. I think that's the 600 block.
9-1-1 Operator: At Cherry Hill Road?
Caller: Yes, Cherry Hill Road.
9-1-1 Operator: Cherry Hill?
Caller: Yes.
9-1-1 Operator: Thank you.
The trial court admitted this portion of the tape, explaining that "[t]he whole tape from the beginning up until after the tag number was given is an excited utterance and admissible." Ultimately, the jury convicted Langley of first-degree murder, use of a handgun in the commission of a crime of violence, and wearing or carrying a handgun. The trial judge imposed a sentence of life-imprisonment for murder, a consecutive twenty-year term for use of a handgun, and a concurrent three-year term for wearing or carrying a handgun.
Langley noted timely an appeal to the Court of Special Appeals. The panel of the intermediate appellate court, in an unreported opinion, relying on Crawford and Davis, held that the statements in the 9-1-1 tape were non-testimonial, explaining that the 9-1-1 call "was for precisely . [the] purpose" "to describe current circumstances requiring police assistance." The Court of Special Appeals, in the alternative, explained that "[e]ven if . the admission of the 911 tape were in error, however, we would be persuaded beyond a reasonable doubt that such error was harmless."
Langley filed timely a petition for writ of certiorari, which we granted, Langley v. State, 405 Md. 290, 950 A.2d 828 (2008), to consider the following questions:
1. Did the admission of a recording of a 911 call violate Petitioner's right to confrontation where the call was placed after the offense had been completed and where the alleged perpetrator had left the scene and the caller indicated that she was aware that the police had been notified and were in the process of responding?
2. Was the admission of the recording of the 911 call harmless?
We hold that the statements in the 9-1-1 tape are non-testimonial for Confrontation Clause purposes, and, thus, Langley's confrontation rights were not infringed by the admission of the statements. Accordingly, we affirm the judgment of the Court of Special Appeals.
STANDARD OF REVIEW
The flagship question presented in the present case queries whether certain statements admitted at trial were admitted in violation of Respondent's rights under the Confrontation Clause of the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution. This is a question of law, which we review under a non-deferential standard of review. See Snowden v. State, 156 Md.App. 139, 143 n. 4, 846 A.2d 36, 39 n. 4 (2004), aff'd, 385 Md. 64, 867 A.2d 314 (2005) ("We . apply the de novo standard of review to the issue of whether the Confrontation Clause was violated in this case.").
ANALYSIS
The Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution, made applicable to the States through the Fourteenth Amendment, see Brye v. State, 410 Md. 623, 634, 980 A.2d 435, 441 (2009), provides, in pertinent part, that, "[i]n all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right . to be confronted with the witnesses against him." U.S. CONST, amend. VI. This confrontation right "seeks to protect a defendant from the complexities of the legal system and his or her lack of understanding of the law." Brye, 410 Md. at 634, 980 A.2d at 441. Currently, regarding Confrontation Clause jurisprudence, "[o]ne question attracting much attention is the status of statements made during 911 calls." Geetanjli Malhotra, Resolving the Ambiguity Behind the Bright-Line Rule: The Effect of Crawford v. Washington on the Admissibility of 911 Calls in Evidence-Based Domestic Violence Prosecutions, 2006 U. Ill. L.Rev.205, 215 (2006).
In order to understand properly the current state of Confrontation Clause jurisprudence as it relates to 9-1-1 calls, some context is required. In Ohio v. Roberts, 448 U.S. 56, 66, 100 S.Ct. 2531, 2539, 65 L.Ed.2d 597, 609 (1980), the Supreme Court held that the Confrontation Clause does not bar the admission of statements of an unavailable witness where such statements "bear adequate indicia of reliability," and that such reliability is established where the "evidence falls within a firmly rooted hearsay exception," or where it bears "particularized guarantees of trustworthiness." (Internal quotation marks omitted.)
