Opinion ID: 414451
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Mellor Memorandum

Text: 99 AT & T argues that the trial court erred in not admitting for its truth a memorandum taken by James Mellor, a Litton senior vice-president, that summarized Mellor's conversation with Leonard Mende, one of the Litton BTS (Business Telephone Systems) executives who had been discharged as a result of the San Mateo incident. Mellor's notes of this conversation indicate that he told the discharged executive that the San Mateo scandal had screwed up a very promising business activity. The trial court admitted the memorandum for the purpose of showing what Mellor had said to Mende, but refused to admit the memorandum for its truth--i.e., as proof that the San Mateo scandal caused Litton to leave the terminal equipment market. AT & T makes the same argument under 801(d)(2)(D) with respect to this evidence that it makes with respect to the Roberts notes, and the reservations we expressed earlier are applicable here. In any event, Mellor himself testified that the contents of the memorandum accurately summarized what he said, and the memorandum was examined by the jury and quoted in AT & T's opening and closing arguments. We therefore cannot see how AT & T was prejudiced by the trial court's decision not to admit the memorandum for its truth.