Opinion ID: 2517904
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: forfeiture by wrongdoing is recognized under the utah constitution

Text: ¶ 9 The issue of whether Utah law recognizes the doctrine of forfeiture by wrongdoing has never been squarely addressed by this court, but the district court embraced it; we agree with the district court's reasoning. [1] Utah law recognizes that a defendant may forgo the right to confrontation through conduct designed to make a witness unavailable at trial so long as the state can prove the defendant acted with the intent to accomplish that end. ¶ 10 Before turning to the scope of the forfeiture-by-wrongdoing doctrine under state law, it is important to properly frame the question presented here. The constitutions of both the United States and Utah guarantee criminal defendants the right to be confronted with the witnesses against him. U.S. Const. amend. VI; see also Utah Const. art. I, § 12 (using the word by instead of with). Forfeiture by wrongdoing acts to eliminate these constitutionally guaranteed protections because of the defendant's affirmative acts. See Crawford v. Washington, 541 U.S. 36, 62, 124 S.Ct. 1354, 158 L.Ed.2d 177 (2004) ([T]he rule of forfeiture by wrongdoing ... extinguishes confrontation claims on essentially equitable grounds.). Forfeiture by wrongdoing can be viewed as a limitation on the protection guaranteed by the constitution because the right to confront one's accuser no longer applies when the defendant has acted to cause a witness to be unavailable. The Supreme Court has unambiguously recognized the doctrine under the Sixth Amendment. See Giles v. California, ___ U.S. ___, 128 S.Ct. 2678, 2682-83, 171 L.Ed.2d 488 (2008). Under the federal constitution, the protections of the confrontation clause cease to apply to a defendant who (1) causes a potential witness's unavailability (2) by a wrongful act (3) undertaken with the intention of preventing the potential witness from testifying. United States v. Houlihan, 92 F.3d 1271, 1280 (1st Cir.1996); see also Doan v. Carter, 548 F.3d 449, 458 (6th Cir.2008). ¶ 11 Mr. Poole's challenge to the district court's decision in this case, however, is based on both the U.S. and Utah Constitutions. Mr. Poole has asked us to determine if article I, section 12 of the Utah Constitution provides greater protections to criminal defendants than its federal counterpart. The Utah Constitution could provide more protection to criminal defendants by limiting the influence the forfeiture-by-wrongdoing doctrine has on the confrontation clause. See State v. DeBooy, 2000 UT 32, ¶ 12, 996 P.2d 546. Moreover, an analysis under the state constitution is in order given this court's endorsement of the primacy model. See State v. Tiedemann, 2007 UT 49, ¶ 33, 162 P.3d 1106 (explaining and endorsing the primacy model, which dictates that state laws be interpreted independently and prior to consideration of federal questions). ¶ 12 In evaluating the Utah Constitution, we have rejected a presumption that federal construction of similar language is correct. Id. ¶ 37. In theory, a claimant could rely on nothing more than plain language to make an argument for a construction of a Utah provision that would be different from the interpretation the federal courts have given similar language. Independent analysis must begin with the constitutional text and rely on whatever assistance legitimate sources may provide in the interpretative process. Id.; see also Am. Bush v. City of S. Salt Lake, 2006 UT 40, ¶ 10, 140 P.3d 1235 (stating we look first to the plain meaning of the constitution). Other legitimate sources that we may look to include evidence of the framers' intent, the common law, particular traditions of our state, and decisions by our sister states and federal counterparts. See Am. Bush, 2006 UT 40, ¶ 11, 140 P.3d 1235 (discussing sources this court has examined to interpret the Utah Constitution). ¶ 13 Utah's confrontation clause states: In criminal prosecutions the accused shall have the right ... to be confronted by the witnesses against him. Utah Const. art. I, § 12. The plain language of the clause does not preclude a finding that a criminal defendant may forgo the right to confrontation through misdeeds. Recognizing this fact, Mr. Poole attempts to persuade this court that the common law of Utah has previously rejected the forfeiture-by-wrongdoing doctrine because no Utah court has cited to the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Reynolds v. United States, 98 U.S. 145, 25 L.Ed. 244 (1878). Reynolds, decided eighteen years before Utah became a state, is universally held as the first instance in which the U.S. Supreme Court addressed the forfeiture issue. See Giles, 128 S.Ct. at 2687; Commonwealth v. Edwards, 444 Mass. 526, 830 N.E.2d 158, 165 (2005). Reynolds involved a bigamy prosecution arising from the Utah Territory in which an alleged plural wife of the defendant could not be located in anticipation of trial. 