Nearly twenty-five years later, in Crawford, supra, the Supreme Court overruled Roberts. See Bullcoming v. New Mexico, — U.S. -, -, 131 S.Ct. 2705, 2713, 180 L.Ed.2d 610, 636 (2011) ("In a pathmarking 2004 decision, Crawford ., we overruled Ohio v. Roberts . "). In Crawford, Crawford was arrested for stabbing a man who tried allegedly to rape Crawford's wife. Crawford, 541 U.S. at 38, 124 S.Ct. at 1357, 158 L.Ed.2d at 184-85. At trial, because Crawford's wife invoked the spousal privilege, the prosecution sought to admit the wife's tape-recorded statement made to the police describing the stabbing. See Crawford, 541 U.S. at 40, 124 S.Ct. at 1357-58, 158 L.Ed.2d at 185. Importantly, in this statement, contrary to Crawford's version of the events, she testified that the victim had not drawn a weapon before Crawford assaulted him. See Crawford, 541 U.S. at 39, 124 S.Ct. at 1357, 158 L.Ed.2d at 185. The trial court, relying on Roberts, supra, admitted the wife's statement, offering several reasons why it bore adequate indicia of trustworthiness. Crawford, 541 U.S. at 40, 124 S.Ct. at 1358, 158 L.Ed.2d at 186. A jury convicted Crawford of assault. Crawford, 541 U.S. at 41, 124 S.Ct. at 1358, 158 L.Ed.2d at 186. Ultimately, the Washington Supreme Court upheld Crawford's conviction, agreeing with the trial court that the statement "bore guarantees of trustworthiness." Crawford, 541 U.S. at 41, 124 S.Ct. at 1358, 158 L.Ed.2d at 186. The Supreme Court granted certiorari to determine "whether the State's use of [Crawford's wifej's statement violated the Confrontation Clause." Crawford, 541 U.S. at 42, 124 S.Ct. at 1359, 158 L.Ed.2d at 187.
Explaining that Roberts's reliability test was unpredictable and "demonstrated [a] capacity to admit core testimonial statements that the Confrontation Clause plainly meant to exclude" and after exploring centuries of history relating to the use of ex parte statements as evidence against the accused, the Supreme Court held that only with respect to "testimonial evidence" does the "Sixth Amendment demand! ] what the common law required: unavailability and a prior opportunity for cross-examination." Crawford, 541 U.S. at 63, 68, 124 S.Ct. at 1371, 1374, 158 L.Ed.2d at 200, 203. Although "leaving] for another day any effort to spell out a comprehensive definition of 'testimonial,' " the Supreme Court enumerated nonetheless a number of "various formulations of this core class of 'testimonial' statements":
"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"; "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.... "
Crawford, 541 U.S. at 51-52, 124 S.Ct. at 1364, 158 L.Ed.2d at 193 (internal citations omitted). Applying these formulations to the facts before it, the Supreme Court explained that "[wjhatever else the term covers, it applies at a minimum to . police interrogations," and, because Crawford did not have a prior opportunity to cross-examine his wife, reversed the judgment of the Washington Supreme Court. See Crawford, 541 U.S. at 68, 124 S.Ct. at 1374, 158 L.Ed.2d at 203.
Supplying the next piece of the puzzle, in Davis v. Washington (and its companion case, Hammon v. Indiana), 547 U.S. 813, 126 S.Ct. 2266, 165 L.Ed.2d 224 (2006), the Supreme Court undertook to "determine more precisely which police interrogations produce testimony," within the contemplation of Confrontation Clause jurisprudence. Davis, 547 U.S. at 822, 126 S.Ct. at 2273, 165 L.Ed.2d at 237. In Davis, Davis's former girlfriend called 9-1-1 in the midst of a domestic disturbance with Davis. Davis, 547 U.S. at 817, 126 S.Ct. at 2270-71, 165 L.Ed.2d at 234. During the call, she informed the dispatcher that "[hje's here jumpin' on me again," and that "[h]e's usin' his fists," and that Davis was the assailant. Davis, 547 U.S. at 817-18, 126 S.Ct. at 2271, 165 L.Ed.2d at 234. As the conversation continued, the dispatcher was advised that Davis had "just r[un] out the door," departing in a car with another individual. Davis, 547 U.S. at 818, 126 S.Ct. at 2271, 165 L.Ed.2d at 234. Ultimately, the State charged Davis with felony violation of a domestic no-contact order. Davis, 547 U.S. at 818, 126 S.Ct. at 2271, 165 L.Ed.2d at 235. Because the former girlfriend did not appear at trial to testify, the trial court admitted a recording of her conversation with the 9-1-1 dispatcher. Davis, 547 U.S. at 819, 126 S.Ct. at 2271, 165 L.Ed.2d at 235. A jury convicted Davis of the charge, and the Supreme Court of Washington concluded that the portion of the tape in which the former girlfriend identified Davis was non-testimonial, and if other parts of the tape were testimonial, their admission was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. Davis, 547 U.S. at 819, 126 S.Ct. at 2271-72, 165 L.Ed.2d at 235.
