Opinion ID: 2599781
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Exclusion of Jennifer Dean's Statement

Text: Defendant contends that the trial court erroneously excluded as hearsay a videotaped statement by Jennifer Dean in which she claimed to have killed her husband. Defendant sought to introduce the videotape under the hearsay exception for statements against penal interest. (Evid. Code, § 1230.) He asserts that the error violated his Fifth, Sixth and Fourteenth Amendment rights to a fair trial. We conclude that the trial court properly excluded the statement as untrustworthy. ( People v. Cudjo (1993) 6 Cal.4th 585, 607, 25 Cal.Rptr.2d 390, 863 P.2d 635 [trustworthiness is a threshold requirement for admission of a statement under Evid.Code, § 1230].)
After her husband's murder, Jennifer Dean was questioned by police and gave three statements, two of which were videotaped. In her first statement, which was videotaped, she said she came home from work, was unable to find her husband, and knew nothing of his death. In a second statement, which was not videotaped, she suggested that defendant and Jeffrey Hunter had killed her husband on their own initiative to obtain insurance money. In a third statement, which was videotaped, she told police that she alone had killed her husband because he had hurt their daughter, Sabrina. She claimed to have stabbed him to death with a kitchen knife while she was nude, following an argument with him. After killing her husband, she said she washed the knife, took a shower, dressed and called her neighbors. Defendant called Dean to the stand, but she asserted her privilege against self-incrimination and was declared by the trial court to be unavailable. [6] Defendant then sought to introduce the third statement as a statement against penal interest. (Evid. Code, § 1230.) Ultimately, the trial court declined to admit the third statement on the grounds that it failed to meet the exception's threshold requirement of trustworthiness. The court observed that the first and third statements were virtually mutually contradictory which indicated that ... at least one of the versions was unreliable because it was contradicted by another version. The court found, further, that taken as a whole the third statement was exculpatory, whether it was setting up a possible defense of self-defense or reduction of a charge from murder to manslaughter or whatever. Alternatively, the trial court found that the statement was barred by Evidence Code section 352 because to rule to the contrary would open up this whole trial to other evidence which I think in the final analysis would confuse the jury.
Evidence Code section 1230 provides that the out-of-court declaration of an unavailable witness may be admitted for its truth if the statement, when made, was against the declarant's penal interest. The proponent of such evidence must show `that the declarant is unavailable, that the declaration was against the declarant's penal interest, and that the declaration was sufficiently reliable to warrant admission despite its hearsay character.' ( People v. Lucas (1995) 12 Cal.4th 415, 462, 48 Cal. Rptr.2d 525, 907 P.2d 373.) The focus of the declaration against interest exception to the hearsay rule is the basic trustworthiness of the declaration. [Citations.] In determining whether a statement is truly against interest within the meaning of Evidence Code section 1230, and hence is sufficiently trustworthy to be admissible, the court may take into account not just the words but the circumstances under which they were uttered, the possible motivation of the declarant, and the declarant's relationship to the defendant. ( People v. Frierson (1991) 53 Cal.3d 730, 745, 280 Cal.Rptr. 440, 808 P.2d 1197.) [E]ven when a hearsay statement runs generally against the declarant's penal interest and redaction has excised exculpatory portions, the statement may, in light of circumstances, lack sufficient indicia of trustworthiness to qualify for admission.... [¶] ... We have recognized that, in this context, assessing trustworthiness `requires the court to apply to the peculiar facts of the individual case a broad and deep acquaintance with the ways human beings actually conduct themselves in the circumstances material under the exception.' ( People v. Duarte (2000) 24 Cal.4th 603, 614, 101 Cal.Rptr.2d 701, 12 P.3d 1110.) Finally, such statements, even if admissible are nonetheless subject to Evidence Code section 352 under which the trial court is required to weigh the evidence's probative value against the dangers of prejudice, confusion, and undue time consumption. ( People v. Cudjo, supra, 6 Cal.4th at p. 609, 25 Cal.Rptr.2d 390, 863 P.2d 635.) A trial court's decision to admit or exclude evidence is a matter committed to its discretion `and will not be disturbed except on a showing the trial court exercised its discretion in an arbitrary, capricious, or patently absurd manner that resulted in a manifest miscarriage of justice.'  ( People v. Brown (2003), 31 Cal.4th 518, 534, 3 Cal.Rptr.3d 145, 73 P.3d 1137.) The trial court did not abuse its discretion in excluding the videotape of the third statement. As the court observed, the third statement was utterly inconsistent with Dean's initial statement, in which she told police she knew nothing of her husband's death, and also inconsistent with her subsequent statement blaming defendant and Hunter for her husband's murder. Thus, on their face, two of her three statements were absolutely untruthful, rendering the reliability of any of the statements questionable. The fact that Dean confessed to killing her husband in the third statement did not, by itself, establish that the third statement was any more reliable than the other two. Dean's admission was accompanied by an explanation that she killed her husband because she had just quarreled with him and that he had hurt their daughter. Dean may have believed that this explanation minimized her culpability or excused her conduct altogether. Moreover, Dean was having an affair with Hunter and her third statement, taking the blame for the murder with an excuse, may have been her attempt to protect him and, by extension, his confederate, defendant. Thus, we conclude that in examining Dean's statement in light of the circumstances under which [it] was uttered, [Dean's] possible motivation ... and [Dean's] relationship to [Hunter] ( People v. Frierson, supra, 53 Cal.3d at p. 745, 280 Cal.Rptr. 440, 808 P.2d 1197), the trial court did not abuse its discretion in excluding the statement. We also agree with the trial court's alternative justification for excluding the evidence under Evidence Code section 352. Given Dean's contradictory statements and the complexity of her possible motives for making them, had the third statement been admitted, the trial would have devolved into an inquiry into those matters. Thus, the questionable value of that evidence would have been substantially outweighed by the probability that its admission would have necessitate] undue consumption of time or confuse[d] the issues and misled the jury. (Evid.Code, § 352.) Having found no error, it is unnecessary to examine defendant's claims of constitutional error or prejudice.