98 U.S. at 159-60. Mr. Poole argues that the facts underlying Reynolds imply that the framers of the Utah Constitution would not adopt a doctrine finding its birth in Reynolds.  Mr. Poole's argument appears to be that because Reynolds involved a prosecution on the basis of polygamy, and because Utah had a history of plural marriage, the residents of the state who ratified the constitution would never have supported any policy having its origins in Reynolds. ¶ 14 Mr. Poole's argument misses the point of Reynolds. Reynolds' forfeiture holding was not authored as an indictment on polygamy and the Utahns who practiced it. [2] This holding stands forand continues to be cited forthe policy that a criminal defendant who causes a witness's absence is in no condition to assert that his constitutional rights have been violated because the constitution does not guarantee an accused person against the legitimate consequences of his own wrongful acts. Id. at 158. It is similar to a clean hands policy, common in equitable proceedings. The issue here is not about Utah's history and the practice of polygamy. The issue at the center of this appeal, as well as in Reynolds, is whether a defendant can benefit from wrongfully causing a witness's absence at his criminal trial. Nothing suggests the framers of the Utah Constitution intended otherwise. ¶ 15 Bolstering this view, the state has supplied us with evidence from the Utah constitutional convention that shows the framers of the Utah Constitution drafted the confrontation clause to mirror the protections of the federal constitution. The framers debated this very clause and rejected language that was not identical to the federal confrontation clause. Moreover, by the time the framers of the Utah Constitution gathered, the Supreme Court had already issued Reynolds, holding that the confrontation clause could be forfeited through wrongful conduct that renders a witness unavailable. That decision put Utah's founders on notice of the federal interpretation, and the drafters of the state constitution could certainly have incorporated greater protections had they desired. They debated this issue and expressly declined to do so. In the context of the decision in Reynolds, there is simply no indication that the framers of the state constitution would have been inclined to permit criminal defendants to render witnesses against them unavailable without any negative consequence. Finally, it appears that other states, when asked to adopt the doctrine of forfeiture by wrongdoing, have universally recognized the principle. See Edwards, 830 N.E.2d at 166-67. ¶ 16 Utah's public policy is the same as that underlying the federal interpretation and that of our sister states. The Supreme Court has succinctly articulated this policy: [W]hen defendants seek to undermine the judicial process by procuring or coercing silence from witnesses and victims, the [confrontation clause] does not require courts to acquiesce. While defendants have no duty to assist the [s]tate in proving their guilt, they do have the duty to refrain from acting in ways that destroy the integrity of the criminal-trial system. Davis v. Washington, 547 U.S. 813, 833, 126 S.Ct. 2266, 165 L.Ed.2d 224 (2006) (emphasis in original). To hold otherwise would provide criminal defendants with a strong incentive to tamper with the witnesses against them. See Vasquez v. People, 173 P.3d 1099, 1104 (Colo.2007) (The forfeiture doctrine prevents defendants from profiting by their own misconduct; a defendant who eliminates a witness would otherwise be rewarded with the exclusion of that witness's out-of-court statements.). ¶ 17 Given the plain language of the Utah confrontation clause and the public policy at the time of the state's founding, Utah law, like its federal counterpart and that of a number of sister states, recognizes the doctrine of forfeiture by wrongdoing.