In Hammon, police responded to the home of Amy and Hershel Hammon for a reported domestic disturbance. Davis, 547 U.S. at 819, 126 S.Ct. at 2272, 165 L.Ed.2d at 235. Upon arrival, the police found Amy on the front porch appearing "somewhat frightened." Id. Police went inside the residence to speak with Hershel, who explained to police that he and his wife had "been in an argument." Id. By that point, Amy returned inside and police interviewed her in a separate room regarding the incident. See id. She signed a "battery affidavit," on which she wrote that Hershel "shoved [her] down on the floor into the broken glass," and that he "[h]it [her] in the chest and threw [her] down." Davis, 547 U.S. at 820, 126 S.Ct. at 2272, 165 L.Ed.2d at 235. Amy did not appear to testify at trial. The prosecution called the officer who questioned her at the scene, whereupon the officer authenticated the affidavit and recounted what Amy told him. Davis, 547 U.S. at 820, 126 S.Ct. at 2272, 165 L.Ed.2d at 236. The trial judge found Hershel guilty of domestic battery and violating his probation. The Indiana Supreme Court affirmed the conviction, explaining that Amy's statement was not testi monial and that, if the affidavit was deemed testimonial and thus admitted wrongly, its admission was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. Davis, 547 U.S. at 821, 126 S.Ct. at 2273, 165 L.Ed.2d at 235.
In its opinion, the Supreme Court explained:
Statements are nontestimonial when made in the course of police interrogation under circumstances objectively indicating that the primary purpose of the interrogation is to enable police assistance to meet an ongoing emergency. They are testimonial when the circumstances objectively indicate that there is no such ongoing emergency, and that the primary purpose of the interrogation is to establish or prove past events potentially relevant to later criminal prosecution.
Davis, 547 U.S. at 822, 126 S.Ct. at 2273-74, 165 L.Ed.2d at 237. Accordingly, Davis established what courts and commentators alike refer to as the "primary purpose test." See, e.g., Bryant, — U.S. at -, 131 S.Ct. at 1167, 179 L.Ed.2d at 120 (Thomas, J., concurring); Seely v. State, 373 Ark. 141, 282 S.W.3d 778, 787 (2008); Gregory M. O'Neil, Davis & Hammon: Redefining the Constitutional Right to Confrontation, 40 Conn. L.Rev. 511, 543 (2007). In distinguishing the statements in the consolidated Davis case—held to be non-testimonial—from those in Crawford—held to be testimonial— the Supreme Court explained that, in Da,vis, the declarant was "speaking about events as they were actually happening, rather than describing] past events, that there was an ongoing emergency, [and] that the elicited statements were necessary to be able to resolve the present emergency...." Bryant, — U.S. at -, 131 S.Ct. at 1154, 179 L.Ed.2d at 106 (some quotation marks omitted). Accordingly, Davis stands for the proposition that "where . the primary purpose of an interrogation is to respond to an 'ongoing emergency,' its purpose is not to create a record for trial and thus is not within the scope of the [Confrontation] Clause." Bryant, — U.S. at -, 131 S.Ct. at 1155, 179 L.Ed.2d at 107. Ultimately, in the consolidated Davis case, the Supreme Court held that the admitted statements were non-testimonial, explaining that the 9-1-1 "call was plainly a call for help against a bona fide physical threat" "necessary . to resolve the present emergency, rather than to learn (as in Crawford) what had happened in the past." Davis, 547 U.S. at 827, 126 S.Ct. at 2276, 165 L.Ed.2d at 240 (emphasis omitted). In Hammon, on the other hand, the Court held the statements testimonial and thus inadmissible, explaining that "[i]t is entirely clear from the circumstances that the interrogation was part of an investigation into possibly criminal past conduct...." Davis, 547 U.S. at 829, 126 S.Ct. at 2278, 165 L.Ed.2d at 242 (emphasis added). Although the Court's opinion in Davis "clarified the definition of 'testimonial' statements," United States v. Crockett, 586 F.Supp.2d 877, 887 (E.D.Mich.2008), the Supreme Court did not "attempt[] to produce an exhaustive classification of all conceivable statements . as either testimonial or nontestimonial.... " Davis, 547 U.S. at 822, 126 S.Ct. at 2273, 165 L.Ed.2d at 237.
