Opinion ID: 2060701
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Police Officer's Direct Examination

Text: During Williamson's direct examination of one of the police officers, Williamson asked: Did Mr. Nichols tell you there was a fight inside that hotel room? The State objected on the basis that Nichols' statements to the police officer were hearsay within hearsay. Williamson argued that, under D.R.E. 106, the court was required, in fairness, to admit this remaining part of Nichols' statement because the State had offered a portion of the same statement during its case-in-chief. Williamson also argued, again, that the statement went to the witness' credibility. The trial court sustained the State's objection, noting that as to Nichols, the statement was an admission and was, therefore, admissible under D.R.E. 804(3). As to Williamson, however, the trial court explained that the statement contained multiple levels of hearsay. The court concluded: You've got to find an exception. If you don't have an exception, the only way you can get it in is for your client to get on the stand and tell his version of what happened. After a careful review of the record, we hold that the trial court did not abuse its discretion in refusing to permit Williamson to question Zecca about Williamson's description of the events in the motel room. The State avoided this area during Zecca's direct examination. The trial court also properly refused to admit the hearsay testimony of Zecca and the police officer. Williamson did not argue that Zecca's hearsay statement fell within any hearsay exception under D.R.E. 803, and although Williamson argued that Nichols' statement to the police officer was an excited utterance, [40] admissible under D.R.E. 803(2), Williamson did not argue that his statement to Nichols fell within any hearsay exception under D.R.E. 803. We also find that the trial court did not abuse its discretion in implicitly rejecting Williamson's oft-repeated assertion that the hearsay statements should be admitted to test the witnesses' credibility. In Weber v. State, [41] we explained that the United States' Constitution guarantees a party's right to cross-examine for bias; the objective is to uncover any incentive a witness might have to testify falsely. In that case, we held that the trial court violated the defendant's rights by refusing to allow him to question witnesses about cash payments they had allegedly received from the victim's mother. [42] The testimony Williamson sought to introduce during Zecca's cross-examination, however, revealed nothing concerning a motive for Zecca to testify falsely. In fact, because Zecca's testimony would merely have been an iteration of what Williamson said, its admission would have put Williamson's credibility in issue, not Zecca's. The Sixth Amendment right to cross-examine for bias has no applicability to Williamson's direct examination of Zecca or the police officer, and Williamson's credibility arguments at the direct examination stage were properly rejected by the trial court. Williamson argues that because the State offered a portion of Zecca's statement to the police and a portion of Nichols' statement to the police, the trial court was required, in fairness, to admit Williamson's proffer of the remaining portions of those statements under D.R.E. 106. That rule states: When a writing or recorded statement or part thereof is introduced by a party, an adverse party may require him at that time to introduce any other part or any other writing or recorded statement which ought in fairness to be considered contemporaneously with it. Whether fairness requires the admission of the remainder of or a related written or recorded statement under D.R.E. 106 is left to the sound discretion of the trial court. [43] We find no abuse of discretion in the trial court's refusal to admit the remainder of Zecca's and Nichols' statements to the police. Under D.R.E. 403, the statements' probative value was outweighed by the potential prejudice to the State. The statements, both iterations of Williamson's self-serving description of the events in the motel room, would have put Williamson's credibility in issue. Because he chose not to testify, however, the State would have been unable to test Williamson's credibility through cross-examination. Although the trial court did not explicitly mention D.R.E. 403, the portions of the trial transcript reproduced above reveal that the trial court's focus was correct: the court prevented Williamson from admitting his self-serving statements, offered for their truth, where the State would have been unable to test Williamson's credibility. Admitting the additional portions of the statements given by Zecca and Nichols would not have tested their credibility in any meaningful way. Finally, Williamson argues that in refusing to allow his cross-examination of Zecca and in repeating several times that Williamson had the right to testify, the trial court unfairly tried to force Williamson to testify. We find no merit in Williamson's argument. The trial court merely stated a fact under the law: that the statements sought to be admitted were beyond the scope of the State's direct examination of Zecca or were hearsay that could not be admitted unless they fell within an exception to D.R.E. 802. If Williamson were to testify, however, his hearsay statement to Zecca would have been admissible under 11 Del.C. § 3507 and may have been admissible as non-hearsay under D.R.E. 801(d)(1)(B) if offered to rebut a charge of recent fabrication.