Enter Bryant, which sought to "further expla[i]n[ ] . the 'ongoing emergency' circumstance addressed in Davis." Bryant, — U.S. at -, 131 S.Ct. at 1156, 179 L.Ed.2d at 108. In Bryant, Michigan police officers responded to a dispatch that a man had been shot in a gas station parking lot. Bryant, — U.S. at -, 131 S.Ct. at 1150, 179 L.Ed.2d at 102. Upon arrival, the officers found the victim lying on the ground suffering from a gunshot wound to his abdomen, "appearing] in great pain, and sp[ea]k[ing] with difficulty." Id. Further,
[t]he police asked him what had happened, who had shot him, and where the shooting had occurred. [The victim] stated that "Rick" shot him at around 3 a.m. He also indicated that he had a conversation with Bryant, whom he recognized based on his voice, through the back door of Bryant's house. [The victim] explained that when he turned to leave, he was shot through the door and then drove to the gas station, where police found him.
Id. (internal citations and quotation marks omitted). The victim later died of his injuries before trial. Id. At trial— occurring prior to Crawford and Davis—the police officers that spoke with the victim at the scene testified as to the victim's statements. Id. Ultimately, Bryant was convicted of second-degree murder and related charges. Id.
The Supreme Court of Michigan held that the statements were testimonial and—with the victim unavailable and there being no prior opportunity for cross-examination by Bryant— inadmissible, explaining that the circumstances "clearly indicate that the 'primary purpose' of the questioning was to establish the facts of an event that had already occurred; the 'primary purpose' was not to enable police assistance to meet an ongoing emergency." Bryant, — U.S. at -, 131 S.Ct. at 1151, 179 L.Ed.2d at 103 (quoting People v. Bryant, 483 Mich. 132, 768 N.W.2d 65, 71 (2009)). Rather, explained the state supreme court, the victim's "primary purpose in making these statements to the police . was . to tell the police who had committed the crime against him, where the crime had been committed, and where the police could find the criminal," noting that the officers' actions did not suggest that they perceived an ongoing emergency at the scene of the crime. Bryant, — U.S. at -, 131 S.Ct. at 1151, 179 L.Ed.2d at 103 (quoting People v. Bryant, 768 N.W.2d at 71). Because Davis "arose in the domestic violence context, that was the situation [the Court] had immediately in mind," the U.S. Supreme Court granted certiorari to
"confront for the first time circumstances in which the "ongoing emergency" discussed in Davis extends beyond an initial victim to a potential threat to the responding police and the public at large. This new context requires [the Court] to provide additional clarification with regard to what Davis meant by . 'an ongoing emergency.' "
Bryant, — U.S. at -, 131 S.Ct. at 1156, 179 L.Ed.2d at 108 (some quotation marks omitted).
The Court, through Justice Sotomayor, explained that "the existence of an 'ongoing emergency' at the time of an encounter between an individual and the police is among the most important circumstances informing the 'primary purpose' of an interrogation," because an emergency "focuses the participants on something other than proving past events potentially relevant to later criminal prosecution." Bryant, — U.S. -, 131 S.Ct. at 1157, 179 L.Ed.2d at 109 (some internal quotation marks and alterations omitted). The Court explained that, in Davis, it did not "define the outer bounds of 'ongoing emergency,' " and that whether an emergency exists is a "highly context-dependent inquiry." Bryant, - U.S. at -, 131 S.Ct. at 1158, 179 L.Ed.2d at 110. For instance, because Davis involved a domestic dispute, the Court "focused only on the threat to the victims and assessed the ongoing emergency from the perspective of whether there was a continuing threat to them." Id. (emphasis omitted). The Court continued:
Domestic violence cases . often have a narrower zone of potential victims than cases involving threats to public safety. An assessment of whether an emergency that threatens the police and public is ongoing cannot narrowly focus on whether the threat solely to the first victim has been neutralized because the threat to the first responders and public may continue.
Bryant, — U.S. at -, 131 S.Ct. at 1158, 179 L.Ed.2d at 110; see Bryant, — U.S. at -, 131 S.Ct. at 1163, 179 L.Ed.2d at 116 ("[T]he scope of an emergency in terms of its threat to individuals other than the initial assailant and victim will often depend on the type of dispute involved."). Thus, except in domestic disputes with similar facts as those with which the Court in Davis dealt, a court may not hold that an emergency is no longer ongoing merely because the alleged assailant has fled the scene of the crime.
Related to the type of crime as a relevant factor in determining whether an emergency is "ongoing," explains the Court in Bryant, is "the type of weapon employed." Bryant, — U.S. at -, 131 S.Ct. at 1158, 179 L.Ed.2d at 111 (emphasis added); see id. (criticizing the Supreme Court of Michigan for "rel[ying] on Davis and Hammon, in which the assailants used their fists, as controlling the scope of the emergency [in Bryant], which involved the use of a gun"). That is, in Davis, being a domestic dispute involving fists only, there was less concern that the assailant remained a threat to responding officers or the public at large after he left the scene of the crime. See Commonwealth v. Beatrice, 460 Mass. 255, 260, 951 N.E.2d 26 (2011) (holding as "testimonial" statements made in a 9-1-1 call where "there was no suggestion . that her boy friend was armed with a dangerous weapon, or that her boy friend posed any risk to the public at large"). The same, obviously, cannot be said of an unknown shooter, as in the present case. See Bryant, — U.S. at -, 131 S.Ct. at 1158, 179 L.Ed.2d at 111 (quoting United States as Amicus Curiae in Bryant, at 20) ("An emergency posed by an unknown shooter who remains at large does not automatically abate just because the police can provide security to his first victim."); Bryant, — U.S. at -, 131 S.Ct. at 1164, 179 L.Ed.2d at 117 ("An emergency does not last only for the time between when the assailant pulls the trigger and the bullet hits the victim."); see also Guevara v. Adams, 2011 WL 1790605, at *5, 2011 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 49905, at *13 (C.D. Cal. 25 March 2011) (post-Bryant case holding statements from a non-victim caller to a 9-1-1 dispatcher to be non-testimonial, where the dispatcher's questions were "posed in response to a report of a violent event" (a stabbing), and that the "initial questions focused on ascertaining the location of the incident and the victim, and the identity of the assailant"); Philpot v. State, 309 Ga.App. 196, 709 S.E.2d 831, 889 (2011) (postBryani case holding that a victim's statements to a responding officer following a burglary were non-testimonial, where, "by the time the officer arrived, it could have reasonably been presumed . that the burglar, who had just left the scene of the crime armed with a knife, was still in the immediate vicinity").
In the present case, an individual walked into the carry-out store and killed the store's owner with a gunshot to the head. The caller relayed to the 9-1-1 dispatcher that a shooting had "just occurred." (Emphasis added.) After waiting for the 9-1-1 dispatcher to give the caller another number to call, the caller exclaims, "Hurry up. It just happening." The caller informs the dispatcher that he had "seen the guy" and that he knew the color and the tag number of the getaway vehicle, and approximately what the assailant was wearing. The facts of this case, then, are similar to those with which the Supreme Court in Bryant dealt, as both involve assailants inflicting wounds with a firearm, and the declarant relaying identifying information to law enforcement personnel. After Bryant, it is of little matter that the purpose of the call was not to stop the immediate shooting or get medial assistance; all that matters for purposes of the "ongoing emergency" analysis is that the caller in the present case was reporting a shooting that was "just happening," and that the shooter was fleeing, thus remaining potentially a threat to responding authorities and the public at large.
Bryant clarified, however, that its emphasis on the existence of an "ongoing emergency" "should not be taken to imply that the existence vel non of an ongoing emergency is dispositive of the testimonial inquiry." Bryant, — U.S. at -, 131 S.Ct. at 1160, 179 L.Ed.2d at 112. Another factor, the Court explained, "is the importance of informality in an encounter between a victim and police." Id. In explaining that this "prong" weighed in favor of a finding that the statements were non-testimonial, the Court explained that "[t]his situation is more similar . to the informal, harried 911 call in Davis than to the structured, station-house interview in Crawford." Bryant, — U.S. at -, 131 S.Ct. at 1166, 179 L.Ed.2d at 119. We consider the 9-1-1 call in the present case to be "harried," with the caller telling the dispatcher to "[h]urry up," and saying "[h]ello?" when apparently the dispatcher remained silent for a period of time. That is, we believe that a review of "the statements and actions of both the declarant and [dispatcher] provide objective evidence," Bryant, — U.S. at -, 131 S.Ct. at 1160, 179 L.Ed.2d at 112, that the caller's statements in the present case are non-testimonial.
Our recent, pre-Bryant, opinion in State v. Lucas, 407 Md. 307, 965 A.2d 75 (2009), is not to the contrary. In Lucas, Anne Arundel County police officers responded to a "[djomestic call." Lucas, 407 Md. at 309, 965 A.2d at 77. Upon arriving at the residence, the officers interviewed the victim at length. See Lucas, 407 Md. at 309-10, 965 A.2d at 77. At trial, one of the officers agreed that his "purpose in speaking with [the victim] or knocking on the door and speaking with the occupants was to conduct an investigation" and that he was "there to gather information." Lucas, 407 Md. at 310, 965 A.2d at 77. We held that the statements, in which the victim gave details about the domestic dispute and identified her attacker, were testimonial, considering they indicated a "primary purpose to 'establish or prove past events potentially relevant to later criminal prosecution' and not to 'enable police assistance to meet an ongoing emergency.' " Lucas, 407 Md. at 323-24, 965 A.2d at 85 (quoting Davis, 547 U.S. at 822, 126 S.Ct. at 2273, 2274, 165 L.Ed.2d at 237).
The facts in Lucas are distinguishable readily from the facts in the present case and from those with which the Supreme Court dealt in Bryant. Unlike the present case and Bryant, Lucas involved a domestic dispute between the victim and her male friend. See Lucas, 407 Md. at 309, 965 A.2d at 77. Further, the weapon employed in Lucas was the assailant's fists and feet, not a firearm, as in the present case and in Bryant. See id. Considering the type of crime and the nature of the weapon employed, we were correct in Lu,cas to hold that there was no "ongoing emergency," and, thus, that the statements to the police officers were testimonial. Importantly, in Lucas, we said that the circumstances in that case "are distinct from those in which officers encountered victims with apparent severe injuries requiring immediate medical attention and/or where an assailant had not yet been located. " Lucas, 407 Md. at 324, 965 A.2d at 86 (emphasis added). Of course, in the present case, the caller was reporting a shooting (which suggests potentially "apparent severe injuries requir ing immediate medical attention") and the assailant had not yet been located. Accordingly, any reliance on Lucas is misplaced.
Like Bryant, in the present case, "at no point during the questioning did either [the caller] or the police [dispatcher] know the location of the shooter." Bryant, — U.S. at -, 131 S.Ct. at 1164, 179 L.Ed.2d at 117. Further, like Bryant, "[n]othing [the caller] said to the police [dispatcher] indicated that the cause of the shooting was a purely private dispute or that the threat from the shooter had ended." Bryant, — U.S. at -, 131 S.Ct. at 1163, 179 L.Ed.2d at 116. Nor should this Court review a purported ongoing emergency with the benefit of hindsight; statements must be reviewed objectively—at the time they were made—as to whether a reasonable person would believe there was an emergency, "even if that belief is later proved incorrect." Bryant, — U.S. at - n. 8, 131 S.Ct. at 1157 n. 8, 179 L.Ed.2d at 109 n. 8. Accordingly, we classify the caller's statements to the 9-1-1 dispatcher in the present case as "the exact type of questions necessary to allow the police to ' "assess the situation, the threat to their own safety, and possible danger to the potential victim" ' and to the public," Bryant, — U.S. at -, 131 S.Ct. at 1166, 179 L.Ed.2d at 118 (quoting Davis, 547 U.S. at 832, 126 S.Ct. at 2279, 165 L.Ed.2d at 243 (quoting Hiibel v. Sixth Judicial Dist. Court of Nev., Humboldt County, 542 U.S. 177, 186, 124 S.Ct. 2451, 2458, 159 L.Ed.2d 292, 303 (2004))), and hold that the statements do not implicate the Confrontation Clause and, thus, are admissible.
JUDGMENT OF THE COURT OF SPECIAL APPEALS AFFIRMED. COSTS TO BE PAID BY THE PETITIONER.
BELL, C.J., GREENE, and ELDRIDGE, JJ., Dissent.
. Other evidence at trial linked Langley to the crime scene. Following Langley's arrest, police recovered a .380 caliber round from Langley's residence. Ballistics testing of a shell casing left at the scene determined that the .380 caliber round recovered from the residence and the shell left at the scene had been chambered in the same gun.
. The original transcript of the trial did not include the bracketed portions of the content of the call. An unopposed motion to correct the record by adding the bracketed words was filed in the Court of Special Appeals to make it part of the record. That motion was granted and no complaint about that action was made here. We assume that the bracketed statements were played for the jury and their omission was simply a transcription oversight.
. In clarifying that it was not saying "that a conversation which begins as an interrogation to determine the need for emergency assistance cannot . evolve into testimonial statements," the Court noted, in Davis, that "after the operator gained the information needed to address the exigency of the moment, the emergency appears to have ended (when Davis drove away from the premises).'' Davis, 547 U.S. at 828, 126 S.Ct. at 2277, 165 L.Ed.2d at 241 (emphasis added) (internal citations and quotation marks omitted). Understandably, because the Court in Davis suggested that the emergency ended when the defendant left the scene of the crime, many courts read Davis as "narrowly construing] the context of the 'ongoing emergency' for purposes of its analysis." Saracoglu v. Walker, 2010 WL 1221764, at *9, 2010 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 27640, at *27 (C.D. Cal. 27 January 2010). As explained more fully infra, however, after Bryant, the "ongoing emergency" concept is no longer construed so narrowly. See Bryant, - U.S. at -, 131 S.Ct. at 1158, 179 L.Ed.2d at 110 (criticizing the Supreme Court of Michigan for "employing] an unduly narrow understanding of 'ongoing emergency' that Davis does not require"); Posting of Prof. Richard D. Friedman to The Confrontation Blog, http://www.confrontationright.blogspot.com/2011/03/preliminary-thoughts-on bryantdecision.html (2 March 2011, 00:42 EST) (noting that the court, in Bryant "takes the 'primary purpose' language of Davis and expands on it").
. At the time the present case was argued before us, Michigan v. Bryant, - U.S. -, 131 S.Ct. 1143, 179 L.Ed.2d 93 (2011), had not yet been decided. In the period between the Supreme Court's opinions in Davis v. Washington, 547 U.S. 813, 126 S.Ct. 2266, 165 L.Ed.2d 224 (2006), and Bryant, two separate lines of cases developed in the state courts regarding the testimonial nature vel non of 9-1-1 calls made following the completion of a crime. Compare, e.g., Commonwealth v. Simon, 456 Mass. 280, 923 N.E.2d 58, 75 (2010) ("[T]he statements in the 911 telephone call in which the victim identified the nature of the emergency and described the shooter were not testimonial .") and Glover v. State, 678 S.E.2d 476, 478-79 (2009) (holding that statements made in a 9-1-1 call were non-testimonial where "the calls were made while the incident was still ongoing, the perpetrator was at large, and the operator's questions were intended to assist the police in meeting an ongoing emergency") with State v. Koslowski, 166 Wash.2d 409, 209 P.3d 479, 488 (2009) (holding that "the . fact that the suspects were at large and that [the] Sergeant . relayed the information he learned from [the declarant] to officers in the field is not enough to show the questions . were necessary to resolve a present emergency situation") and People v. Trevizo, 181 P.3d 375, 379 (Colo.Ct.App.2007) (holding that statements made in a 9-1-1 call were testimonial where "there was no immediate threat to the victim, [and] defendant had left the scene"). Until Bryant, Langley could have hung his hat on the latter line of cases. With the filing of Bryant, however, the screws to that coat rack came loose. See Philpot v. State, 309 Ga.App. 196, 709 S.E.2d 831, 835 (2011) (noting that Bryant "substantially alters and expands the framework for analyzing whether an out-of-court statement being challenged on Confrontation Clause grounds is testimonial or nontestimonial in nature").
. That is, in a case where a shooting just occurred and the shooter is at large, because of the potential continuing threat to responding authorities and the public at large, the information relayed from the caller to the 9-1-1 dispatcher relates to a present event, and does not involve "possibly criminal past conduct...." Davis, 547 U.S. at 829, 126 S.Ct. at 2278, 165 L.Ed.2d at 242 (emphasis added).
. The dissent's argument, which relies on Davis alone, that the 9-1-1 caller's statements were testimonial because they occurred after the shooting is unpersuasive. The declarant in Bryant made his statements to the police 25 minutes after he was shot as well as described prior events in the past tense. Michigan v. Bryant, - U.S. -, 131 S.Ct. 1143, 1166, 179 L.Ed.2d 93, 118-19 (2011).
. The Supreme Court in Davis explained that 9-1-1 operators "may at least be agents of law enforcement when they conduct interrogations of 911 callers," and therefore "considerfed] their acts to be acts of the police" for purposes of that opinion. Davis, 547 U.S. at 823 n. 2, 126 S.Ct. at 2274 n. 2, 165 L.Ed.2d at 238 n. 2. We do the same.
. We foresee an argument that the 9-1-1 call in the present case is not associated with a call seeking police assistance, as the only information the caller relates concerns the identification of the alleged shooter—i.e., his car tag number and his physical appearance. Perhaps such identifying information is not associated with a call seeking police assistance to help the shot victim, but it is certainly information that is associated with a call seeking police assistance to help capture the fleeing suspect who remains a potential threat to responding authorities and the public at large. After Bryant, the "ongoing emergency" analysis focuses on the latter, not the former.
. Even assuming the 9-1-1 caller was not "frantic" (or "harried" as Bryant describes), as the dissent argues, the trial court determined that the statements were at least excited utterances, and therefore justifiably reliable. See Michigan v. Bryant, - U.S. -, 131 S.Ct. 1143, 1157, 179 L.Ed.2d 93, 109 (2011) ("[T]he prospect of fabrication in statements given for the primary purpose of resolving [an] emergency is presumably significantly diminished [because] the Confrontation Clause does not require such statements to be subject to the crucible of cross-examination. This logic is not unlike that justifying the excited utterance exception in hearsay law.").
. We recognize, like the Supreme Court, that "none of this suggests that an emergency is ongoing in every place or even just surrounding the victim for the entire time that the perpetrator of a violent crime is on the loose." Bryant, - U.S. at -, 131 S.Ct. at 1159, 179 L.Ed.2d at 111.